Stuttering, not Lagging.

[Beherit_Baphomar]

I've recently installed a new graphics card because I was getting slight stuttering ingame. I thought it was my bad graphics card so I changed it out. I logged in and detected optimal settings and it comes up very high.

But the stuttering is still happening.

Now, the funny thing is in most quests I can go to v.high settings and get zero stuttering. Doesn't matter how many dancing balls, how many porting devils, how many fogs...zero stuttering. But the moment I go 'open air' I stutter.

What I mean by open air is you can see the sky and you can see into the distance, The Shroud, Bastion of Power (I think is what its called, the new prison one.) In open air its even painful to type in chat or move the mouse cursor.

I thought it was lag, but it's not. Believe me, me and lag go back a long, long way and I know it intimately. I'm not getting info after the fact, I'm not standing still or suddenly zipping forward. It's as if I'm only getting some of the frames.

I've tried lowering the frame rates and I've tried switching to software instead of hardware for sound, I've tried turning off all anti-virus and I've defragged and clean my computer. I've turned off indexing and restore points...it saying my CPU runs between 20%-100% while playing and nothing seems to be being taxed.

I've looked at conflict's in BIOS and my graphics card is listed there, but I'm kinda unclear as to what that means...One website told a guy with a similar problem to look under conflicts and if his graphics card was listed that was his problem...but didnt go into further details how to resolve the problem.

I know people have similar problems with ATI cards, but this is Nvidia.

I'm pretty much stuck with what this could be. It never happened when I was in the US, but I've also replaced my power supply because UK electricity and US electronics dont mix, apparently.

Any insight would be much appreciated.

Thank you in advance.

[Beherit_Baphomar]

Could this be a temperature problem? Would a hot GPU/CPU cause this?

[Tarkafunk]

This sounds odd I know, but if you are outside in the game world and you tilt the camera to the floor and move around whilst staring at the floor, does the stuttering stop?

[Beherit_Baphomar]

If Im in an area that I can see less of the landscape it will be better, wont stop, but will be better.

And Ive got the draw distances, hell everything, down as low as it can go.

But again, inside a quest, on high...devils porting, balls up, fog, firewalls..whatever I get zero stuttering.

Also, its not just ingame, if I'm watching a video on Youtube and mouse over links the video will stutter. Or if there is an advert on Yahoo! page and I mouse over links the commercial will stutter...

[Tarkafunk]

It certainly sounds like the issue isn't specifically game related. The graphics card / chip could be overheating or being pushed beyond its limits.
If its safe to do so, try running the PC with the side panel off to let more air get to it.

Failing that, try reseating the graphics card but blow on the socket and pins before you reseat it.

The thing is, you were getting the stuttering prior to the installation of this card. Which possibly points to the issue lying elsewhere e.g. overheating processor or problems with ram.
Perhaps whilst you're reseating the graphics card, you could reseat your ram (it won't hurt to do so, though no guarantees it will fix the issue either).

Obvious Disclaimer: If you don't feel up to doing the above, then get a pc techie to do it for ya, no offense intended

[Beherit_Baphomar]

I actually just removed my mono, heatsink & fan and cards and cleaned it all out. CPU is running a good 8C cooler. My GPU was running at about 55C and my CPU a little higher.

*sigh* I dunno. But thanks for yer time.

[Zorminster]

I have similar issues and can verify that on my end its not temp. im @ 55c on my graphics card.

Zone specific: Ritual Sacrifice, Shadow Crypt are the two that i've had it in. About every 5 seconds i'll get a freeze frame and then right back to my normal 60 fps.

[lyeman]

I am having this same exact problem in the same exact quests - shadow crypt and ritual sacrifice, freezing every 3-4 sec, then fine. Updating drivers and lowering settings has not fixed it. Anyone find a fix?