Stuttering video

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Mike Kohary - 22 Jan 2004 01:44 GMT

Ok, I've looked everywhere for help on this, Googled up groups for old
postings, and even worked with Rockstar tech support, to no avail. Maybe
someone here can help? I'm playing GTA3 Vice City on the following setup:

Alienware Area-51, Full Tower
420-Watt power supply
Intel 875P Pentium 4 motherboard
Intel P4 3.0GHz, 800MHz FSB, 512KB cache
1GB DDR SDRAM PC-3200
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB 8x AGP
Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 Platinum 6.1
2 200GB Western Digital Caviar SE ATA-100 8MB cache hard drives
Plextor PlexWriter 48/24/48A CD-RW
Sony DRU-500 DVD-RW

Needless to say, it's a kick-a.s machine that plays pretty much everything
smoothly. Everything, that is, except for GTA3 Vice City. My problem is
that the video constantly stutters. More precisely, the frame rate runs
smoothly when it's not stuttering, but every couple of seconds, the video
will pause for a brief moment, and then resume, resulting in little stutters
that end up being supremely annoying.

I've tried every option in the game, even dialing every option down and
setting it at 640x480 (ugh), and it doesn't help. My video card drivers are
up to date as of about 2 months ago (I'll try updating now, since ATI
releases new drivers every month or so, but I'm not hopeful it will help).
I plan to fool with options like anti-aliasing, but that just doesn't seem
likely to be the problem.

I do notice that the stutters correspond with hard disk activity, a
phenomenon unique to this game on this computer (hard disk activity doesn't
affect any other game or application in this manner), so I tend to think
there's some kind of problem there. The disk is defragged, and as I said
only affects GTA, so it's got to be something particular between those two
(but this is only the start of a theory).

Any ideas? I've been working with computers for over 20 years, and pride
myself on troubleshooting to resolution even if it makes my brain bleed (in
fact, I have a lot of fun doing it). But this one has me absolutely
stumped. I'd appreciate any input. The game is perfectly playable, even
though the stuttering adds a bit of challenge, but I'd do almost anything to
get rid of it for good.

Thanks,

Mike

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chris - 22 Jan 2004 15:53 GMT

> Any ideas?
> Thanks,
>
> Mike

Mike,

GTA is a resource hog. Whatever you throw its way it uses. Stutters
along with HD activity could mean the game needs more data faster than
memory could deliver. I would try the following (in that order):

- turn on the frame limiter (in the game)
- check if the problem persists (this should basically do it even though
the game looks a lot sexier without it)
- decrease screen resolution (game)
- check if the problem persists
- decrease color depth (game *and* graphics card options, they should be
the same, e.g. 16bit)
- check if the problem persists
- turn off antialiasing (in your graphics card's options)
- check if the problem persists
- turn off anisotropic filtering (if applicable)
- check if the problem persists
- try an older driver for your graphics card
- check if the problem persists
- try another graphics card
- check... well you get the idea

HTH. HAND.

Chris

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Mike Kohary - 26 Jan 2004 04:30 GMT

Thanks all, after playing some more over the weekend (and watching closely
when it stutters) and reading some of your comments, I'm going to settle on
disk thrash as the likely culprit, probably having to do with virtual
memory/swap space. I'll try some different things and see what I can get it
to do.

I've ruled out performance-based problems, because I literally dialed down
every single option in the game and on my graphics card, only to experience
the same stutter (and an ugly-looking game).

Thanks for the tips - hopefully I can figure this thing out and play the
game proper! :)

Mike

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Oro - 22 Jan 2004 22:19 GMT

Hard disk or CDROM access is usually the problem when games stutter. Your
system is more than fast enough. Increase swap space or disable swap files.
If you still get the problem, try uninstalling and reinstalling the game.
When it's installed, parts of the game might be placed in different areas
on your hard disk, and you've got a huge hard disk so access might be
slower than someone with a smaller hard disk. I don't know the RPM on your
hard disk, but I doubt if it's 10,000. Defragmentation helps if you've got
the time.

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Roadie Roger - 23 Jan 2004 02:05 GMT

> Needless to say, it's a kick-a.s machine that plays pretty much everything
> smoothly. Everything, that is, except for GTA3 Vice City. My problem is
> that the video constantly stutters. More precisely, the frame rate runs
> smoothly when it's not stuttering, but every couple of seconds, the video
> will pause for a brief moment, and then resume, resulting in little stutters
> that end up being supremely annoying.

I have an older machine (800 Mhz) and it stuttered in two ways. With
the original 128 Mbytes you could see the disk flail and the video
stutter often. When I went to 384 Mbytes, the stutter went away. It
was remarkably stable. I could play for 2 - 3 hours and the
performance wouldn't change. I bought an ATI Radeon 9200 chipset
based video card and the game played much faster. I was doing Pizza
Boy and Ambulance in half the time :) The memory does seem to have
leaks (contiguous and/or available memory grows shorter over time).
It occassionaly stutters. The longer I play the more this happens. I
always reboot every couple hours.

My guess is: Video Card or Virtual Memory is thrashing to the disk.
You may be able to check out the virutal memory theory by booting in
safe mode. This should maximize your memory. Does the stutter
change? If no, then the virtual memory theory is shot and I'd guess
video card. If this temporarily fixes the problem, but it gets worse
over time, I'd look at something to do with virtual memory setup.

Good Luck,
Roadie Roger

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