Constant stuttering and FPS drops

Arunei · October 2015

I recently got an Alienware from where I work, and all in all it runs well. Whereas my old computer was pulling 10-15 FPS, this one hits anywhere between 60-90. Unfortunately, it doesn't stay that way for some reason.

Basically I keep getting massive FPS drops every few seconds. Sometimes my PR goes up, sometimes it doesn't. I'll drop down to single digits a lot of the time. It only lasts for a second or so, but it also keeps happening several times a minute, so you can imagine how frustrating it gets. The only place I don't have any issues is in IC, more specifically in the Sewers. I've tried turning most of my settings down or off, and I also tried to update the drivers for my GPU. However that caused a SERIOUS drop in FPS, down to 5-6, and was constant, so I ended up rolling back to the previous driver.

The only settings I have set to High are Textures and SubSampling. Everything else is Medium/Low or Off (aside from Grass).

Specs:
Alienware X51 R2 w/ i3 @ 3.30 and dual-cores
8GB RAM
Nvidia 645GTX GPU
500GB HDD

I've seen a lot of posts/threads about the lag and such in-game, but I've never noticed it on this level until upgrading computers. Then again, my FPS was already crud, so that's probably why I didn't notice. Are there any other options I can try to make the FPS quit hemorrhaging all over the place?

Sav72 · October 2015

I am running 3sli gtx 580 before IC, 70 plus fps, now its like 17 to 30 when 10v10 fights, and 45fps idle. I do not hit 70fps since IC

Arunei · October 2015

Sav72 wrote: »

I am running 3sli gtx 580 before IC, 70 plus fps, now its like 17 to 30 when 10v10 fights, and 45fps idle. I do not hit 70fps since IC

For my FPS all I have to do is just be running around doing nothing and they plummet every few seconds. But when I'm in IC, I can be in a giant battle with several mobs and other players and not have a single drop in performance. I'm not sure if the open world is just harder for my rig to render, but you'd think even in a smaller map like the Sewers that I'd lose FPS when there are battles going on.

Funny thing, the Chests in IC used to lag hardcore on my other computer, and I couldn't even open Simple ones. On this one though, everything is butter-smooth and I have no issues with the Chests. I would assume those would cause some issues, what with the crazy particle effect going on, but they don't.

Elder_III · October 2015

Are you sure you installed the new video card drivers correctly? if you feel technically proficient enough to try it, I would download DDU, do a complete uninstallation of the old drivers, run DDU and then do a clean install of the latest drivers (not beta ones) from Nvidia.com - Also open up your User Settings and change the following (straight from ZoS themselves):

There are also a few settings in the Usersettings.txt file that you can change to improve your performance. Please close ESO first, then make these changes. This file is located at Documents\Elder Scrolls Online\Live.

As with any document change, we advise creating a back up of the original file in an alternate location. This will allow you to restore your usersettings to their old values in case the new ones are less optimal.

Simply open the file with Notepad and make the following changes:

Change:
SET GPUSmoothingFrames "10"
To:
SET GPUSmoothingFrames "3"

Change:
SET PreferExclusiveFullscreen "0"
To:
SET PreferExclusiveFullscreen "1"

Find this section and Change:

SET RequestedNumJobThreads "-1"
SET RequestedNumWorkerThreads "-1"
To:
SET RequestedNumJobThreads "0"
SET RequestedNumWorkerThreads "0"

Arunei · October 2015

Elder_III wrote: »

Are you sure you installed the new video card drivers correctly? if you feel technically proficient enough to try it, I would download DDU, do a complete uninstallation of the old drivers, run DDU and then do a clean install of the latest drivers (not beta ones) from Nvidia.com - Also open up your User Settings and change the following (straight from ZoS themselves):

There are also a few settings in the Usersettings.txt file that you can change to improve your performance. Please close ESO first, then make these changes. This file is located at Documents\Elder Scrolls Online\Live.

As with any document change, we advise creating a back up of the original file in an alternate location. This will allow you to restore your usersettings to their old values in case the new ones are less optimal.

Simply open the file with Notepad and make the following changes:

[snip]

I'm fairly sure I did. I went to Nvidia's site directly and downloaded the driver. I suppose I could try a reinstall of everything though, especially since I'm not sure how old this GPU is and how many other driver versions might be sticking around.

