FPS drop and stuttering for no reason?

[Sormflaith]

Just to get specs out of the way, I have 16 GB of RAM and am running an GTX970m. This should be more than enough to run this game very smoothly (in fact, I know it is because of the problem I am about to describe).

This happens no matter what my graphics settings are, even turned as low as they can possibly go.

When I first run the game, I have no problems, with a solid 60 FPS even in very populated areas. However, after about 5-10 minutes or so, my FPS will suddenly drop to 30-40, and I get this EXTREMELY annoying stuttering effect. It's very subtle, if you were watching a stream of my gameplay you wouldn't notice it. But it occurs about once every 5 to 10 seconds, and boy can it be felt. It's like my controls freeze up for a fraction of a second while the FPS tries to catch up. So I end up taking one extra step than I intended to - very frustrating in a parkour game.

Sometimes if I alt-tab out of the game and back into it, the problem goes away and I have a super smooth 60 FPS again--but once again it only last for about 5-10 minutes, then I'm back to 30-40 FPS with an annoying stutter effect.

I've tried the tech support FAQ, I've tried every help video on youtube (which are all several years old at this point), and nothing works, at least not permanently. Using RivaTuner to force the FPS to 10, and then force them back to 60 again, temporarily fixes the problem for about 5-10 minutes as well. But then the whole problem repeats itself--it's an endless struggle.

[Reece]

Have you ever had this problem with any other games?

Also, how are you capping your frames? Are you using the games Vsync setting, or using the one on Nvidia Control Panel? If you have both of these enabled simultaneously it could be causing stuttering as there are 2 differing things trying to control the frame rate.

[Alio]

Make sure you have enough room for your pagefile, also.. your laptop CPU may not be up to snuff to handle the game, if performance starts degrading after 10-15 minutes that's usually a sign of thermal throttling on your CPU/GPU.

[Sormflaith]

Originally posted by IAmALazyGamer:

Have you ever had this problem with any other games?

Also, how are you capping your frames? Are you using the games Vsync setting, or using the one on Nvidia Control Panel? If you have both of these enabled simultaneously it could be causing stuttering as there are 2 differing things trying to control the frame rate.

Nope, never had this problem before. My laptop runs any AAA title near flawlessly. The Witcher 3, for example, runs at Ultra settings with about 20-30 FPS (and no stuttering), I can get 40-60 FPS with lower settings.

The problem exists no matter how I cap my frames, unfortunately. Or no capping at all. I tried removing all frame caps, and I get almost 200 FPS. But then, same as before, after 5-10 minutes it reverts back to 40 FPS and stutters. 40 FPS by itself wouldn't bother me, either, it's the stupid stuttering that is getting me.

Originally posted by Alio:

Make sure you have enough room for your pagefile, also.. you're laptop CPU may not be up to snuff to handle the game, if performance starts degrading after 10-15 minutes thats usually a sign of thermal throttling on your CPU/GPU.

Enough room for my pagefile? I'm unfamiliar with that term. What's a pagefile? By room do you mean Hard Drive space? I have plenty of that as well (1.25 TB of it)

I was wondering if it was something along those lines too. But what confuses me is the fact that no other game does this, and that I can get 200 FPS when I remove all FPS caps (albeit just for the 5-10 minutes). Additionally, if I alt-tab several times, it eventually kicks it out of the 40 FPS stutter mess and reverts back to 60 FPS (200 FPS with no cap) and stays that way for another 5 minutes. It's extremely consistent: no matter how many programs are open, no matter how hot my CPU gets, no matter what graphics settings I'm using, no matter how I cap my FPS, it always runs smooth for 5-10 minutes, then reverts back to stuttering.

My most recent attempt at fixing this was to set the priority to "Realtime" in the task manager. This helped, but in an odd way. The pattern is exactly the same: about 5-10 minutes of normal play, following by a massive drop in FPS paired with a stutter every 5 seconds. However, instead of going to 40 FPS and stuttering, it now goes to 50 FPS and stutters for about half the length of time (but still about every 5 seconds). This is slightly more bearable, but not by much. It almost seems like this is hard coded into the game code itself. It's extremely weird.

Any other ideas?

Thanks for your replies, I really appreciate knowing at least someone is trying to help.

[♡♥♡Wei♡♥♡]

I have the same problem, I've got a Intel i5 Skylake 6400 with a GTX 1060 6GB with 8GB RAM

[Sormflaith]

if you find a solution let me know. What I mentioned about setting the priority to "Realtime" seemed to help some, but it's only a partial fix.

[Alio]

Try running the game with Vsync on via your Nvidia control panel with it turned off in game, also make sure your 3D settings are on Single Display performance and Maxmimum Power. Also running RivaTuner with a 60fps cap on top of the Vsync change may help.

Try not to alt-tab out of your game, and also try running in Borderless Windowed mode to see if it helps hold a steady framerate.

Make sure your draw distance is set to like 1/4th of the bar or less with a laptop CPU.

[Reece]

Originally posted by captainaop135:

if you find a solution let me know. What I mentioned about setting the priority to "Realtime" seemed to help some, but it's only a partial fix.

