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MikeTheRat

Stuttering in multiplayer

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Hi!

For the last week the game is stuttering on multiplayer servers (modded). It looks like this: I have solid 60 FPS (or more if I set "refresh" parameter to 144 in profile .cfg file) with VSync on and every 15-20 seconds my fps going down to 35 in a half of the second. It feels like a little freeze, but overall it is really devastating.
In the single player or if I hosting the server by myself there are no lags or freezes (at least I didn't mentioned any).  UPD. 06/17/2021 It happens in single player too, tested today.

My specs: Win10 x64, i7-8750H, GTX 1070 8gb GDDR5, 16gb of DDR4 2666 MHz RAM. Also the game and all mods are installed on the same M.2 SSD. Also it's a MSI laptop.

What I tried to do in last two days:
1. Messing with various video settings in game (on Low and Ultra video settings I have the same result with stuttering).
2. Tested different settings (and default too) in A3 launcher (CPU count, Hyper threading, Large page file size etc.), also tried all memory allocation options - no luck.
3. Checked the game files via Steam.
4. Completely reinstalled the game.
5. Checked the temps of CPU and GPU - 75C max (with Turbo Boost disabled).
6. Edited the .cfg file on Documents folder.
7. Disabled (and then enabled back) Hyper Threading in BIOS.
8. Updated all existing drivers. Also I was forced to roll back my GTX 1070 drivers because with last driver version after alt+tab my game just freezes and stop responding.
9. Did memory tests via Memtest86 - it's fine tho.
10. Did antivirus scan in case of miners or other malware stuff - it is clean.
11. Fixed all the errors in Registry and did a nice big cleaning of PC via CCleaner.
12. Set Power Settings to Max Performance.
13. Tested various Windows Page file size (also tried system allocated).

14. Created new Arma 3 profile - it helped a little, but stuttering still appearing once in a minute or two.

Still no luck. I literally have no idea what I can do more. Any suggestions?

P.S. All other games I play are working fine, no issues so far.

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Does this happen when playing a vanilla mission in multiplayer?

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2 hours ago, MikeTheRat said:

For the last week the game is stuttering on multiplayer servers (modded).

Welcome to BI forums MikeTheRat!

 

What servers, and what mods?

Same mods if you host mp lan?

What mission/s are you playing on the servers when you do play them?

What maps (Terrains) are they on?

 

Have you checked your rpt when you get the stuttering and low fps?

 

Do this, be sure you have your logs on for the rpt, and test again with fresh game

til you get the stuttering in mp on a server, then go to here

C:\Users\your username\AppData\Local\Arma 3

and open the rpt (opens with notepad) you get copy it all, and paste it here https://justpaste.it/

publish it then post the link in your next reply.

 

Now rpt on client may only show so much but either way it should show whats going on with

your game in relation to whats happening on the server, i'd like to know anyways, it may or may not show anything

of value, it could be the servers your getting on for all you know, it depends, lets take a look anyways.

 

Aside that please answer all questions, even Stanhope's, lastly thank you for providing detailed information in your 1st OP

about your issue, it prevents us from asking 20 questions even though we still asked, but we have a rough idea of what could be going on,

but lets see what we can find out! 🙂

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11 hours ago, stanhope said:

Does this happen when playing a vanilla mission in multiplayer?

Well actually I did some tests today and it happens in single player campaign mission.

Also I tried to go multiplayer servers that running vanilla - same stuttering as for modded.

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10 hours ago, Gunter Severloh said:

Welcome to BI forums MikeTheRat!

 

What servers, and what mods?

Same mods if you host mp lan?

What mission/s are you playing on the servers when you do play them?

What maps (Terrains) are they on?

 

Have you checked your rpt when you get the stuttering and low fps?

 

Do this, be sure you have your logs on for the rpt, and test again with fresh game

til you get the stuttering in mp on a server, then go to here

C:\Users\your username\AppData\Local\Arma 3

and open the rpt (opens with notepad) you get copy it all, and paste it here https://justpaste.it/

publish it then post the link in your next reply.

 

Now rpt on client may only show so much but either way it should show whats going on with

your game in relation to whats happening on the server, i'd like to know anyways, it may or may not show anything

of value, it could be the servers your getting on for all you know, it depends, lets take a look anyways.

 

Aside that please answer all questions, even Stanhope's, lastly thank you for providing detailed information in your 1st OP

about your issue, it prevents us from asking 20 questions even though we still asked, but we have a rough idea of what could be going on,

but lets see what we can find out! 🙂

Thanks!

