F1 2017 (PC) Microstuttering at High Refresh Rate Potential Workaround

[kraM1t]

Locking to 100fps with MSI Afterburner/Rivatuner @ 144hz Vsync off fixes all stuttering for me, rock solid 10.0ms frame times, never skips a beat.

As soon as you uncap it above 100 though the microstutter frametiming spikes are constant.

100fps is fine though, at least it's fixed.

@trenamax   Why are you sitting on the drivers head? Lower that seat damnit lol

[trenamax]

kraM1t said:

Locking to 100fps with MSI Afterburner/Rivatuner @ 144hz Vsync off fixes all stuttering for me, rock solid 10.0ms frame times, never skips a beat.

As soon as you uncap it above 100 though the microstutter frametiming spikes are constant.

100fps is fine though, at least it's fixed.

@trenamax   Why are you sitting on the drivers head? Lower that seat damnit lol

Because I don't like to see the on screen wheel when I have a replica in my hands ;) shame there is no option to turn off the on screen wheel

[kraM1t]

@trenamax
 Agree with you on that tbh man, ridiculous we still can't do it.

[cheekymunkey78]

Could someone reading this test the following to see if it makes a difference

Setup a 50% Race in Grand Prix Mode in Spain
Make a custom weather so it changes from Heavy Rain to Clear to Heavy Rain
Set to Official Time
Set the Ai so you can "play" with them (drop back out of the slip stream/dirty air and catch back up)
Run the start of the race but do not finish it
Quit the game
shut down the PC
Reboot
Load the game
Go straight to Grand Prix and race

If this improves your stutter please let us know,

If not do the following:
Quit the game
Delete the codemasters folder in the user Temp folder
Reboot
Load the game
Go straight to the Grand Prix and race

If this improves your stutter please let us know.

My logic:
I tested Spain with the above settings and I had stutter whilst recording so I undid everything from previous comments above including moving the Temp folder and moving the game back to the SSD.
I then retested Spain and it worked smooth (30 laps then quit, I did not finish the GP so I could use the setting again).
I closed the game without rebooting and loaded the game again, I got stutter on the first 3 laps (about once per lap, It seems to happen when something happens - for example, Jeff speaks, I hit someone, A Car goes off the track but most noticeable when catching another car or they catch you - maybe when close enough to be affected by the dirty air/slipstream).
I deleted the codemasters temp folder (got the idea due to me moving the Temp folder location) and rebooted.
Re-Ran the GP and it was smooth (23 laps then quit).
Closed the game, reloaded and ran GP and it Stuttered within the first 3 laps.
Shut the PC down and rebooted (without deleting the Temp folder).
Re-Ran the GP and it was smooth until lap 16 then I had "minor" stutter (looked like only a couple of frames were dropped) 5 times till lap 30.

[cheekymunkey78]

Sorry it didn't work for you, thanks for trying.

I have only tested it on one machine but from my logic it appeared that rebooting the machine (not deleting the temp folder) reduced the stutter.

Deleting the temp folder and rebooting removed the stutter.

Both only worked on the first session loaded.  If I closed the game and reloaded or went back to the main menu without deleting and rebooting the next session would stutter.

I have however only did this once as described in my post so it could be a "false positive".

Since the post I have completed a 50% career race (inc. all practices and short quali), deleted temp folder+rebooted then did a 2h multiplayer (which included Australia in the rain, Bahrain, Monaco in the rain and at night, Spain in the rain, Canada in the rain, China in the rain and Baku.  All of which have stuttered in the past but yesterday not even a micro stutter.

I was hoping someone else could get similar results to try and pinpoint the issue.

Kindest regards.

[Ho3n3r]

The stuttering seems related to career mode IMO. I did a test race the other night at Singapore to prepare myself for the actual career race, and I had no stutters. Then I went into career, started doing the last few practice programs and stuttering was back. It wasn't gone during the actual race either.

Perhaps it might even be the career score variables that probably record most things you do - something that clearly doesn't happen during once-off races.

[cheekymunkey78]

Ho3n3r said:

The stuttering seems related to career mode IMO. I did a test race the other night at Singapore to prepare myself for the actual career race, and I had no stutters. Then I went into career, started doing the last few practice programs and stuttering was back. It wasn't gone during the actual race either.

Perhaps it might even be the career score variables that probably record most things you do - something that clearly doesn't happen during once-off races.