If you're going to change this, set it to high. You won't be running anything else at the same time so every single bit of performance counts :)

[Speedbump]

Originally posted by captainaop135:

I tried removing all frame caps, and I get almost 200 FPS.

On low settings?

As for the stuttering, open you task manager, go to processes and find the Dying Light process. Right click it, choose set affinity, NOT set priority. Uncheck all processors, recheck it and hit ok. Should fix your issue. Will have to do it each time you start the game.

Originally posted by captainaop135:

if you find a solution let me know. What I mentioned about setting the priority to "Realtime" seemed to help some, but it's only a partial fix.

DO NOT DO THIS, OR RECCOMEND IT TO ANYONE. It can destroy the computer, literally, as it prioritises the game over everything.

[Reece]

Originally posted by Rick Mason Mason Militia:

Originally posted by captainaop135:

I tried removing all frame caps, and I get almost 200 FPS.

On low settings?

As for the stuttering, open you task manager, go to processes and find the Dying Light process. Right click it, choose set affinity, NOT set priority. Uncheck all processors, recheck it and hit ok. Should fix your issue. Will have to do it each time you start the game.

Originally posted by captainaop135:

if you find a solution let me know. What I mentioned about setting the priority to "Realtime" seemed to help some, but it's only a partial fix.

DO NOT DO THIS, OR RECCOMEND IT TO ANYONE. It can destroy the computer, literally, as it prioritises the game over everything.

It won't destroy the computer at all, it just allocates it a more than average amount of resources to the .exe while it is running. This won't do anything bad to the PC. At most, it will slightly increase temperatures, but unless you are playing in a boiling hot room it's nothing to worry about.

The only way this may decrease the stability of your system is if you change the priority of Windows processes. These should not be touched. Any third-party processes, such as games, are fine to change :)

[Sormflaith]

Originally posted by Alio:

Try running the game with Vsync on via your Nvidia control panel with it turned off in game, also make sure your 3D settings are on Single Display performance and Maxmimum Power. Also running RivaTuner with a 60fps cap on top of the Vsync change may help.

Try not to alt-tab out of your game, and also try running in Borderless Windowed mode to see if it helps hold a steady framerate.

Make sure your draw distance is set to like 1/4th of the bar or less with a laptop CPU.

Thanks for these tips. So far I've gone longer than I ever have before the stuttering starts. Stuttering usually starts within 5-10 minutes, I'm currently at about 15 minutes and haven't seen any stuttering yet.

[Reece]

Originally posted by captainaop135:

Originally posted by Alio:

Try running the game with Vsync on via your Nvidia control panel with it turned off in game, also make sure your 3D settings are on Single Display performance and Maxmimum Power. Also running RivaTuner with a 60fps cap on top of the Vsync change may help.

Try not to alt-tab out of your game, and also try running in Borderless Windowed mode to see if it helps hold a steady framerate.

Make sure your draw distance is set to like 1/4th of the bar or less with a laptop CPU.

Thanks for these tips. So far I've gone longer than I ever have before the stuttering starts. Stuttering usually starts within 5-10 minutes, I'm currently at about 15 minutes and haven't seen any stuttering yet.

Keep us updated

[Sormflaith]

I went about an hour with no noticeable stutter, yay! However, i did notice that the fps did drop down to 40-50 again. I didn't notice how long into my play session it did that, though. Once I noticed the drop in frames I tried paying attention to the stuttering. It's still there, unfortunately, but it's so subtle now that it doesn't really bother me anymore. I would say it's sufficient now for normal play.

Thanks again for all your tips!

[Reece]

Originally posted by captainaop135:

I went about an hour with no noticeable stutter, yay! However, i did notice that the fps did drop down to 40-50 again. I didn't notice how long into my play session it did that, though. Once I noticed the drop in frames I tried paying attention to the stuttering. It's still there, unfortunately, but it's so subtle now that it doesn't really bother me anymore. I would say it's sufficient now for normal play.

Thanks again for all your tips!

Glad we could help

[St1ckyGreeN]

hey guys,
little late, but here's what helped me get constant +100 fps:
btw i got a gtx 1660ti and a i7 9th gen but i had like 8-30 fps in Dying Light which was rediciulous

how i fixed it:
1. CTRL ALT DEL task mgr
2. go to details
3. right click on "DyingLightGame.exe" and set Priority to "High" or "Higher than usual"
4. Change Game Settings to -> Windowed Full Screen mode
5. check your fps, i got 120 fps after priority settings

before you play, check every 1-2 minutes in your task manager if the priority settings is still on High, because sometimes it changes back to "normal"

you can also do this with steam, nvidia gforce experience, etc ...

hope it works for yall aswell

[Zabavon]

Same problem!

1 year ago on same system and same settings game get stable fps.
today i install game, press PLAY, 5-10 minutes of gameplay and -40 FPS.
just WOW!

i set v-Sync to ON, set CPU Priority HIGH for game, set affinity for CPU Cores, play on FULL and Borderless modes.. All not work! 5-10 minutes and fps go drops.

1 year ago all work stable.

Updated Windows, fresh drivers.
Is not hardware problem. is software.