Please see post above - it happened in Single Player missions too, so I guess it's a whole game issue. Also I tried vanilla King of the Hill server without any mods - I have same issue with stuttering on it.

What moded servers I played? Well, I did all my tests on this one:

Server name: CodeFourGaming - King of the Hill - RHS Inf No Towers EU #3 HC
Address: 135.125.140.176:2302
Server version: 204147719
Required game version: 2.4.0

Map: Altis
Mission: King of the Hill RHS by Sa-Matra (v14, Infantry)
Server is running 4 RHS mods: United States Forces, Serbian Armed Forces, GREF, Armed forces of Russian Federation.

I tried to host the game with same 4 mods on Altis (except the mission, I don't have this mission listed above).

About .rpt - I ran the game, connected to server and as soon as the problem appeared I disconnected from server, shut down the game and here is link: https://jpst.it/2xuF7

Hope it will help. 🙂

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Thanks for the information.

From the RPT im seeing this,

PhysMem: 16 GiB, VirtMem : 131072 GiB, AvailPhys : 10 GiB, AvailVirt : 131068 GiB, AvailPage : 24 GiB, PageSize : 4.0 KiB/2.0 MiB/HasLockMemory

Idk if thats a setting or something that could be restricting your memory, cant say.

@oldbear any ideas what that MiB/HasLockMemory is or is doing, is it limited memory being used or how is it used?

Also, i'll ask @Tankbuster what you guys think this could be for the stuttering, im thinking failing SSD, or this lock memory, or

is his laptop overheating?

 

I see your using the -hugePages as on of your startup parameters, do you get same stuttering without that?

22 hours ago, MikeTheRat said:

M.2 SSD

How old is the M2?

 

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39 minutes ago, Gunter Severloh said:

I see your using the -hugePages as on of your startup parameters, do you get same stuttering without that?

How old is the M2?

 

Yes, tried with/without that.

SSD is two years old.

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Nothing in the specs of this machine are noticeably weak. The RAM seems a little slow but it's the default speed for DDR4.

Overheating would seem to be the first thing to rule out. Are you in the UK, or somewhere else it's been unseasonably warm recently?

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12 hours ago, Tankbuster said:

Overheating would seem to be the first thing to rule out. Are you in the UK, or somewhere else it's been unseasonably warm recently?

I'm in Russia and yes, it's pretty warm here recently.

I made some more tests btw and I found this in OCCT monitoring: please see screenshot.

It looks like GPU power is a little messed up, so it causes stuttering. Temps at the screenshot are ok, but after hour of playing, GPU hotspot temperature is somewhere in high 90's Celsius. I read some info about hotspots and many people reporting that hotspots temperatures are much higher than average GPU temperatures. And 97-100 C is "normal" for a such thing as GPU hotspot. Well, I'm not completely sure that they are right tho. 😬 One thing I know right: I need to repaste my CPU and GPU in a nearest future.

Anyways, I considered to update EC (embedded controller) firmware for my laptop and looks like it helped a little with stuttering - it still happens, but a little easier. Unfortunately, I don't have enough time recently to test it out, so I will do it in a few days I guess. And of course I will post here results.

Thanks!

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In case of overheating of a laptop, there are two possibilities, either the PC crashes with a blue screen or even a black one, or the laptop goes into throttling mode.

The core and memory frequencies begin to drop, along with your FPS, until temperatures drop to a safe operating range.

It could be the case here.

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Hi guys! 

 

Sorry that the answer took so long. But anyways better late than never, as they say.

 

I tried to reduce the heat, and I managed to do it using undervolting CPU and GPU, but it didn't help to solve this issue with stuttering. Temps went down but the issue was still there.

 

So I was in extreme desperation and decided to start from scratch and reinstall the whole OS with more fresh version of Win10 Pro 20H2, applied all the latest OS updates and updated all the drivers. Except GPU drivers, because latest NVIDIA driver freezes my PC till hard reset while I am alt+tabbing from ARMA3 - I tried borderless screen, but it didn't help. I use version 461.40 (latest is currently 471.11) now and it works pretty fine.

I'm happy to report that the game actually works fine now. I tested ARMA3 with heavy mod load for a couple weeks by now and seems the issue is gone. Hopefully forever. :)

Thanks for taking a time to answer me!

 

P.S.

Temps are still the same btw. :)

 

Regards.

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