MSFS and micro stutters

I have recorded a 1:15 video showing the micro stutters that I am having. I am hoping that by looking at the video, a solution might be found.

 

I have also included how my configuration is setup. The flight is also in Dev mode so you can see when the micro stutter happens (about every 3 seconds), the sim will pause about 1/2 second and then continue. I have read and watched dozen's of "fixes" about this, none of which has helped. I thought I had this fixed a few weeks ago, by uninstalling a Windows Update, but no such luck this time. No update was done (I checked), turned off Norton for an hour, no mods were loaded.

 

Any other questions, please ask :)

 

At the instant of the micro stutter (not so "micro"! That's a pretty mature stutter) the counter shows that the perfomance is limited by the mainthread, which implies CPU.

 

I see you've a pretty powerful CPU, but only a low-profile cooler. What's the temperatures like on your CPU? Maybe you're bouncing against a thermal limit, causing throttling.

 

Another idea:

Have you looked at task manager while flying? Looking at what's using CPU, apart from the sim, could also be insightful...

Edited November 1, 2022 by KiloWatt

At the instant of the micro stutter (not so "micro"! That's a pretty mature stutter) the counter shows that the perfomance is limited by the mainthread, which implies CPU.

 

I see you've a pretty powerful CPU, but only a low-profile cooler. What's the temperatures like on your CPU? Maybe you're bouncing against a thermal limit, causing throttling.

 

Lol, I had always thought of it as a micro stutter :)

 

My temps are actually pretty good on the CPU. I keep a close eye on them, 60-70's while flying. When loading the sim, I will hit in the 80's but they lower to the 60-70's

 

Same as with my GPU, that remains in the 40's

 

Another idea:

Have you looked at task manager while flying? Looking at what's using CPU, apart from the sim, could also be insightful...

 

That was something I had not considered. Just did a quick flight, I am using 40-55% of the CPU, only one process was at the top (besides MSFS), and it was only 1.7%. Unless I need to be looking for something else ???

 

Edit-I also had turned off the traffic as well, tried the lowest cloud settings, no change. Also in VR, same results.

That's so strange.

 

I had a quick look through the other thread. So would I be correct in saying that you have:

 

1. Reinstalled Windows

2. Reinstalled the video drivers with DDU

3. Ensured XMP is enabled

4. Lowered all the graphics settings in the game

5. Enabled a frame limiter to 30

6. Checked your internet connection, which is excellent

7. Tried DX11 and DX12

8. Loaded everything onto a SSD

9. Added MSFS to anti-virus whitelist

10. Adjusted various nVidia 3D settings

11. Ensured that CPU and GPU temperatures are welll within the limits

 

Did I miss anything in there?

 

Also, I see you run your cpu at 3.8 GHz. Why's that? It's supposed to boost to well over 4 GHz.

Edited November 2, 2022 by KiloWatt

That's so strange.

 

I had a quick look through the other thread. So would I be correct in saying that you have:

 

1. Reinstalled Windows

2. Reinstalled the video drivers with DDU

3. Ensured XMP is enabled

4. Lowered all the graphics settings in the game

5. Enabled a frame limiter to 30

6. Checked your internet connection, which is excellent

7. Tried DX11 and DX12

8. Loaded everything onto a SSD

9. Added MSFS to anti-virus whitelist

10. Adjusted various nVidia 3D settings

11. Ensured that CPU and GPU temperatures are welll within the limits

 

Did I miss anything in there?

 

Also, I see you run your cpu at 3.8 GHz. Why's that? It's supposed to boost to well over 4 GHz.

 

The only thing I have not done (yet) is the first, reinstall Windows. As you are no doubt aware, that is a LOT of work, but it may be what needs to be done. I have done all the other items on your list :)

Yes, resintalling the OS is quite a time investment!

 

Have you tried, just for troubleshooting purposes at least, to completely remove the Anti-Virus?

 

If that doesn't work, would you mind making another video? It would be helpful if it shows:

 

1. Task manager in the foreground

1a. Task manager on the Performance tab

1b. Task manager update speed on High (go to view-> Update Speed -> High)

1c. Showing CPU logical cores (right click on the cpu graph -> Change Graph to -> Logical Processors

2. Sim the background

 

It would be interesting to see the CPU activity when this happens. Maybe it spikes, or maybe it dies down... we may learn something either way.

