Audio popping issue

I'm kinda scared that since its mostly with people who have older CPUs,we might not actually get a fix for this,and just sorta be left out,get a better CPU kinda thing
Which is stupid,since ShB worked perfect

Completely agree playing with NO AUDIO since shortly after 6.0 to avoid the ear splitting noise and still no fix just some half baked comments.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AsheStrachan

I'm kinda scared that since its mostly with people who have older CPUs,we might not actually get a fix for this,and just sorta be left out,get a better CPU kinda thing
Which is stupid,since ShB worked perfect

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In addition to the fact that it's clear that it's not as simple as saying "old hardware" given how many other newer machines have this same issue, including when the benchmark itself identifies and provides no problems or bugs of any sort along these lines, there is also the issue of having perfectly serviceable software just a few weeks back prior to FFXIV 6.0 that worked totally fine (and which many people are calling for a return to at least until such an issue with an improved sound engine is provided). Plus...I mean, it does sound a little weird for a game that's operating on fundamentally ten-year-old code and software/server models to say that we need newer machines
now to keep up with it.

Why is the benchmark that was supposed to be the program that shows if our system is able to run the game does not present this problem?

I've done the test without any program running along the test and with several programs running along the test and always had good results.

The benchmark doesn't even have the option of this immersive audio, so it shouldn't have this update in the audio driver.

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Originally Posted by Nyarlat

getting more and more obvious by the day that the problem stems from the implementation of this 3rd party audio mod that nobody wanted

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Considering all the tried "fixes" done on this forum alone, it should also be pretty clear that nothing can be done on the user side. I also feel like that it is pretty obvious and at this point anyone should be able to dedutct, that the reason is probably the implementation of the 3rd party audio programm or the changes to accommodate its use. I just find it mostly baffling that no method of reversing to the old audio was made during development/ implementation (which is usually a standart when you are doing such drastic changes that could affect the whole playerbase). In addition, I also find it very concerning that this issue (at this point) perists already for 3 weeks, because it has been known since day 1 and is one of the biggest problems, besides login issues.
All we can do is just giving them the bug report stats, explanations and keep hoping, I guess.
I am not even mad anymore, just pretty disappointed.

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Originally Posted by polyphanes

In addition to the fact that it's clear that it's not as simple as saying "old hardware" given how many other newer machines have this same issue, including when the benchmark itself identifies and provides no problems or bugs of any sort along these lines, there is also the issue of having perfectly serviceable software just a few weeks back prior to FFXIV 6.0 that worked totally fine (and which many people are calling for a return to at least until such an issue with an improved sound engine is provided). Plus...I mean, it does sound a little weird for a game that's operating on fundamentally ten-year-old code and software/server models to say that we need newer machines
now to keep up with it.

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Yeah like my processor isn't new, but they say
"Older then 10 years" and I see a ton of folks, myself included, using the FX 8320, and that was october 2012, so it's 9 years old.

Side Note: Turned on the "Spatial Pack" and the popping seems to have gone away.
The new problem is.. well... the audio pack sounds terrible. Voices and music are normal, but sound effects now have a muffled sound like they're underwater.
I also noticed if the spatial audio is on, the Equalizer HAS to be set to normal.
Changing it to Bass/Treble/Voice/Logi will cause it to stutter, but changing it back to Normal will instantly fix it.
This is not a solution since I'll have to buy the pack once the trial is over...

Thank you very much for the communication, Zhexos. I've finally gotten around to doing some more thorough testing on my end (spoilers: none of the fixes worked) and have submitted a bug report including answers to your questions. Here's hopin'. I'd like to bring up the request that a legacy audio driver be looked into, as many others have suggested, but of course I understand that it might not be technically feasible. However, it's been three weeks and the only fix to this issue has actively made it worse for many. An official statement by the team via Lodestone would go a long way to calming people's nerves.

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Originally Posted by Zhexos

Greetings,

As we continue to investigate the matter, we have confirmed that after the fixes we applied in Patch 6.01 the issue continues to persist for some of our players who may be using CPUs that are older than 10 years. However, due to the fact that there are various types of CPUs available we still have not isolated the cause of the issue.

