Microstuttering

[The Darkangel UK]

I have a really strange issuse:

Almost every game I played goes with a stuttering for a few milliseconds, even the PLAYSTATION 2 bootlogo has a microsttuter, but after playing a while the game I hit reset on the PCSX2 and the gameplay plays buttersmooth with no stuttering whatsoever, but after shutdown the PCSX2 and reenter the same game is the same problem, the PCSX2 "compiles" some kind of shaders or pipelines or whatever in RAM, and then when I exit the game this "compilation" has to be redone?, or am I missing something here?

Thank you in advance for your kind relies.

My Specs.

CPU: Ryzen 3700x
RAM: 64GB 3200mhz Dual Channel
GFX: Is so embarrasing better I don't tell  (GT1030 2GB PCIE) (Victim of chip market shortage)

P.S. This only happens when I have the vsync turned on. But I'm kinda sure that the stuttering has something to do with some kind of "compilation", I'm looking for someone to enlightment me regarding this matter.

[Catlin]

Is your pcsx2 or roms stored on a HDD? not SSD

I had a problem a while back with hdd parking that caused stutters. I had to use crystaldiskinfo to disable this and never had problems again.
https://crystalmark.info/en/software/cry...m-control/

[The Darkangel UK]

Is your pcsx2 or roms stored on a HDD? not SSD

I had a problem a while back with hdd parking that caused stutters. I had to use crystaldiskinfo to disable this and never had problems again.
https://crystalmark.info/en/software/cry...m-control/

Thank you very much for your reply, yep my roms are stored on SSD (NVME to be exact), in desperation I tested moving temporarily onto a ram drive to same effect, I am starting to wonder if is my crappy video card. But only microstutters in new scene or stage effect it wasn't loaded yet, but when I reset inside the PCSX2 it runs just fine, that's makes me think some precompilation shader/pipeline/beatsme in RAM and then when I close the game it starts microstuttering again, I'm banging my head against the wall about it, I'm just dying to know if is something related to some precompiling graphics not saved to disk afterwards issue. Cheers

[MrWizard]

Turn off vsync . You're forcing the emulator to match your monitor's refresh rate. Which is tricky in most games and basically impossible in some even on good hardware.

As an aside... It's generally a bad idea to enable vsync on any emulator as the games inherently aren't optimized for PC monitors.

[ToiletDuck]

Turn off vsync . You're forcing the emulator to match your monitor's refresh rate. Which is tricky in most games and basically impossible in some even on good hardware.

As an aside... It's generally a bad idea to enable vsync on any emulator as the games inherently aren't optimized for PC monitors.

That kind of micro stutter isn't related to vsync necessarily from my experince.
micro stutter usually is caused by wrong monitor → TV refresh rate !  Ntsc games need atleast 60 refresh rate ..  Even 50fps (pal) games can cause stutter on 60hz monitor/tv .. unless the monitor supports variable refresh rate, only then it doesn't matter as much what the monitors refresh rate is.  

Best is to match monitor/tv refresh rate to the fps of whatever content you try to play for buttersmooth true motion 

And when it occasionally stutters during playback, vsync on top of it can help, since it uses buffer technique sort of speak. At cost of input lag..

Speaking from my own experience ofcourse... 

[The Darkangel UK]

That kind of micro stutter isn't related to vsync necessarily from my experince.
micro stutter usually is caused by wrong monitor → TV refresh rate !  Ntsc games need atleast 60 refresh rate ..  Even 50fps (pal) games can cause stutter on 60hz monitor/tv .. unless the monitor supports variable refresh rate, only then it doesn't matter as much what the monitors refresh rate is.  

Best is to match monitor/tv refresh rate to the fps of whatever content you try to play for buttersmooth true motion 

And when it occasionally stutters during playback, vsync on top of it can help, since it uses buffer technique sort of speak.  At cost of input lag..

Speaking from my own experience ofcourse... 

Thanks everybody for your replies, you're are too kind, Yep, turning v-sync off helps, but it keeps me wondering, why (with v-sync enabled) when all are loaded up, when resetting inside PCSX2 it doesn't stutters all the before loaded scenes anymore, but when I restart the PCSX2 it microstutters again, someone knows if it is some kind of graphics shader pipeline whatever it is doing it in realtime and not preloading when loading the game again issue or any of the sort that makes stuttering and maybe is not so taxing when the v-sync is disabled, BTW: my TV is 60hz.

This situation is making me bonkers, really, I can't figure it out, I tried every configuration, even I tested in a clean Windows installation partition, I moved temporarily everything (PCSX2 in portable mode, ISO), and the results are very much the same, maybe my 3700x with 64GB of DDR4 3200mhz RAM is taking a toll when doing the alleged shader/something compilation and is more noticeable when the V-Sync is on, I'm just rambling 'cause I know very little about the inner workings of emulation of such complex machines.