Did you reboot between the test race and career session?

[Ho3n3r]

cheekymunkey78 said:

Ho3n3r said:

The stuttering seems related to career mode IMO. I did a test race the other night at Singapore to prepare myself for the actual career race, and I had no stutters. Then I went into career, started doing the last few practice programs and stuttering was back. It wasn't gone during the actual race either.

Perhaps it might even be the career score variables that probably record most things you do - something that clearly doesn't happen during once-off races.

Did you reboot between the test race and career session?

I did not.

[cheekymunkey78]

@Ho3n3r any chance you could try deleting the temp folder, rebooting and trying it.

[Ho3n3r]

cheekymunkey78 said:

@Ho3n3r any chance you could try deleting the temp folder, rebooting and trying it.

Good idea, will do that tonight. Thanks.

[Ho3n3r]

cheekymunkey78 said:

@Ho3n3r any chance you could try deleting the temp folder, rebooting and trying it.

Coming back to this (LOL I know, right).

I never did this, totally slipped my mind, but I started a new custom grand prix season instead, with weather disabled - career amount of rain just got boring so I abandoned it til I can find a way to disable career weather.

And guess what - no microstutters at all, so I'm still convinced that the recording of career progress in the background is causing the microstutters. I am one race further than where I stopped in career (career - Mexico season 1, dry season - Brazil), and I have done mid-race saves, jumped in mid-race save after exiting, after not exiting etc. and no microstutters at all.

Previously in career I was getting them in dry, light rain, heavy rain, doesn't matter.

[cheekymunkey78]

You might be on to something regarding career mode causing the stutters but I'm wondering if it could be linked to using flashback and mid-session save.

I have only had one online race microstutter since I did the "delete the temp folder" I have mentioned previously so all other modes have been very good however at the same time have also stopped using flashbacks.

The reason I have mentioned this is the other day I did a mid-session save (Australia).  When I went back to it i wasn't sure how to restart.  It plays a replay of the last few seconds and like flashback you can restart from anywhere the replay allows.  I restarted somewhere in the middle of the replay.  I was getting stutter everywhere, the worst I have ever had it.  So I quit the race and reloaded the mid-session save again.  This time I let the replay play to the end before taking over the car and no stutter at all.  I quit again and tried to replicate the stutter by starting half way through the the replay, this time however when I pressed the key to take control my car everything jumped to the end of the replay and I had no stutter (I could not take control mid-replay like before).  I tried a few times but could not start from the midpoint of the replay, every time it jumped to the end and there was no stutter so I am wondering if there could be a syncing error between where you start from when using flashback/mid-session save and where the game thinks you are, just like lag spikes in multiplayer but for the whole track.

This "memory" then stays within the career save for the following races.

[Ho3n3r]

I'm not sure it's related to mid-session save or flashbacks, as I use them in both modes(flashbacks for stupid backmarkers) and I only get stutters in career mode.

[cheekymunkey78]

Just my theory and we could be having different issues.

To confirm I used to only get microstutters (might still get) in career mode and online with races over 5 laps.

[jlp0209]

Just wanted to post an update since my original post back in August. I've just switched from Asus Z270 IX Hero and i7 7700K to a Gigabyte Z370 Gaming 7 board + i7 8700K. My GPU is the same GTX 1080 Ti. The micro stutter has completely vanished for me. I'm back using G-sync at 144hz refresh rate and disabled GPU power monitoring in EVGA Precision (this did not help with my Z270 Asus build). I didn't even re-install Windows 10, simply installed all Gigabyte drivers and re-installed the latest Nvidia driver. My build prior to Z270 was also an Asus Z170 board and I also had stutter with F1 2016 as mentioned earlier. Not saying moving to Gigabyte for Z370 or 8700K is the answer, but for some reason unknown to me this game is finally butter smooth at 144hz + 1440p w/ G-sync. I'm running Windows 10 Pro version 1709. 

[Caaaaam]

Was hoping this wouldn't still be occurring, hadn't played the game for a month after just taking a break from it, everything is fine for me bar multiplayer with stutters, impossible really to play enjoyably with stutters every so often :/

[jklondon]

Had same issue with i7 6700k, ssd, 1080, 16gb, 165hz setup. Set power profile to maximum performance in windows and also in Nvidia Graphics setting (global). Stuttering gone and fps now around 100-120 from 60-70.