If you continue to experience in-game audio issues, we ask you to try the following steps below:

1. The system specifications for your PC hardware may be running below the minimum specifications required to play FFXIV. If you have multiple applications running in the background while playing FFXIV or have certain in-game settings to a higher setting, your hardware may be performing below the required minimum specifications. Please try making the following changes to see if the issue resolves:
   • Decrease the number of characters and objects displayed.
     This option is available in the System Configuration > Other Settings > Character and Object Quantity.
   • If you have multiple applications running in the background, try closing those other applications.
   • Make sure your output audio device is set as the Default Device.
     In Windows, open the Control Panel (hit the Windows key and type "Control Panel" and hit the Enter key) > Click on Hardware and Sound > Click on Sound > Under the Playback tab, make sure your audio device is set as the Default Device. If you do not see your audio device as the Default Device, right-click the audio device and select the "Set as Default Device" option.
2. If the above methods do not resolve the issue, we would like for you to submit an in-game bug report with the following information along with your system information.
   • What are your Character and Object Quantity current set to?
   • What other applications do you have running in the background while playing FFXIV?
   • Is your audio device set as the Default Device? (Yes/No)
   • Would the issue persist when playing the game in DirectX 9?
     DirectX 9 option is available when you turn off the DirectX 11 Support option which can be found in your FFXIV Launcher by clicking on the gear icon on the top right (Config).
   • If you use a gamepad, does the issue persist when you unplug the gamepad? (Yes/No)
   • Does the issue persist when you have the in-game Equalizer Mode set to Standard? (Yes/No)
     This setting can be found under the System Configuration > Sound Settings > Equalizer.
   • Does the issue persist when the Listening Position is set closer to the Character? (Yes/No)
     This setting can be found under the System Configuration > Sound Settings > Listening Position.
   • Please copy/paste your system information.
     System information can be found in your FFXIV Launcher by clicking on the gear icon on the top right (Config) and clicking on Display under System Information. Another window with your system information will be displayed so please click on the "Copy to Clipboard" button and past the information with your bug report.

We thank you all for your support as we continue to investigate the matter.

---

Not gonna lie... I feel kind of insulted.

These questions are so incredibly basic, and have been answered in this thread alone 100 times over. Why are we even making threads if nobody even bothers to read even a fraction of it?
None of these things actually fix anything for anyone. Everyone in this thread, BESIDES the official response, seems to be aware of that.

WAY to point out, that our CPUs are 10 years old, and infer that the issue is on US for running old hardware... AGAIN.

On that note... May I ask how old FF XIV is? How much outdated infrastructure does square rely on? How well has it worked up until now? Why are companies generally hesitant to upgrade hardware and software, just for the sake of it? Wanna remind me what kind of problems you guys ran into recently, when having to upgrade your servers, given the semiconductor shortage and the ludicrous prices for any hardware whatsoever?

Do you think we the consumers do not have good cause to follow the exact same line of reasoning square does when it comes to upgrading hardware and software? Do you think we are immune to those very same problems you guys run into?

Do you see the irony in asking us to play on Dx9 because newly introduced changes by square broke the already broken Dx11 further... while simultaneously being dismissive of our issues due to the fact that our CPUs are "old"?

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As we, the consumers, continue to investigate the matter, we have confirmed that after the issues introduced in Patch 6.0 and 6.0.1, the developer persistently relies on 27 year old software released in 1995 as a fallback for users in 2021.

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See how infuriatingly disingenuous this is, although factually correct? Complexity and innovation always trades stability for performance. It's perfectly good reasoning to prioritize stability over innovation.

While we are at it, wanna remind me WHAT specific, completely unnecessary, unannounced, cheaply outsourced, payed Audio KEYWORD: "Upgrade" on square enix's side brought about this problem to people who do not even use said service in the first place?
-----------------------------------

...Moving on - I understand that square is trying to help. But their attempt at doing so implicitly reveals a complete lack of understanding, and an attitude towards the consumer, that is quite frankly insulting.

