Strange 1/2 second freeze/stutter while gaming

[Guest]

I seem to have a weird hiccup issue in a few of the games I play and have no clue what could be causing this problem. When Playing WoW I sometimes experience a slight half second hiccup or stutter when my character is idle, or when I click on other players. The same thing seems to be happening in starcraft offline mode so I don't think it's an internet issue, but maybe it could be. I was not having this issue with my old PC. All I did with this new PC was upgrade the video card and power supply. Every driver and all software is up to date.

Here are some short videos showing what my problem looks like:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkHCwWr9n9E&context=C3058c00ADOEgsToPDskIA-aPN7NXNJsX_KXfeyjGo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0Y8Fuwkw1w&context=C3cc9bccADOEgsToPDskIIAaYItXvD-zRWuOcj44Op
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXOqZY1F2LY&context=C3cfc0e5ADOEgsToPDskKTR9s9n_iN-68DdvIDFn-V

Things in WoW that trigger this half second hiccup/freeze:
looting
targeting player
targeting NPC
start/end of and event
start/end of a fight with players or npc
when idle

info:

Time of this report: 1/28/2012, 00:03:43
Machine name: ECN-PC
Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1 (7601.win7sp1_gdr.110622-1506)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: Acer
System Model: Aspire M3970
BIOS: BIOS Date: 10/31/11 10:13:44 Ver: 04.06.04
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-2320 CPU @ 3.00GHz (4 CPUs), ~3.0GHz
Memory: 10240MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 10220MB RAM
Page File: 1542MB used, 24005MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
User DPI Setting: Using System DPI
System DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
DWM DPI Scaling: Disabled
DxDiag Version: 6.01.7601.17514 64bit Unicode



---------------
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: AMD Radeon HD 6900 Series
Manufacturer: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
Chip type: ATI display adapter (0x6719)
DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)
Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_6719&SUBSYS_24601462&REV_00
Display Memory: 2786 MB
Dedicated Memory: 2028 MB
Shared Memory: 758 MB
Current Mode: 1680 x 1050 (32 bit) (60Hz)
Monitor Name: ACER X223W (Analog)
Monitor Model: Acer X223W
Monitor Id: ACR0050
Native Mode: 1680 x 1050(p) (59.883Hz)
Output Type: DVI

 

[HEXiT]

again way to much page file... turn it down to 1.5 your actual available ram...
your info shows you only have 1 gig of ram? if thats tru then thats your issue. the game is running off vram ie your hdd. get another 1 gig minimum... make sure its the same type/ speed and cas latency...

better still get a 2x2gig stick pack and boost your performance properly.

 

[Guest]

I have 10gb of Ram, where does it say 1gb?

 

[HEXiT]

Memory: 10240MB RAM... sorry m8 i miss read it... didnt see the last 0
often happens with me and my dyslexia...


still your page file is to big even for 10 gigs it should be a maximum of 15.
have you tried turning off eist so your cpu is running 100% speed all the time? if so have you tried bumping it a couple of hundred mhz..
try turning off turbo boost if you have it, if the problem gets worse then you know its cpu speed related.

 

[Guest]

No problem at all man.

I had my paging file set to the recommended amount which was 15 ish but I changed it to system managed a little while ago. Also I tried one of my games just now without EIST and turboboost and still encountered the same problem.

I have no idea how to bump up the mhz, that's not something I want to mess with. Anything else you can think of? I appreciate your help so far and thanks for your time.

 

[Mecanicien]

It might be a stupid suggestion but do you have changing backgrounds on your desktop? Try to disable that and set a fixed background.

 

[Guest]

It might be a stupid suggestion but do you have changing backgrounds on your desktop? Try to disable that and set a fixed background.

Do you mean like a slide show type deal for my desktop background in the personalize section? If so, then no. there's just one background pick.

