Will Valve ever fix the stutter bug?

Dr. Cogent, Manabyte is right. It's not Valves problem, it's your problem. Posting stuff like "Oh, I've seen your kind" in response to intelligent posts makes you look like a fucken dolt.
I have similar hardware to you:

AMD 64 3200+
1gig of Ram (x2 512mb 3200)
Radeon 9800
SB Live

Halflife 2 runs like a fucken dream at 1280x1024.
 
-jinx- said:
I don't like where this thread is going.

Complaining about performance issues with HL2 is a valid subject. However, claiming that games developed for a console -- with a perfectly fixed hardware configuration -- and PC games which have to support virtually infinite combinations of hardware and software configurations is a bullshit argument.

Quite frankly, I think this thread is just an excuse to complain about HL2 under the disguise of "speculation."
Click to expand...

Jinx, take any PC game. I don't care. Put Doom 3 in there. Does that make it somehow better? The point is, good games can run well. On the PC, they can run well on a myriad of machines. HL2 almost seems biased against high end machines to run bad.

It's no guise.

And now it's been how many months since release? And the game still has this issue? Will it be fixed? I am beginning to think it won't.
 
I get your 'point' about the comparison to RE4, but dragging consoles into this creates for a pretty flawed analogy, as others have already stated why. I do agree that HL2's engine has some issues, and the general response to the whole 'why does is stutter on my system' question on most forums is typically the not-so-subtle brag of 'it runs flawless on my system' followed by a list of their PC stats and fourteen high resolution pictures of their neon blue case. HL2 is a good looking game, not exactly great by modern standards, and certainly not to the point that it should be causing the many issues it causes on many machines. I too get the stutter problem occasionally, and yes, it honestly subtracts from the gameplay. Doom 3 and a myriad of other modern games run just fine on my system, so what makes HL2 so different? Why does it run fine on some systems with weaker specs than my own and better on others? What minuscule software differences are causing the conflicts? It's these little issues that really invalidate any comparisons to the closed environment of a console. At this point, I don't really care about the issues as I've had my fun with the game and ready to move on. I just hope I don't run into future Source-engine games with similar issues.
 
Did you defrag your hard drive if you downloaded from Steam? I dunno if it will fix this specific problem...

I never did get the stutter. Athlon XP 2500+, Radeon 9800 Pro, 768 MB of RAM (PC2700).
 
tedtropy said:
I get your 'point' about the comparison to RE4, but dragging consoles into this creates for a pretty flawed analogy, as others have already stated why. I do agree that HL2's engine has some issues, and the general response to the whole 'why does is stutter on my system' question on most forums is typically the not-so-subtle brag of 'it runs flawless on my system' followed by a list of their PC stats and fourteen high resolution pictures of their neon blue case. HL2 is a good looking game, not exactly great by modern standards, and certainly not to the point that it should be causing the many issues it causes on many machines. I too get the stutter problem occasionally, and yes, it honestly subtracts from the gameplay. Doom 3 and a myriad of other modern games run just fine on my system, so what makes HL2 so different? Why does it run fine on some systems with weaker specs than my own and better on others? What minuscule software differences are causing the conflicts? It's these little issues that really invalidate any comparisons to the closed environment of a console. At this point, I don't really care about the issues as I've had my fun with the game and ready to move on. I just hope I don't run into future Source-engine games with similar issues.
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Like I said to -jinx-, if you replace RE4 with Doom 3, I don't feel it makes it any more better or acceptable.

What bothers me is that I can get something so good out of so little, and with this high profile game to end all PC games on a fast ass machine, runs like crap for some reason - with absolutely no visible comment from Valve whatsoever regarding the issue. It's also in that Troika Vampire game (whatever its called). It's been complete silence since day one, so it begs the question - is anything ever going to come of it?
 
Wellington said:
Did you defrag your hard drive if you downloaded from Steam? I dunno if it will fix this specific problem...

I never did get the stutter. Athlon XP 2500+, Radeon 9800 Pro, 768 MB of RAM (PC2700).
Click to expand...

Nope didn't download from Steam. I defragged anyway.

Just take a look at what this guy did on the Steam forums. It's almost ludicrous.

http://forums.steampowered.com/foru...hlight=Finding+the+cause+of+the+audio+stutter

I realize the thread is long, but if you read even a few pages of it - you can see what people have gone through to try to rid themselves of this problem.

People have adjusted PCI latencies, defragged, installed tons of different drivers, reinstalled, you name it - they've done it.
 
Dr_Cogent said:
What bothers me is that I can get something so good out of so little, and with this high profile game to end all PC games on a fast ass machine, runs like crap for some reason - with absolutely no visible comment from Valve whatsoever regarding the issue.
Click to expand...