I hope the ongoing 3 weeks+ long "investigation" picks up a little and considers catalogueing the specs, attempted fixes and issues encountered in this thread. Actually reading some of the many useful posts and videos made in here may also seem like a very easy and effective thing do. Posts like this one.

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Originally Posted by MiaShino

It took much time to find simple way of stating this.. maahhh things make so much sense in the mind yet when you attempt putting them to words everything goes fooey.

This audio stuttering issue reminds me of the type of issues experienced during HLE audio emulation on console emulators. It seems Square could be struggling to schedule audio processing requests across multiple cpu cores if any slowdown in the pipeline occurs. This results in the audio engine waiting to process new requests which as you hear causes stuttering effect. This would be especially prominent on FX cpus because of unique nature of core configuration.

Example time! On Bulldozer (FX series) cpu cores do not have dedicated floating point units opting instead to share one across two cores. They are much much of the worse at certain calculations especially ones requiring these floating point units. Vector calculations were and still are quite difficult to work with and as spatial audio requires many of these to be made..

You cannot rely on cpu utilization either. You may see something close to 40% utilization and wonder; but the cpu is not at 100% so I have additional headroom! You may in fact not. If something has stalled thus starving those cpu cores of something to process it will not be processing anything so will read as "not fully saturated". Even worse for FX because if that shared floating point unit is busy doing something then both cpu cores sharing it must also wait.

I may have the number of FP units per core cluster wrong so many apologies again. I hated working with bulldozer and do not do much difficult software development anymore (because it causes insanity..).

Square must increase the audio buffer (this may introduce slight audio delay but is highly preferable to crackling audio) or add option for number of audio channels into the sound options going forward.

For any suffering from this issue who also attempt thousands of erroneous solutions, I would not waste too much time doing this. I.. just.. cannot believe a major developer would make drastic overhaul to their sound engine without seemingly properly testing it across multiple hardware configurations. At the least they should have implemented a legacy fall back should unforeseen problems arise allowing users to temporarily roll back to working solution until problem is resolved. Then I find out they charge for the sound pack that created the issue in first place, seriously? Who does this?

Myself and friends are not encountering the issue yet on older hardware (i7 4790K and Amd Phenom x4).

Edit time! The PS3 cell micro architecture suffered from similar issues when attempting to make those pesky spes do anything because you had to wait for the ppe. It was unholy nightmare for many.

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So the newest update to the spatial audio addon actually fixed the issue for me, but the solution cant be to spend more money..

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Originally Posted by paga

So the newest update to the spatial audio addon actually fixed the issue for me, but the solution cant be to spend more money..

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Yeah I downloaded it last night and with it on, and with Equalizer set to Normal, it seems to not crackle/pop ingame though it still gets choppy when loading between zones.

Is this truly what we'll have to deal with? To pay money to get what we once had?!

It's like the Launch Trailer said...
There must be a way to restore things to the way they were! To reclaim the perfect audio paradise we once had!
It will be ours again! Our world free of crackles!

Once again the response is "Your CPU must not be good enough to run this game" which is complete BS and shows a lot of ignorance on the matter. Really souring my attitude towards this game which is a shame because I absolutely love Endwalker. Though I've been one of the few who have actually been able to PLAY the damn thing in spite of this gross bug. That's only because it doesn't seem to be as severe for me.

Bottom line is that the game worked flawlessly before 6.0 and the release of this new sound engine/spatial audio pack. I'd rather SQEX be honest and say "screw you, get a better CPU/buy the spatial audio pack or we're moving on without you regardless" more plainly instead of patronizing the customers with their "solutions" and things that have already been ruled out by said customers painstakingly looking into the issue themselves.

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Originally Posted by imabooterfly

Once again the response is "Your CPU must not be good enough to run this game" which is complete BS and shows a lot of ignorance on the matter. Really souring my attitude towards this game which is a shame because I absolutely love Endwalker. Though I've been one of the few who have actually been able to PLAY the damn thing in spite of this gross bug. That's only because it doesn't seem to be as severe for me.

Bottom line is that the game worked flawlessly before 6.0 and the release of this new sound engine/spatial audio pack. I'd rather SQEX be honest and say "screw you, get a better CPU or we're moving on without you regardless" more plainly instead of patronizing the customers with their "solutions" and things that have already been ruled out by said customers painstakingly looking into the issue themselves.