 

[HEXiT]

all i can think of is measure system performance. open taskmanager and set it to the performance tab. blay the game for a few mins and then quickly alt tab out and look at the performance graphs... if your cpu is maxing out at 100 percent then thats likely to be the problem.. if its getting to 50 or so percent then suddenly dropping to 0 then back to 50 in a saw tooth fashion then you have another program running thats causing the issues.
also you have run realtemp or similar and gpu-z to check the temps?

 

[shashmahal]

Backup Cache,WTF,Interface folders and delete them, then ingame reset to default settings and see what happens, this usually helps.

 

[Guest]

Backup Cache,WTF,Interface folders and delete them, then ingame reset to default settings and see what happens, this usually helps.

I tried that many times already, deleting those files does nothing for me unfortunatly, thanks for the input though.

 

[Guest]

all i can think of is measure system performance. open taskmanager and set it to the performance tab. blay the game for a few mins and then quickly alt tab out and look at the performance graphs... if your cpu is maxing out at 100 percent then thats likely to be the problem.. if its getting to 50 or so percent then suddenly dropping to 0 then back to 50 in a saw tooth fashion then you have another program running thats causing the issues.
also you have run realtemp or similar and gpu-z to check the temps?

I finished playing a few minutes of WoW (AlteraC Valley) and here are some numbers:

I'm pretty sure no ther programs are running at the same time unless it's some service or process that causing the problem.

 

[shashmahal]

Everything seems fine to me. Anyway WoW is problematic game. I have unsolved issue as well -> http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/116984-25-world-warcraft-strange-problem . I remember having problem like yours but i have no idea how i got rid of it. I del my cache every time because im using NPC scan, and thats all. Try defragmenting your drive where WoW is installed (do not defragment if its SSD). Try full pc scan/clean even. Re-download the client. It can be connection issue as well.

 

[Guest]

Everything seems fine to me. Anyway WoW is problematic game. I have unsolved issue as well -> http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/116984-25-world-warcraft-strange-problem . I remember having problem like yours but i have no idea how i got rid of it. I del my cache every time because im using NPC scan, and thats all. Try defragmenting your drive where WoW is installed (do not defragment if its SSD). Try full pc scan/clean even. Re-download the client. It can be connection issue as well.

Yes, same here, I had a similar issue in WoW years ago... I don't remember how it was fixed but it did go away eventually. Believe it or not I'm also experiencing a screen flicker much like the screen flicker in your video... although it does not happen often.

I have reinstalled the game a few times, with no luck. I had WoW on the same drive with my OS and still had problems, WoW is now on a seperate drive and still I encounter this problem. I use MSE and malwarebytes, they didnt find anything bad. I also defragmented with no positive results =(.

 

[Guest]

Could this hiccup I experience be a symptom of a bottleneck somewhere in my system? I don't see how though because all I did was upgrade from a 6570 to a 6950 and replace the psu.

Would my video card work at all if it wasnt flush in the PCIe slot?

 

[HEXiT]

im thinking its a driver issue, it may be a slight bottleneck but when you turned the cpu down it would have gotten worse. you said it was no different so im less inclined to think bottleneck...

 

[Guest]

I also seem to be having some kind of mouse issue that is showing up when browsing the web or my pc and in WoW, as you can see in this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cE2UutDYUuA

My pc isnt registering approx. 75% of my mouse clicks, when trying to click on another tab or pretty much anything that needs to be clicked on. It sometimes take 1-4 clicks before my mouse click registers. In WoW, When I hold down the left click button on the game field my cursor does not remain stationary like it should instead my cursor jitters around and moves when it shouldnt. Also I am able to select players/npc's and click on various objects while the left click button is held down which shouldnt be possible.

Think maybe this has something to do with my hiccup problem? a mouse/keyboard input issue or something?

 

[HEXiT]

sounds like you have an issue thats systemic, or is becoming so.. its not unheard of for worms to infect mmo servers and could explain the stutter... as you move the system sends info to the server causing lag while doing so.

have you run any malware scans recently with decent antimalware. when i say decent i mean malwarebytes, spybot and a good av like avira/kaspersky/nod32 or bitdefender....
personally i wont touch ms essentials although others swear by it, i didnt find it much use. avg avast and norton are also avs with poor catch-rates so if you have any of them 4 last 1s you will probably find something if you use the first 1s i mentioned.

do a full scan and see if the problem goes away also make sure your registry is clean...

but honestly m8 this has turned into guess work for me... you may have more luck on a wow forum.