 

Edit: Also, you are running without any mods right? I should have started with this question...

Edited November 2, 2022 by KiloWatt

I re-installed Windows 10 Pro earlier this year by downloading the latest installation media tool and creating a USB flash drive to install Windows. The install includes the all latest updates and patches, so it's fully up to date and you're good to go in no time: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

Yes, resintalling the OS is quite a time investment!

 

Have you tried, just for troubleshooting purposes at least, to completely remove the Anti-Virus?

 

If that doesn't work, would you mind making another video? It would be helpful if it shows:

 

1. Task manager in the foreground

1a. Task manager on the Performance tab

1b. Task manager update speed on High (go to view-> Update Speed -> High)

1c. Showing CPU logical cores (right click on the cpu graph -> Change Graph to -> Logical Processors

2. Sim the background

 

It would be interesting to see the CPU activity when this happens. Maybe it spikes, or maybe it dies down... we may learn something either way.

 

Edit: Also, you are running without any mods right? I should have started with this question...

 

I will make the video with your suggestions, and then post the link. As for mods, I've gone both ways, with and without. No change. The 1st video was made without.

I re-installed Windows 10 Pro earlier this year by downloading the latest installation media tool and creating a USB flash drive to install Windows. The install includes the all latest updates and patches, so it's fully up to date and you're good to go in no time: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

 

Hi Tim, if I go that route (which for me would be the a last resort, would I not need to wipe the C drive first? That is actually the hard part. I can do a backup, but I am leery at time of them :)

Yes, resintalling the OS is quite a time investment!

 

Have you tried, just for troubleshooting purposes at least, to completely remove the Anti-Virus?

 

If that doesn't work, would you mind making another video? It would be helpful if it shows:

 

1. Task manager in the foreground

1a. Task manager on the Performance tab

1b. Task manager update speed on High (go to view-> Update Speed -> High)

1c. Showing CPU logical cores (right click on the cpu graph -> Change Graph to -> Logical Processors

2. Sim the background

 

It would be interesting to see the CPU activity when this happens. Maybe it spikes, or maybe it dies down... we may learn something either way.

 

Edit: Also, you are running without any mods right? I should have started with this question...

 

And here is the video-

 

 

Also, I had uninstalled Norton, rebooted, running with MS Defender, which right away detected MSFS as bad, lol.. Had to allow it.

Edited November 2, 2022 by davidc2

And here is the video-

 

 

Also, I had uninstalled Norton, rebooted, running with MS Defender, which right away detected MSFS as bad, lol.. Had to allow it.

 

It looks like spikes DOWN in GPU usage at a regular interval, maybe your 3 seconds? There are also spikes UP in CPU usage, though they don’t go very high. Weird.

Hi Tim, if I go that route (which for me would be the a last resort, would I not need to wipe the C drive first? That is actually the hard part. I can do a backup, but I am leery at time of them :)

 

The install process itself includes the option to delete and create a new partition and then format it (which I did), took about 90 seconds. I use Macrium Reflect (free) to create a disk image backup, it takes about an hour and a half on my 2tb hybrid drive, but I only restore my documents, downloads, music, and msfs community folders onto the new Windows install.

Edited November 2, 2022 by tiger1962

And here is the video-

 

 

Also, I had uninstalled Norton, rebooted, running with MS Defender, which right away detected MSFS as bad, lol.. Had to allow it.

 

The first thing that stood out is that your graph shows only 8 threads, but it's a 16 thread processor. Presumably you disabled hyperthreading?

 

Also from the graph, you can see that the main thread is on the eighth core, by looking at the nominal core usage. On that core, you can also clearly see the spikes which line up at roughly 3 second intervals. I've made a quick markup of the graph to highlight the spikes and thread usage:

 

 

I don't know if your problem could be scheduling issue, because hyperthreading is disabled, but it's easy enought to test.

 

Try the following:

 

1. Enable hyperthreading. If that doesn't work,

2. Completely remove your anti-virus (hail mary if the above doesn't work).

The first thing that stood out is that your graph shows only 8 threads, but it's a 16 thread processor. Presumably you disabled hyperthreading?