If anybody wants to jump in this weird/nonsensical quest for the buttersmooth experience with PCSX2, please give me a holler 

[MrWizard]

I'm not going to express my opinion beyond "PS2 isn't a PC" as others definitely have better way to quantifiably explain what is happening. But. I'm a strong believer of the...

"Patient: Doctor, It hurts when I poke *here*"
"Doctor: Then don't poke there"

... method. For buttery-smooth experience you may be trying to force emulator to do things with game that's not originally intended. Sometimes it's not feasible without exceptional hardware and sometimes it's not possible at all. On vsync specifically, just searching for 'vsync and emulation' brings up lots and lots of lots articles why it's typically not a great idea, and it's much better to let your hardware and emulator do what they can do or they think is right vs shoe-horning them into what user thinks.

[ToiletDuck]

Thanks everybody for your replies, you're are too kind,

Aww Gosh.., am i blushing

If anybody wants to jump in this weird/nonsensical quest for the buttersmooth experience with PCSX2, please give me a holler 

 have you ever thought of changing the following ↓ in pcsx2 for butter butt smooth "experience" ?


a. Up the EE cycle rate and overclock pscx2 to 130% for starters , that helps improve frame rate (IF your system is fast enough)
b. Play with "optimal →Frame← pacing" / latency control settings

cheers,
TD

[The Darkangel UK]

Aww Gosh.., am i blushing


 have you ever thought of changing the following ↓ in pcsx2 for butter butt smooth "experience" ?


a. Up the EE cycle rate and overclock pscx2 to 130% for starters , that helps improve frame rate (IF your system is fast enough)
b. Play with "optimal →Frame← pacing" / latency control settings

cheers,
TD

Again, you're too kind, Yep I messed with that in some games even "overcloking" it 3x, some hits 60fps vs 25-35fps in real PS2 (Mainly games running in Unreal Engine), other games crash and burn badly, even one game (I don't remember the name) crashed my video driver and I have to reboot the entire machine, LOL, but I meant with "Butter butt smooth"    , to run without stuttering, just like a plain old vanilla PS2 (but with cleaner graphics, not so vanilla, but you catch my drift). My only way to get it flawless now, is to play the game twice    

MrWizard Wrote

... method. For buttery-smooth experience you may be trying to force emulator to do things with game that's not originally intended. Sometimes it's not feasible without exceptional hardware and sometimes it's not possible at all. On vsync specifically, just searching for 'vsync and emulation' brings up lots and lots of lots articles why it's typically not a great idea, and it's much better to let your hardware and emulator do what they can do or they think is right vs shoe-horning them into what user thinks.

MrWizard, bro, nearly all PS2 games have V-Sync on in real hardware, if I turned V-Sync off, the game's screen tearing is crazy, and that tearing isn't happening in the real PS2, and besides if the game "screentears" in the PS2, the same effect happens on PCSX2, regardless of the V-Sync option, the V-Sync option is for syncronize the video that the emulator outputs with the screen, not for the game, I know there are emulators (for simpler machines) that tries syncing the game itself, often with terrible results (glitches, crashes, freezes, audio desyncing, etc), but I think with PCSX2 that's not the case, maybe I'm wrong, but I've seen videos on youtube of PCSX2 running flawless without that pesky microstutter and with no tearing (That makes me think that there is the V-Sync on in that videos), anyway, I think I'm just SOL.

But I'm really grateful for your kind replies, and for trying to help, I'm looking forward for your new ideas, or maybe the developers (if I'm blessed enough to be read by them) sheds some light about that issue, I think that's an interesting topic (I hope)

Cheers everybody

[ToiletDuck]

(but with cleaner graphics, not so vanilla, but you catch my drift).

Have you considered to upgrade your gpu (REALY !!)  .  An gpu with better vulkan support is realy worth the money for emulation i can tell you for sure..

your gpu is more an match for my cpu, but my PCIe 4.0 GPU is more like an match for your cpu  
Check these VS results out, but i suggest you sit firmly down before you do 

Atleast i've got already an decent gpu ready for my next build in 2023


Yet, considering my cpu is weaker than your rizen it must be an gpu restriction.  iam even able to emulate "some" PS3 games at an "butter butt smooth" 60fps in rpcsx3 and @1440p resolution too with my ol fx-xxxx cpu.

Also, you've mentioned some poeple suspect the audio settings causing micro stutter behaviour, and i must confirm that. 
I've had some occasional microstutter myself in some games, untill i started to use Xaudio2 + Async Mix combo    ↔ = Pitch perfect.

You can even hear it ingame if the audio "might" have something to do with frame stutters if you listen carefull .


cheers,
TD