Issue with micro-stuttering, hitch and frame timing spikes
Issue with micro-stuttering, hitch and frame timing spikes
Hello everyone,
I’d like to bring up a matter that has been bothering me for quite some time. I’ve tried all possible solutions, and although things have improved slightly, the problem still lingers and disrupts my gaming experience. It appears to be a minor stutter or delay that briefly halts the image (not the audio), long enough to break immersion—frametime spikes.
After conducting thousands of tests with various hardware and drivers, I’m sharing the current configuration I’ve settled on, which still gives me the best possible performance:
- i7 8700 5.1 GHZ Delidded (previously tested with default settings, manual OC, BIOS profile tweaks)
- Trident Z Neo 32 [2x16] GB RAM DDR4 3600 Mhz CL16-16-16-36 1.35v B-DIE (tested with 1 DIMM, swapped, stock, XMP, manual OC)
- Asus Maximus X Apex latest BIOS 2402 (stock and custom settings)
- Asus Rog PG278Q 2560x1440 144hz (also tested with PG348q 3440x1400 100hz)
- 1x GTX 1080 Ti ASUS ROG (tested with OC, non-OC, SLI setup, single or swapped)
- Samsung NMve M.2 970 Pro 512GB (tested across multiple SSDs: Samsung, Kingston...)
- PSU BeQuiet 1500W Dark Power 11 (OC on six 12V rails, one massive rail non-OC)
- Water cooling Fractal Design s36 Kelvin
[All setups have been rigorously tested and stressed; no thermal throttling detected.]
Operating system: Windows 10 Pro 2004
Browser: Opera (installed)
Network: Ethernet disabled
Audio: Disabled
Drivers: GPU/Audio default removed via DDU (safe mode), Nvidia Drivers 456.71 installed, Chipset driver, ACHI driver, Samsung/NVM drivers, MSI Afterburner, GPU-Z, CPU-Z
Xbox Game Bar: Disabled
Game Mode: Enabled (tested with it off)
VRR & GPU scheduling: Enabled (tested off)
Windows Update: Disabled
Antivirus: Disabled (repeated every reboot)
Firewall: Disabled
HPET in Device Manager: Disabled
CMD commands used:
- bcdedit /set useplatformclock no - Reiniciar
- bcdedit /set useplatformtick yes - Reiniciar
- bcdedit /set disabledynamictick yes - Reiniciar
Configuration settings: All non-essential Windows 10 features turned off (privacy), unnecessary apps removed (Office, Spotify...) and services disabled (SysMain, Windows Update, Printers Management...)
Processes: Lasso and Park Cores installed with high priority CPU cores/I/O, core affinity set to all cores/threads, Application power profile optimized for GTX 1080 ti.
Additional tools: Intelligent standby list cleaner installed; timer resolution set to 0.5 seconds.
MSI Util v3: Installed, configured GTX 1080 ti in MSI mode with interrupt priority set to High.
Interrupt Affinity Policy Tool (intPolicy_x64): Set GTX 1080 ti to Core 4 and USB HUB to core 2 (first core is 0).
Steps before launching a game:
- NVidia Control Panel: GSYNC, Force V-Sync, Prefer maximum performance, highest refresh rate available.
- MSI Afterburner: Cap FPS at 100 (or adjustable values depending on monitor and test).
- Monitor: CPUx usage, framerate, frametime displayed.
Performance issues:
When a game needs to perform certain actions—loading textures, displaying new items or NPCs, explosions, physics calculations—it occasionally triggers micro-stutters or frame drops. In some titles like *The Witcher 3* (especially when opening trunks, boxes, loot), isolated framespikes appear. In others such as *Batman Arkham Knight* (car driving, radio chats) or *Deus Ex: Manking Divided* (Prague scene), noticeable spikes occur.
Capping FPS to 60 eliminated spikes in certain games (though some still show spikes when opening boxes). This suggests a possible issue tied to game engines, possibly due to latency problems. Even with Latency Monitor enabled, I suspect CPU cycles are being consumed by interrupts, preventing stable 90% or 100% performance during demanding tasks.
The situation worsens without Hyperthreading enabled. Graphics settings and resolution don’t seem to help. Occasionally it feels like an unsynchronization between monitor refresh rate, V-sync, game engine, and CPU—possibly a result of trying too hard with optimization.
You can view examples of the behavior here:
https://ufile.io/f/q97jk
If you need specific MSI Afterburner monitoring graphs, further details, or want to re-test any configuration, please let me know. I’m happy to assist.
Thank you for your understanding.
My hope is that this post can help someone improve their setup, even if it’s just a small step.
Your happiness is important.
Hey everyone, enable low latency mode in the Nvidia Control Panel.
Hardly suggest trying without any monitoring software! I spent two full days figuring out what causes spikes in frame rate even though I didn’t have special settings in Windows or BIOS. With a new ftw3 3080, 10700k, rog z490e motherboard, and 970evo plus, all my games had spikes (no FPS drop!!!) especially in multiplayer (solo games barely noticeable). I always monitored with Afterburner or HWInfo, then once I turned them off the spikes disappeared! Not completely, but much better. Possibly an NVIDIA driver issue, because when I swapped it to my old 2060Super it did exactly the same. Maybe this helps!
Hey everyone, enable low latency mode in the Nvidia Control Panel.