I've seen the same kind of argument since i've been a pc gamer. Upgrade your rig and stop crying. Pc gaming is expensive. How many times have i heard OMFG DOOM1/2/Quake/duke3d/etcetc IS NOT OPTIMISED THEY ARE MORONZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11eleven.
 
I have never experienced stutter, but the load times in HL2 single player are still pretty long. I didn't get the game till mid January (so whatever patch was out at that time), and I optimized the fuck out of my computer and the game's settings before I started on the campaign.

Radeon 9800XT 256mb
Athlon 64 3000+ at stock speed
1GB PC3200 RAM
SATA hard drive

On my rig HL2 runs much better than Doom 3.
 
Naked Shuriken said:
I've seen the same kind of argument since i've been a pc gamer. Upgrade your rig and stop crying. Pc gaming is expensive. How many times have i heard OMFG DOOM1/2/Quake/duke3d/etcetc IS NOT OPTIMISED THEY ARE MORONZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11eleven.
Click to expand...

Yup. The good Dr is the type of caller Tech Support people dread, but also the source of the most inner-office laughter and jokes.
 
Dr_Cogent said:
Like I said to -jinx-, if you replace RE4 with Doom 3, I don't feel it makes it any more better or acceptable.

What bothers me is that I can get something so good out of so little, and with this high profile game to end all PC games on a fast ass machine, runs like crap for some reason - with absolutely no visible comment from Valve whatsoever regarding the issue. It's also in that Troika Vampire game (whatever its called). It's been complete silence since day one, so it begs the question - is anything ever going to come of it?
Click to expand...

Again, it's apples and oranges. The Gamecube is a device utterly optimized to play games SPECIFICALLY designed for it. Half-Life 2 has to deal with an almost infinite amount of different hardware and software configurations. Granted, HL2 may seem to have more problems that most PC games, but then again, it's more popular than alot of PC games and its problems are going to naturally be more in the spotlight. If HL2 makes you regret your PC purpose, then there's plenty of other games out there to fill your ubermachine lust. Or just run a looping 3DMark2003 benchmark.
 
Wow, with all the damage control that Manabyte is running you would think that George Lucas made the fuckin' game :lol

The stuttering problem seems widespread enough and affecting mid/high-range users enough that you can't just pawn the bullshit off on everyone's hardware. Telling people already sitting on a gig of RAM to go and buy more is ridiculous....particularly considering that 512 MB is the Recommended (not Minimum) spec. People with the Minimum spec should not expect outstanding framerates, but you would have to be an asshole to suggest that they should put up with 0 fps stuttering.

As a sidenote: I think a more interesting question is "Who will fix their problems faster - Bungie or Valve?"
 
Burger said:
Dr. Cogent, Manabyte is right. It's not Valves problem, it's your problem. Posting stuff like "Oh, I've seen your kind" in response to intelligent posts makes you look like a fucken dolt.
I have similar hardware to you:

AMD 64 3200+
1gig of Ram (x2 512mb 3200)
Radeon 9800
SB Live

Halflife 2 runs like a fucken dream at 1280x1024.
Click to expand...

That's bullshit. I had the stuttering at launch and, as I posted earlier, had it fixed by one of the early patches (So that it doesn't stutter the entire game). Nothing on my end changed. Only the patch that Steam downloaded onto my computer. If nothing in an equation changes other than a patch, it was obviously fixed by Valve. There's just some real condescending posts in here about people being too stupid to get it running flawlessly. After reading these, consider yourself fortunate if it's running the way it's supposed too. I know I do. The enjoyment factor shot up a couple notches for me once this issue was removed.
 
interesting. No stutter here, and I played through the whole game on an AMD 64-bit 3200+, 512 pc2700 RAM, and a Radeon 9500 pro. Pretty much mid-to-low-end stuff. The ability for me to run the game at a good resolution with pretty good detail settings and no slowdown was a major reason I liked the game so much. Sorry you've had so many problems.

Note - I make a practice of disabling all non-essential services before I play games. That's pretty much the only thing I did to run it, and it runs well.
 
Just looking at the varying configs and conflicting performance claims. This bug is gonna be one bitch to fix. One thing that eludes me is why the bug hasnt been mentioned in any of the reviews that use the source benchmarking tool for cpu or gpu benchmarks. Its the nature of the beast in PC gaming though many configs and even more drivers and their different versions. Some of ya may need bios updates, others new drivers or a full hdd format. I dunno cant comment cause I never had the problem running the game on a 9600 pro.

