Really Random Lag Issue

[Izzy]

Every once in a while while I'm playing games, the game will start to lag. It will be a little jerky, but the FPS counter will not go down. (FFXI stays at 30, WoW will stay at 200, etc.)

However, if I open my task manager, the lag magically disappears. The only way to make the lag disappear is to open the task manager, which sucks balls, because I can't see if anything is sucking up extra CPU.

I downloaded procmon and I can't see anything out of the ordinary. Has anyone else experienced this?

[xopher]

Sounds like DirectX or your video drivers are having a problem. Try reinstalling both.

Also are you using SLI or crossfire? Could be microstutter.

Also, lag is typically a term used for network latency. That's what I came into this post expecting :\

[Izzy]

Sounds like DirectX or your video drivers are having a problem. Try reinstalling both.

Also are you using SLI or crossfire? Could be microstutter.

Also, lag is typically a term used for network latency. That's what I came into this post expecting :\

Yeah, I shoulda used a different word

I don't use Crossfire, and I've also formatted/tried different drivers/etc. and nothing seems to fix it.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume it's something to do with my motherboard and the GPU that I got.

[xopher]

Is it any specific games?

[Izzy]

Does it in WoW/FFXI/FFXIV. I don't really play much else to see if it does it.

[xopher]

If it's stopping for a few seconds, typically when you're in town or around a lot of people it's not your card. It's your hard drive halting your game so you can load the piece of gear each player is wearing.

This will only be fixed with an SSD.

[The Stig]

Do you play the 3 games in Windowed mode? Or full screen? I was wondering if you experience this issue with the task manager up but minimized.

Random note:

From your description, since you said "every once in a while", I think your machine is somehow marked as idle, and when that happens, something, somewhere, on your machine, is underclocking/switching off/idling (to save power or throttle down). So the moment you open task manager you basically wake the machine up again.

I remember when I played FFXI and my screen would switch off (power saving) when I'm just playing with my controller (for periods of quietness when I don't type/use my keyboard). You did mention you play WoW as well and that is full-on using a keyboard so it in theory shouldn't happen there.

I'm probably wrong but that best matches what I've encountered before.

[xopher]

After I hear back if it affects you more in town than other places, I'll give you some other theories.

[Izzy]

1) It doesn't lock up for a few seconds or anything, it's more of a noticeable framerate drop, but any framerate counter on all games still shows the max framerate.
2) It happens everywhere. The middle of Orgrimmar to the most barren area of Desolace. The middle of Port Jeuno to an empty Sarutabaruta zone.
3) I'm playing windowed in every instance. Simply having the task manger open doesn't fix it, the task manager must be closed, then I have to CTRL+Shift+ESC and open it and the stuttering stops.
4) All 3 of these games are installed on SSDs. They were originally installed on HDDs and had the same issue. After I formatted I installed all the games on an SSD and the problem persisted.

I was able to lockdown an interesting thing with procmon running. CCC.exe opens a thread around the time that this happens. When I open the task manager, CCC.exe closes the thread. It's gotta be something with ATI's software.

[xopher]

I bet there's a setting in the CCC that's throttling your card. Researching...

[Izzy]

I bet there's a setting in the CCC that's throttling your card. Researching...

Good idea. I'll run MSI afterburner and track the clock speeds when it happens.

[Izzy]

Whelp, MSI is lying to me about my GPU usage.

[Izzy]

Ok, it just happened, and neither the core clock or the memory clock dropped in frequency. The fan speed dipped for some reason though lol.

[xopher]

I would uninstall CCC entirely.

[Izzy]

I would uninstall CCC entirely.

Just did. I'll post if it happens again.

[oblit]

Try running Driver Sweeper ver 3.2 after you uninstalled CCC.

[xopher]

Try running Driver Sweeper ver 3.2 after you uninstalled CCC.

Why? He's keeping his drivers, just uninstalling the CCC management system.

[Izzy]

Since I've removed CCC, it hasn't happened yet which is a pretty good sign.

[xopher]

I'm guessing this issue is resolved?

[Izzy]

I'm guessing this issue is resolved?

No issues as of yet. It happens so randomly I'm not actually sure if it's fixed yet, but it's looking good so far!