 

[Guest]

I have finally narrowed it down to a sound issue, While playing minecraft I will notice from time to time my game stutter when ever I hear the siren type noise that plays once in a while during game play. Yet I still dont know how I could fix this because I am using the sound drivers that came with my PC.

Anyways thanks for the help guys and any further help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[HEXiT]

you can always dissable the sound via system/audio or sytem/device manger/ audio open up the drop down and click dissable. if it clears up the issue then uninstall the driver and let windows install new 1s on reboot... it the issue comes back then you have found the problem and its time to either report it back to the motherboard manufacturer so thy can issue new drivers or realtech or what ever company produces the audio chipset.

 

[Skaugify]

I have finally narrowed it down to a sound issue, While playing minecraft I will notice from time to time my game stutter when ever I hear the siren type noise that plays once in a while during game play. Yet I still dont know how I could fix this because I am using the sound drivers that came with my PC.

Hi! I have the same problem in League of Legends. And it definately as something to do with the sound. Sometimes, the sound in-game will kinda loop by 0.5 seconds, for 2 seconds. The same duration as the freezes.

 

[malevolenced]

Hello, I am experiencing exactly the same issue as aggai11 and Skaugify, IN every game I get this 2 seconds freezes with the sound-ingame looping.

My PC doesn't crash, never got a BSOD or anything like it.

My PC weeks ago was perfect for a few years, until I replaced my 480 GTX with a 690 GTX, then the issue started. Is not temperature issue, because the 690 GTX is way cooler than the 480 GTX.

My CPU is an i5 i5 3570k OC to 4.1 GHz (temps are fine here) and I got 16 GB of RAM (DDR3).

Now I, of course started suspecting about the new 690 GTX I just installed few weeks ago, but I tested the card with FurMark for 3 hours and no issues there, Prime95 stress test all passed for my CPU (more than 12 hours test), I then started to think it was a video driver issue, so I installed a new driver (not beta) from nvidia, did a clean install, but still, no luck.

Unless, the issue is with the new HDMI sound from the 690 GTX ? I only use the HDMI sound when I use my TV , normally I watch movies, but watching movies is fine, never got an issue there, even with the new 690 GTX. Also I would like to config the "page file", but how much do I need to setup for 16 GB of RAM ?

Please if someone can help, I am getting mad about this.

 

[Skaugify]

Hi guys! I made a post at Overclock.net. I noticed I had alot of RAM in standby mode, but now I'm pretty sure it's my harddrive :S. Check this out!
http://www.overclock.net/t/1427451/between-1-5-gb-of-ram-in-standby-mode-causing-lag-in-game#post_20830806

 

[alfa_c95]

Had the same issue. I updated my directX version and got the latest drivers. Issue fixed! To update the right drivers without causing any possible damage, enable the windows update (if turned off) and let it take care of your troubles! Yeah, forgot to
tell:- Don't turn on windows update if your copy of windows is not licensed, or else, it's gonna trigger a nightmare...

 

[gamerk316]

again way to much page file... turn it down to 1.5 your actual available ram...

Leave it system managed; there's NO REASON WHATSOEVER to manage the Page File manually anymore unless you are starved for HDD space. [I actually have mine set manually to 64GB, because I actually have a task that I run that requires that much space and Windows won't allocate the much on its own. That's an extreme edge-case though]

Anyway, probably a driver side issue, though temps might be playing a part.

 

[tonytran]

Pretty sure it's to do with the sound
Either update it or Nvidia audio is interfering with you Realtek audio.
Or get a decent sound card with installed driver which should work.
IF you disable all your sound from windows and your games works fine then yeah it's your sound problem.