Fortnite freezing randomly

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

Hey!
For a while my PC is getting frozen while playing Fortnite, it happens on all games, but on Fortnite it's really Harsh.
I experience random freezes, which my computer is still running and the game is still going on, but my visuals are frozen.
At first I thought that my HDD is slow so I switched to a SSD, it didn't help.
I tried rebooting my game drive and Windows, the clean boot didn't help.
CPU, GPU and RAM usage and temp. seems normal, any ideas?

My rig:
GTX 1060 6GB
i5 4670k @ 3.40 Ghz
8GB Ram

smashjohn · May 7, 2018

In windows, run the Event Viewer. Look at the Windows Logs. Specifically look at the System and Application Logs for red Errors.

It sounds like either your video card/driver is failing or the Fornite game is failing. The event log should tell you which. Since your screen doesn't go black, I'm leaning towards a Fortnite failure. Let us know what you see.

General repair steps would include doing a clean install of your nVidia drivers followed by a clean install of Fornite.

WiiUMasterGman · May 7, 2018

Do you have virus? I don't see anything wrong other then MAYBE you have a virus

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

smashjohn :

I'm not sure that I read the Event Viewer correctly, but I haven't found any red errors or errors that have something to do with my GPU \ Fortnite.

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

WiiUMasterGman :

No, I watch over my computer and make sure to not allow any malware in, even so, I booted my computer today.

smashjohn · May 7, 2018

Do you see any Event Log errors corresponding to the time of the crash?

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

smashjohn :

I can't really tell, the crashes are just 2-6 second freezes that happen randomly.
I can see that I have AppModel-Runtime (69) Errors that happen often, maybe related?

smashjohn · May 7, 2018

That might be more of a stutter than a crash. Do you mean the screen freezes, unfreezes, freezes, unfreezes?

You could be experiencing network lag. In your Fornite HUD settings, you should be able to enable an option to monitor your ping/latency. I don't have the game in front of me so I don't know what the menu looks like. This could point to a wifi, router, bandwidth or Internet issue.

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

smashjohn :

Not a network issue I'm afraid, my ping is at around 60ms, never causing freezes.
The freezes that I suffer from is basically my screen being stuck on a single frame for a few seconds, then continues to run normally. It happens randomly, even when I'm in the menu.

smashjohn · May 7, 2018

I recently had a similar issue when I alt-tab'd between windows. It started taking 3-8 seconds to complete (normally it's pretty instintaneous). I restored an old backup and 'fixed' it. I'm assuming something got into my PC or a Win10 Update jacked something up. Similar to you, I couldn't detect any processor, memory, GPU, network or HDD utilization issues and have no idea what it was doing for those 3-8 seconds. No event logs, no other symptoms. I also run a pretty clean system, including a paid AV software. But this behavior made me think my computer was compromised somehow.

If you don't have a backup, you might try "restore your computer to an earlier point in time" and select a date from before the issue began.

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

smashjohn :

Don't have any backup to restore to, unfortunately, I don't have the option to go back to an older version without a backup.

smashjohn · May 7, 2018

In Windows 10, goto Recovery. Then click Open System Restore. You should have at least one Automatic Restore Point created by windows updates. Some version of this function exists in Win 8 and Win 7, but under slightly different menu locations.

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

smashjohn :

It says that I cannot restore because system protection is off, but it doesn't let me turn it on..

smashjohn · May 7, 2018

If you've fully reinstalled Fornite and graphics drivers, I'd look at doing at clean install of windows. I haven't tried the Windows 10 reset before, but this might be an option.

I use Macrium Reflect to keep a good backup image of my system. I only pull the image every few months or after significant changes, but it saves me from having to reinstall everything and reconfigure all my custom settings. I wish I could be of more help, but if reinstall of apps/drivers doesn't work, system logs are clean, and performance logging doesn't show any issues on GPU, CPU, HDD, or NIC... I have no idea where to point you. I'd want to know if the problem still exists after reinstall and you can blame hardware, or if it disappears and you can blame some random errant software issue.

I suppose it's also worth looking for potential heat issues. This could cause your CPU to thermally throttle and cause a stutter. Another area to check would be the SMART health of your SSD. It's possible you're having read/write issues. When you get down to the nitty gritty you can also run memtest86 to clear your RAM of any health concerns. In general, the system requirements for Fortnite are so low, It would surprise me if any of these things were problems given your statement that the issue is worse in Fortnite than in other games.

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

smashjohn :

If you've fully reinstalled Fornite and graphics drivers, I'd look at doing at clean install of windows. I haven't tried the Windows 10 reset before, but this might be an option.

I use Macrium Reflect to keep a good backup image of my system. I only pull the image every few months or after significant changes, but it saves me from having to reinstall everything and reconfigure all my custom settings. I wish I could be of more help, but if reinstall of apps/drivers doesn't work, system logs are clean, and performance logging doesn't show any issues on GPU, CPU, HDD, or NIC... I have no idea where to point you. I'd want to know if the problem still exists after reinstall and you can blame hardware, or if it disappears and you can blame some random errant software issue.

I suppose it's also worth looking for potential heat issues. This could cause your CPU to thermally throttle and cause a stutter. Another area to check would be the SMART health of your SSD. It's possible you're having read/write issues. When you get down to the nitty gritty you can also run memtest86 to clear your RAM of any health concerns. In general, the system requirements for Fortnite are so low, It would surprise me if any of these things were problems given your statement that the issue is worse in Fortnite than in other games.

I just reinstalled Windows 10 today, and my SSD is brand new and working fine.. I really don't know where the problem could be, the only thing that I can think of is maybe it's a general Windows 10 bug, I might downgrade to Windows 7 or 8.1 in order to see if it helps.

TerryLaze · May 7, 2018

First thing try this.
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1075781-tweak-enable-hpet-in-bios-and-os-for-better-performance-and-fps/
If this doesn't help then play a game in windowed mode and have task manager open in the background,go to processes and sort by CPU usage,fortnite is really very sensitive to anything else running along it especially if it's running at a highish priority so if you see something running while fortnite freezes then that's it.

AdamSze · May 7, 2018

TerryLaze :

The issue isn't the performance, my game runs on the highest settings at over 60 fps, and the freezes occur even if nothing is running in the background.

mena.samir98 · Sep 29, 2018

Same problem here.
Got a 1060 6gb with an i5-8400 8gb ddr4

markus.louw · Feb 8, 2019

I installed dimmer.exe because my screen was too bright, about 4 weeks ago. About 2 weeks ago I started getting the above, where Fortnite would freeze for about a second then come back. I stopped running dimmer.exe and now the freeze only lasts about 100 ms. I ran dimmer again and it came back to 1s.

UPDATE: The freezes came back. My CPU was getting too hot. I took a large fan and made it blow onto the motherboard, everything is now silky smooth.

Fortnite freezing randomly

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