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Yeah I have a Ryzen 5 5600x so its not only on old cpu. And even with spatial Audio the bug came back, at least I know to not spend more money on it..

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Originally Posted by paga

Yeah I have a Ryzen 5 5600x so its not only on old cpu. And even with spatial Audio the bug came back, at least I know to not spend more money on it..

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Dang, that's only a year old.
They're over there saying "Issues with 10+ year old CPUs"
Mine's a 8320, which came out late 2012. So it's not new, but 9 years is not 10+ years.
Kind of starting to sound like they have zero clue what is the cause, and they're just saying random things as a way to "maintain communication".
Basically equivalent to a person taking you off hold to tell you they're still there, then putting you back on hold.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Grimno

Dang, that's only a year old.
They're over there saying "Issues with 10+ year old CPUs"
Mine's a 8320, which came out late 2012. So it's not new, but 9 years is not 10+ years.
Kind of starting to sound like they have zero clue what is the cause, and they're just saying random things as a way to "maintain communication".
Basically equivalent to a person taking you off hold to tell you they're still there, then putting you back on hold.

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Well for me luckily it only affects ambient sound so setting that to 0 is a temporary solution but its still annoying, at least I can play the game. Just revert the game back to the old Sound engine, I actually think the game sounds worse with spatial audio.

the only solution that might work is to upgrade our pc, a 9 year old system to play a game that is 11 years old.
I highly doubt we will see a fix with 6.05!! if we are lucky a patch or hotfix later.

Computer parts are so damn expensive now that its probably easier to get a ps5 to play the game

Quote:

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Originally Posted by paga

Well for me luckily it only affects ambient sound so setting that to 0 is a temporary solution but its still annoying, at least I can play the game. Just revert the game back to the old Sound engine, I actually think the game sounds worse with spatial audio.

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I just don't get who Spatial Audio was suppose to help. Like, how does it improve the experience?
I'm over here Googling about Spatial Audio and I see this...

"Is spatial audio better than surround sound?
It's similar since it's audio all around the viewer, but the key difference between surround sound and spatial sound is that spatial sound is reactive to the movement of the player in VR. ... Surround sound does not have that movement capability, it just plays the 5 or 7 channels around the viewer."

....Bro is Spatial Audio a VR thing? Are we being ****ed because of a VR THING!?

So I said I'd post every duty that it happens in, but it's been happening regularly enough now even with Listening Position at 100 that I would go crazy if I did that. It'd now make more sense to list what duties it didn't occur in with Listening Position at 100.

And indeed, reading that quoted post was VERY interesting:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MiaShino

It took much time to find simple way of stating this.. maahhh things make so much sense in the mind yet when you attempt putting them to words everything goes fooey.

This audio stuttering issue reminds me of the type of issues experienced during HLE audio emulation on console emulators. It seems Square could be struggling to schedule audio processing requests across multiple cpu cores if any slowdown in the pipeline occurs. This results in the audio engine waiting to process new requests which as you hear causes stuttering effect. This would be especially prominent on FX cpus because of unique nature of core configuration.

Example time! On Bulldozer (FX series) cpu cores do not have dedicated floating point units opting instead to share one across two cores. They are much much of the worse at certain calculations especially ones requiring these floating point units. Vector calculations were and still are quite difficult to work with and as spatial audio requires many of these to be made..

You cannot rely on cpu utilization either. You may see something close to 40% utilization and wonder; but the cpu is not at 100% so I have additional headroom! You may in fact not. If something has stalled thus starving those cpu cores of something to process it will not be processing anything so will read as "not fully saturated". Even worse for FX because if that shared floating point unit is busy doing something then both cpu cores sharing it must also wait.

I may have the number of FP units per core cluster wrong so many apologies again. I hated working with bulldozer and do not do much difficult software development anymore (because it causes insanity..).

Square must increase the audio buffer (this may introduce slight audio delay but is highly preferable to crackling audio) or add option for number of audio channels into the sound options going forward.