 

Also from the graph, you can see that the main thread is on the eighth core, by looking at the nominal core usage. On that core, you can also clearly see the spikes which line up at roughly 3 second intervals. I've made a quick markup of the graph to highlight the spikes and thread usage:

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]231584[/ATTACH]

 

I don't know if your problem could be scheduling issue, because hyperthreading is disabled, but it's easy enought to test.

 

Try the following:

 

1. Enable hyperthreading. If that doesn't work,

2. Completely remove your anti-virus (hail mary if the above doesn't work).

 

Hyperthreading had already been disabled and I have removed Norton and am running only Windows Defender. While doing some more reading I discovered what possible could be the culprit, however, fixing it has not been easy (suggestions are welcome!!)

 

I noticed that my Device Manager is cycling about every 3 seconds looking for new devices (sound familiar). I have tried to disable it using the services.msc (found in a web article) but that did not do any good.

 

I am looking for a way to disable it searching for new devices, so if anyone knows how to do that it would be greatly appreciated!

Take a look at this thread in the Windows Seven Forums, it sounds identical to your problem and there's a simple solution:

 

https://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/266184-device-manager-suddenly-scanning-new-devices-constantly.html

Take a look at this thread in the Windows Seven Forums, it sounds identical to your problem and there's a simple solution:

 

https://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/266184-device-manager-suddenly-scanning-new-devices-constantly.html

 

Thanks Tim, that does indeed sound like me, however, did not work :(

Hyperthreading had already been disabled and I have removed Norton and am running only Windows Defender. While doing some more reading I discovered what possible could be the culprit, however, fixing it has not been easy (suggestions are welcome!!)

 

I noticed that my Device Manager is cycling about every 3 seconds looking for new devices (sound familiar). I have tried to disable it using the services.msc (found in a web article) but that did not do any good.

 

I am looking for a way to disable it searching for new devices, so if anyone knows how to do that it would be greatly appreciated!

 

No, I meant ENable hyperthreading.

 

Interesting about the device manager thing. I've never heard of that happening. How did you notice that? That's certainly a weird one...

No, I meant ENable hyperthreading.

 

Interesting about the device manager thing. I've never heard of that happening. How did you notice that? That's certainly a weird one...

 

Not sure of the how, but I feel that is the problem. It does not refresh itself in Safe Mode. I have unplugged USB devices, still has not helped!! Not sure what else to do except, (1) ignore it or (2) reinstall

Yep, that sounds like the issue. Any other peripheral connceted to the PC? Maybe another PCI-e device, like a wifi card or something? How about disconnecting all storage devices, except the C drive... Get the system as bare-bones as possible. If that works, reconnect one-by-one and see which causes the issue.

 

Although it now seems unlikely to be the cause, I would still at least try re-enabling hyperthreading. Although it has a small chance of working, it's a quick check.

By now I would have wiped everything out and started with a fresh hard drive.

By now I would have wiped everything out and started with a fresh hard drive.

 

and I have done exactly that. During the process it took out MSFS ( on a different drive), oh well. Least my Device Manager is not scanning, lol

sometimes and it's happened to me a few weeks back the PSU can be faulty and not producing the correct voltage and is basically dying! It's a hard connection to make but it's worth checking the PSU to see if it's up to par and working correctly.... it could be struggling under load.............. I really can not think of anything else. you seem to have checked everything else but not the PSU........ I had to take my rig to Scan UK as 90% of the parts came from there.... I arrived at 10 am and left at 5:30 in the evening.... they went through everything, it turned out to be a faulty PSU and it was only 4 months old! so I had the opportunity to upgrade it to a 1000w PSU ha... all is running sweet now this end....

 

Worth noting I was running an 850w PSU for the RTX3070 and that ran sweet until it died lol....

Edited November 4, 2022 by daspinall

Well, after reloading a new version of Windows AND MSFS, I am stutter free. Now to monitor and see what program started the device manager to go crazy.....

Ok so it's a software issue, at least you have narrowed it right down.... lets hope a win10 updates don't set you back.... good luck David....