Game Micro Stuttering! Could use some expert help.

[Nightfallen]

Alright so I built my PC at the end of 2012 with half decent specs: 8gb of corsair vengeance, i5 3570k, 64gb c300 SSD and a 660Ti graphics card. I have upgraded since then obviously to a 780 OC 10gbs of ram and I threw in another hard drive BUT two games give me issues no matter what. I've re-formatted multiple times and tried the games on different HDDs with no luck.

The two games are Battlefield 4 and DayZ mod not the Standalone. I've tried maaaany fixes and driver rollbacks updates bios blah blah blah and I still get the same crap. For example on DayZ I'll have over 70 fps and this micro stutter thing happens for like half a second or so and my FPS drops to like 14 and then shoots right back up... I have no idea what the issue is and am at a loss. Help?

 

[Vynavill]

I'm taking a stab in the dark here, but it might be they're not compatible with hybrid memory configurations. You had 8 GB and upgraded to 10; I'm assuming that's a 4-4-2 GB setup.

Are all the sticks of the same frequency and CAS latency? Have you already tried taking out the extra module?

 

[Nightfallen]

I'm taking a stab in the dark here, but it might be they're not compatible with hybrid memory configurations. You had 8 GB and upgraded to 10; I'm assuming that's a 4-4-2 GB setup.

Are all the sticks of the same frequency and CAS latency? Have you already tried taking out the extra module?

I can give it a shot, when it was just the 8gbs which is a pair 4/4 it still did this crap.. I think it could possibly be my processor, mobo or RAM.. UGGH

 

[GmanBOSS]

I would check all processes that run at start up then single out those that jump in later while you try to play. Check your cpu and memory usage while playing and when it lags. Did you update your bios on the mobo when you got a new card?

 

[Vynavill]

IMO, Most probably it's the RAM or the GPU, actually. I doubt it's your CPU, but let's not rule out anything yet and take things step by step. Even what GmanBOSS says could be very well right, so before continuing with what I said, I suggest answering him 😛

If it happened the same when you had 8GB there should be no reason taking out the 2GB module.
When it happened without the extra module, did you have those 8GB set for dual channel operation? You should have noticed RAM slots come in differently colored pairs (if they don't, they usually have a printout of some kind close to them pairing them up).

If the answer is no, you should set them up correctly and try an afflicted game afterwards, reporting the results.

Whether the answer is yes or no, run a round of Memtest86+. The best would be to run at least 7~8 passes per each module individually used in each slot. The testing software can only report I/O errors, but they can be caused by either a faulty module, a dirty/faulty RAM slot, or a faulty MoBo; at worst, you're going to have to run the test for [number of RAM modules]*[number of MoBo RAM slots] times, unless you can logically come to the solution. (e.g. you have 8 slots and tested all of them with a single module; all completed without errors, so you move on to the next module; on the first slot the test reports write errors, so you now know that that module is faulty.)
Therefore, you should do this only when you actually have some time at hand, as for every run you need to power-off completely, dismount the module, mount another module on another slot, power-on and re-run the test.

By doing the above, we can pretty much rule out RAM and MoBo (memory aspect).

 

[GmanBOSS]

Just to add to what Vynavill is saying, a great site to see where slot 1 and 2 is on the mobo would be newegg.com. Just find your make/model and search it there to pull up the specs. If it is an older/ " dirty " system I would take out the memory and clean the contacts with an alcohol swap and reseat.

 

[cats_Paw]

It might be HDD related:

Windows has a nasty feature that turns off your HDDs when they are not in use for a certain amount of time. This DOES cause micro stuttering in games that load up a huge amount of information to the RAM, and then dont have to do anything untill a certain point.I dont know about DayZ and battlefield 4 (dont have the games so I cannot confirm that this is the issue), but i know in games like stalker it was rather common problem unless you kept the HDDs running constantly.

That micro sttutering is the time it takes for the HDDs/SSDs to spin up and find the information required.
Its not the ONLY reason possible, but it is the most common since Windows hast this feature ON by default.
It is in Control Panel,power saving settings, Advanced settings, hard drive. there set the time to 0 for never turn off.

If that is not the case let me know and we will move on to less probable reasons.

 

[cats_Paw]

Ram issues cause BSODs, not micro stuttering as far as I know. There are exceptions but even then BSODs are quite common when the ram module tries to purge the information.

 

[Nightfallen]

IMO, Most probably it's the RAM or the GPU, actually. I doubt it's your CPU, but let's not rule out anything yet and take things step by step. Even what GmanBOSS says could be very well right, so before continuing with what I said, I suggest answering him 😛

If it happened the same when you had 8GB there should be no reason taking out the 2GB module.
When it happened without the extra module, did you have those 8GB set for dual channel operation? You should have noticed RAM slots come in differently colored pairs (if they don't, they usually have a printout of some kind close to them pairing them up).

If the answer is no, you should set them up correctly and try an afflicted game afterwards, reporting the results.

Whether the answer is yes or no, run a round of Memtest86+. The best would be to run at least 7~8 passes per each module individually used in each slot. The testing software can only report I/O errors, but they can be caused by either a faulty module, a dirty/faulty RAM slot, or a faulty MoBo; at worst, you're going to have to run the test for [number of RAM modules]*[number of MoBo RAM slots] times, unless you can logically come to the solution. (e.g. you have 8 slots and tested all of them with a single module; all completed without errors, so you move on to the next module; on the first slot the test reports write errors, so you now know that that module is faulty.)
Therefore, you should do this only when you actually have some time at hand, as for every run you need to power-off completely, dismount the module, mount another module on another slot, power-on and re-run the test.

By doing the above, we can pretty much rule out RAM and MoBo (memory aspect).

I tried MEMTEST before and ran into 0 issues and even ran intel burn test and passed for my processor, and they're set up in dual channel correctly.. so I have NOOO idea what to do.

 

[Vynavill]

Cats_paw gave you quite a good reason too, and if no issues were found during those tests, you can rule out CPU, RAM and MoBo.

I recall my old laptop doing the same on some games. It would stop at random times for a couple seconds, and I would hear the disk spinning up before things got back to normal.