The console comparison is still stupid though, if it works on one it works on them all, consoles inherent advantage that balances out lack of upgradeability and general computing utility.

My advice would be to download a good disk defragementer from download.com like disk keeper, check for valve updates, get latest video drivers, mb drivers, and bios. put it all on a disk and try a reformat after you back up your stuff. Also get a memory manager maybe you guys are getting a memory leak, check for spyware, and make sure someone hasnt put a malicious service on your computer. Make sure you try the game with no AA or AF as well those routines make huge memory imprints that can make the game crawl due to lack of video memory. You'r best bet is for valve to pinpoint the bug though, which will be a bitch sense it seems to be a group of people that have no problems and some that cant play.
 
DonasaurusRex said:
My advice would be to download a good disk defragementer from download.com like disk keeper, check for valve updates, get latest video drivers, mb drivers, and bios. put it all on a disk and try a reformat after you back up your stuff. Also get a memory manager maybe you guys are getting a memory leak, check for spyware, and make sure someone hasnt put a malicious service on your computer. Make sure you try the game with no AA or AF as well those routines make huge memory imprints that can make the game crawl due to lack of video memory. You'r best bet is for valve to pinpoint the bug though, which will be a bitch sense it seems to be a group of people that have no problems and some that cant play.
Click to expand...

Also use msconfig and remove anything from startup that you don't absolutely have to have.
 
hrmmm just read the valve boards, theres a sticky about this so devs have noticed. The consensus seems to be that the game has to load sounds from the hdd instead of them being cached into memory. Yeah that'll get ya stuttering when you go from 12 or so ns latency to 40 ms your gonna feel the pain. Maybe the people that dont have the problem are getting lucky cause the sounds are in their hdd cache. Its apossibility, also if your disk is fragmented its gonna wreak havoc. either way if this is true ...pretty bad choice for valve even if they were trying to lower load times....I still dont stutter...
 
I've got a p4 2.8 but only 512 megs of ram and a radeon 9600.....but I can run hl2 without the stuttering. I did have it initially, but when I knocked textures down from high to medium, the problem was solved. I also only run it with like 2x anti-aliasing. And it can run on 1280x1024 pretty smoothly actually, which kind of blew my mind. Most games I would try that just for shits and giggles, I couldn't believe that it was very playable at that res.

Last year after Far Cry though, I set up a a whole new gaming profile on my PC that boots up without all the extra bullshit services XP normally starts up with. Not sure how much that factors into it though. I'll be in the market for a new card soon though, it's a damn beautiful game with the textures cranked.
 
Ryudo said:
My pc specs;

A64 3500
X800XT PE
1 GB 2-2-2-5 Ram
WD 120GB ATA drive
SB audigy

It runs fine in some areas, others it crawls. The game is constantly skipping and stuttering even at 1024 x 768. Factor in the massive and frequent loading times - i refuse to play it.

It really irks me that games run like this, about the only thing i am left to try is buying a raptor 74gb drive, but alas i cant stand HL2 anymore. Frame rate is god on the PC, i cant play anything under 60fps.
Click to expand...


Did you have NVIDIA hardware before? Maybe you should reformat because you are the only person with ATI hardware that has the stutter problem in this thread. :lol

Unless I missed one?
 
I have an AMD 64 3200+, 1 gig of RAM, and a GeForce 6600 GT AGP. The game stutters like fucking hell. It's not the hardware's fault - it's Valve's.
 
I know that there are other issues with this game, for example, not running with some certain RAM configurations...where people would replace the RAM with a different brand and it would solve the issue.

This is why I mentioned hardware configurations.
 
People who are getting pissy and saying "BUY A REAL COMPUTER" or other such bullshit need to chill.

I haven't patched because I finished Half-Life 2 a week or so after it came out, but on the initial version, I tried it on three computers:

Athlon XP 1800+
Abit VIA KT266A-based mobo
Radeon 9800pro
1GB RAM
SB Live

Stuttery, but then this is my old not so fast computer. What did you expect? :)

Athlon 64 3000+
MSI VIA K8T800-based mobo (think that's the right chipset model, maybe it was 800? Think it was a Neo FIS2R or something like that)
Radeon 9800pro
512MB RAM
On board audio

Stuttery. Less stuttery if texture detail is rolled back to Medium, but even so, still annoying.

Athlon 64 3200+
Cheapo ECS Fry's special SiS754-based mobo
Radeon 9600XT
1 GB RAM
On board audio

Hardly stuttery at all - maybe a brief hitch but totally forgivable.

This is why it's not fixed - there's not an obvious pattern. You'd think maybe the cheapest mobo with a low end chipset might be the culprit, but for some reason it performed the best of the three.