And yes, thanks muchly for the .txt advice! That's actually what I was hoping I might get, so I'm happy there are a few things I can try tweaking before trying to do a clean install of my GPU drivers.

Sav72 · October 2015

Turning "Grass" off, in options will help.

Runicus · October 2015

I can confirm the problem is not with the drivers.

- I too am running an Alienware (i7, 16GB, dual HD raid zero, NVidia 770M, Win 8.1). Fully patched OS, latest driver, all software aggressively updated.
- 2 days ago it was pulling high FPS and everything butter smooth on ultra.
- Somehow all went to hell 2 days ago: FPS dropped to between 1 and 25 and ping went up.
- Loading screen are taking a lot more time now and I get 2-3 loading screens when riding through cities on horse
- Black silouettes on players and I bump into NPCs that are not even visible yet
- Distant textures not loading
- World objects not loading (for instance: I go to a craft tables but I have to wait for it to load)
- I'm on NA megaserver, playing from Canada
- Speedtest.net is 12 ms ping throughout the day and giving stellar performance.

I get stuttering FPS when in a cave staring at a wall and both my CPU and GPU are flipping their thumbs waiting for something more to do. Again, 2 days ago everything was fine and now the game is almost unplayable. This is the second time it happens, last time was about 2-3 weeks ago. Problem then was exactly identical and somehow went away by itself.

This clearly is a server-side problem and it now looks like it can cycle on/off. I have no idea what it is but I can invent scenarios in my head such as the megaservers having instance shards spawned on different IP addresses/domains some of which having lag issues.

I read somewhere on a forum from a ZOS engineer that framerate and ping are somehow impacting each other in this game for synchronization issue and the "tick" refresh rate between client and server being tied into the FPS. Doesn't make much sense to me but I guess it's possible and it does seem to happen on my end. The number of characters on screen seems to have an impact too. Loading a new zone will often start with FPs in single digit range and ping in the 500s and it resorbs after 10-20 seconds to stabilize with low FPS and 200 ping after. Ping used to be low 100 past few weeks.

This is clearly and unequivocally a server-side issue. My machine is running far more punishing games and was running this one just fine 2 days ago. I also ran World of Warcraft and Wildstar for comparison and ping is consistently 80-100 whereas ESO spiked to 500, 1600, etc.. today. Loading screens taking 2x-3x the time they took 48 hours ago is not machine related either.

Elder_III wrote: »

Are you sure you installed the new video card drivers correctly? if you feel technically proficient enough to try it, I would download DDU, do a complete uninstallation of the old drivers, run DDU and then do a clean install of the latest drivers (not beta ones) from Nvidia.com - Also open up your User Settings and change the following (straight from ZoS themselves):

There are also a few settings in the Usersettings.txt file that you can change to improve your performance. Please close ESO first, then make these changes. This file is located at Documents\Elder Scrolls Online\Live.

As with any document change, we advise creating a back up of the original file in an alternate location. This will allow you to restore your usersettings to their old values in case the new ones are less optimal.

Simply open the file with Notepad and make the following changes:

Change:
SET GPUSmoothingFrames "10"
To:
SET GPUSmoothingFrames "3"

Change:
SET PreferExclusiveFullscreen "0"
To:
SET PreferExclusiveFullscreen "1"

Find this section and Change:

SET RequestedNumJobThreads "-1"
SET RequestedNumWorkerThreads "-1"
To:
SET RequestedNumJobThreads "0"
SET RequestedNumWorkerThreads "0"

Mettaricana · October 2015

Ps4 has a huge fps and stuttering in reapers march and a few delves like old keeps and prisons that style of dungeon alao stutters

Frawr · October 2015

I've had stutter recently too, particularly at the weekend and only since the IC patch. Everything was fine before the patch ( apart from the standard lag)

I7 4790
Nvidia 970 gtx
8gb ram

Skiserony · October 2015

Got the same issues, and it's quite annoying.

I bought a laptop with a i7-5700HQ and Nvidia GTX960m and 8GB RAM so I could play the game on Ultra, which is fine in PvE. But need to run Medium in PvP because sometimes it drops tremendously. (Which should be able on Ultra)

I never come into IC, but I get those fps drops in Cyrodiil. Sometimes with huge battles, sometimes when I see nothing at all.