I haven't tried it on my new machine (also an A64 3200, but with an nForce 3 250GB based mobo) and they've patched since then, so I can't compare it directly anyway...

What exactly is the stutter bug? I never noticed any stuttering on the PCs I've played the game on...
Click to expand...

Well, it's just that every time the game needs to lo-lo-lo-load a new line of dialogue, it seems to st-st-st-st-st-stutter a few times as the buffers get star-ar-ar-ar-ar-ved. :)
 
I think the stuttering bug is a problem with steam... I hate to bring up discussions of piracy, but didn't pirated copies that worked actually not have stuttering? It may also be that the game is far larger in size than it really looks and the source engine decompresses the files and then recompresses them as the game runs (or at least decompresses as events trigger).

I'm no expert... I did get a lot of stuttering in HL2 (still loved the game though) but a lot of that in my case was video related, because I'm using a godwaful geforce 4 ti4200.
 
this is taken form the firingsquad gl2 optimisation guide:

-Setting the heap size: You know those annoying pauses you get when going through a door or up a ladder and changing scenes. DonÂ’t you think they are too long? Well, if you would like to reduce those times, you can increase what is known as your heap size. This is memory that is allocated for game information and level storage. Increasing this can heavily reduce loading times in the middle of the level when you go through that door or walk down those stairs. Right click on the Half Life 2 desktop icon, click properties and add -heapsize XX to the end of target command line where XX is the allocated memory for the heap. If you have 512, donÂ’t allocate more than 256. If you have 1GB, donÂ’t allocate more than 512. If you have 128, you probably should not be playing this game.

Hope it helps!!!
 
eXxy said:
i don't understand how doom 3 runs so great, but half life 2 runs so crappy :\
Click to expand...

Its the same with me. I have a 3.2ghz processor, gig of good ram, radeon 9800pro and Doom 3 runs like butter. Half Life runs like utter shit. I basically stopped playing because the stuttering was so getting so irritating. I braved it for a little less than half the game until I just said fuck it.

Gantz said:
Get better hardware?

Runs like silk on my 1.8 Athlon, 1 gig pc2100 ram, AIW 9700pro.
Click to expand...

My processor is twice as fast and my video card is better-- it has nothing to do with hardware. It's shitty coding by Valve.
 
Ristamar said:
I don't have Half-Life 2 (yet), but I find this thread intruiging. Time to do some reading on the Steam boards...
Click to expand...

You won't have to look hard Ristamar. It's all over the place.

Celicar said:
HL2 ran perfectly on mine. No stutters. I only have 512. Looks like I win.
Click to expand...

What did you win? I sure hope it's good :lol

marsomega said:
Did you have NVIDIA hardware before? Maybe you should reformat because you are the only person with ATI hardware that has the stutter problem in this thread. :lol

Unless I missed one?
Click to expand...

Has nothing to do with this at all.

MomoPufflet said:
Its the same with me. I have a 3.2ghz processor, gig of good ram, radeon 9800pro and Doom 3 runs like butter. Half Life runs like utter shit. I basically stopped playing because the stuttering was so getting so irritating. I braved it for a little less than half the game until I just said fuck it.
Click to expand...

This is what really pisses me off. The fact that no major reviewing site made mention of the issue. Which begs the question. Did Valve know about it from the start and thats why they forced PC Gamer and the like to come to their offices in WA to play it? Also, Steam is a POS in it's own right, and only now that the game has been out for a while have we noticed anyone complaining about it. We didn't see it in any of the major reviews because they didn't have to contend with idiotic Steam.
 
Valve has commented on the issue and they have addressed it through various patches. You could find this mentioned in the readme assigned to a couple steam updates. It is a real problem and even received a couple console commands specifically intended to address it.

I initially played the game on a 2.4 GHz machine, but I now have both a 3.0 GHz p4 and a 3.6 GHz P4. Both systems still suffer from lengthy loading times (in comparison to other games), though it has improved since launch. The stuttering issue is also still present, though that too has become less problematic.

I have seen this game running on a machine with 2gb of ram as well, and the problem was still there...

Now, here's what is most interesting...

A couple of my friends claimed to have never seen the stutter bug and simply said that there were problems with the machines that suffered from it. However, when I tested the game out myself on their machines, the stuttering was as present as it has ever been...

It's been quite sometime since I've really looked into the issue as I'm finished with the game and probably won't really play it again for a while. However, if I recall, the main issue was related to the compression of the GCF files. There was that pirate build of the game which unpacked all of this data and allowed the game to be run without the GCF files in place. Someone here tested this out and noted that load times were generally half the length of the normal version and stuttering was almost non-existant. Seeing as the GCF file is apart of their security system for Steam, I don't think this will ever be fixed...
 
I get that stutter sometimes, but rarely during gameplay. I get it at the main menu (while clicking on...say Load Game)...I hear the music looping and it seems like it froze. Is that it?
 
TeTr1C said:
I get that stutter sometimes, but rarely during gameplay. I get it at the main menu (while clicking on...say Load Game)...I hear the music looping and it seems like it froze. Is that it?
Click to expand...

Yep, that is exactly it.
 
dark10x said:
Valve has commented on the issue and they have addressed it through various patches. You could find this mentioned in the readme assigned to a couple steam updates. It is a real problem and even received a couple console commands specifically intended to address it.
Click to expand...

Yes, Valve has commented on it in the past, but since their last, unsuccessful for me I might add, attempt to fix it - they have been completely mum on the subject. That seems like ages ago. It was on Jan 10th I believe. We're coming up on 2 months pretty quickly now since then.
 
I've gotten the stutter bug too...not as bad for me as what some people seem to be getting.

Anyway my specs

A64 3000+
X800pro
1 GB low latency ram 2-2-2-5
200GB SATA drive

I run with everything up and at 1280x1024 with 4X AA

Is this bug sound card related perhaps?
 
Vormund said:
Is this bug sound card related perhaps?
Click to expand...

Nope. Happens on a myraid of different sound devices.

I just think it's shitty coding/design personally. Why the HD should be getting hit during gameplay is completely beyond me. I could only understand it if virtual memory was being accessed, but that shouldn't be the case.
 
actually alot of people are saying its how the sound is loaded from the hdd instead of being cached in memory that is causing hte loading/stuttering....bad decision if valve is using this technique.
 
Stuttering on my old PC

AMD XP 1900+
512MB 133MHz RAM
GF Ti4200 64MB
AC97 or SoundBlaster 128 PCI something

No stuttering on new PC.

P4 3.4GHz
1024MB 533MHz RAM
GF 6800 256MB PCI-E
Auidgy 2 ZS
 
I get a little stutter after HL2 loads a new level/environment. A tad annoying but nothing to get upset about. I get more stutter in Vampire: masquerade, which I believe uses the same engine. It's quite annoying in Vampire. My system:

A64 3200+
512MB DDR400
Geforce 6800GT 128MB

So based on tahrikmili's post:
No stutter here:

Athlon XP3200+
1GB PC3200 RAM
128MB Radeon 9800XT

1280x1024 0xAA 16xAF or 2xAA 8xAF depending on map.
Click to expand...

Maybe it is RAM. Although my processor is faster...hmmmm
 
Blatz said:
I get a little stutter after HL2 loads a new level/environment. A tad annoying but nothing to get upset about. I get more stutter in Vampire: masquerade, which I believe uses the same engine. It's quite annoying in Vampire. My system:

A64 3200+
512MB DDR400
Geforce 6800GT 128MB

So based on tahrikmili's post:


Maybe it is RAM. Although my processor is faster...hmmmm
Click to expand...

Vampire uses the exact same engine.

It's not RAM. It's not processor. It's a crap game engine is what it is.
 
If you choose the highest texture quality setting, and your vid card has less than 256MB of VRAM, you'll get some studder. Those with 256MB cards or chooses lesser quality texture settings won't.

So it's not RAM issue, but VRAM issue (don't ask me why).
 
Shogmaster said:
If you choose the highest texture quality setting, and your vid card has less than 256MB of VRAM, you'll get some studder. Those with 256MB cards or chooses lesser quality texture settings won't.

So it's not RAM issue, but VRAM issue (don't ask me why).
Click to expand...

I set my video/audio settings all to the bare minimum. It still hitches. 1 GB of RAM.
 
Shogmaster said:
If you choose the highest texture quality setting, and your vid card has less than 256MB of VRAM, you'll get some studder. Those with 256MB cards or chooses lesser quality texture settings won't.

So it's not RAM issue, but VRAM issue (don't ask me why).
Click to expand...

I set it to medium and the game still stutters for me. It's definitely a ram issue, because I can hear the harddrive still grinding away even after the load screen has finished. HL2 and bloodlines (bloodlines moreso) eats through ram quicker than Star Jones does through a box of twinkies.
 
I'm sure the resources being compressed with the whole GCF thing has something to do with the stutter.

Apparently, the pirated version (which doesn't have compressed resources) runs better; I'd like to know if it stutters.

Maybe I should make a 'mod' where the only difference is extracted resources. I think there are GCF browsers that work.
 
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