For any suffering from this issue who also attempt thousands of erroneous solutions, I would not waste too much time doing this. I.. just.. cannot believe a major developer would make drastic overhaul to their sound engine without seemingly properly testing it across multiple hardware configurations. At the least they should have implemented a legacy fall back should unforeseen problems arise allowing users to temporarily roll back to working solution until problem is resolved. Then I find out they charge for the sound pack that created the issue in first place, seriously? Who does this?

Myself and friends are not encountering the issue yet on older hardware (i7 4790K and Amd Phenom x4).

Edit time! The PS3 cell micro architecture suffered from similar issues when attempting to make those pesky spes do anything because you had to wait for the ppe. It was unholy nightmare for many.

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I took a look at FFXIV's CPU usage when stuttering was happening (Intel i7-920, 2.67 GHz), and I noticed it would go to about 40-50, when normal usage is about 18-25. However, I wasn't getting FPS drops. So this must be what's happening for me. It also seems to happen more often around Sage actions, but then not always. Maybe Dancer too, can't really tell. One thing that I think has helped me a little is changing Battle Effects to Limited or None. This is inexplicably found in Character Configuration->Control Settings->Character tab. This is incredibly undesirable, but I can at least tolerate Limited for Party and None for Others, for now.

However, my biggest problem is that even when it's not stuttering, even if that is fixed, the audio is still wrong. All of the audio is just off, and it's not the fault of anyone's computer. It's just that the sound engine is incredibly poor and playing it all wrong. I don't know what much else to say about that. The sound engine was perfect in Shadowbringers, then plain ruined in Endwalker. I simply didn't realize it until I started doing pre-Endwalker duties again and hearing how obviously wrong it all is, such as in the Nier raids. This isn't some hard-to-grasp issue at all. You can hear it extremely easily on any computer. Even when the audio's working, it's just very obviously wrong in 6.0.

And I take back my concern that Endwalker's audio is unique to this sound engine and so they literally can't revert to 5.5. The benchmark proves that's false because it had plenty of Endwalker audio in it and it was very obviously on the same, good old sound engine that worked perfectly. So there should be absolutely no way that the 5.5 sound engine can't be provided for us, the players, in Endwalker. And if the response is that it can't be an option due to technical reasons, we will know something went very seriously wrong because the benchmark was fine.

While it's frustrating to constantly be told that problems are on our end when there's 50 pages of evidence to back up the obvious fact that it's not, it's important to keep in mind that devs don't have any more time to trawl through huge forum threads than you do. Furthermore, we're dealing with a language barrier, and on top of that most of the Japanese playerbase is probably on consoles, so they likely aren't complaining nearly as much as we are. As a result of that it also wouldn't surprise me if Squeenix's in-house PC testing environment isn't nearly adequate to deal with the scale of the Western market (might explain the state of some of their other games). Point is, if you're having problems, filing an official bug report is the best thing to do. Software gets tested more in the first day after release than it does in months in development. The more people submit bug reports, the sooner we can give Squeenix an idea of what's actually going on. "I'm doing my part" and all that. Squash them bugs.

I gotta say though, the next time a shady company approaches Squeenix peddling some weird audiophile placebo-effect software that only five people are going to care about and suggest their biggest game be overhauled to accommodate it during the release of a major expansion, all the while begging for ear pics, I sincerely hope someone immediately calls security. This has been a profoundly effective advertisement against Immerse Spatial Audio and I will make sure not to have anything to do with Embody ever.

Yeah, that's true. Hard to keep in mind with something so frustrating, but you're right.

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Originally Posted by Nommers

While it's frustrating to constantly be told that problems are on our end when there's 50 pages of evidence to back up the obvious fact that it's not, it's important to keep in mind that devs don't have any more time to trawl through huge forum threads than you do. Furthermore, we're dealing with a language barrier, and on top of that most of the Japanese playerbase is probably on consoles, so they likely aren't complaining nearly as much as we are. As a result of that it also wouldn't surprise me if Squeenix's in-house PC testing environment isn't nearly adequate to deal with the scale of the Western market (might explain the state of some of their other games). Point is, if you're having problems, filing an official bug report is the best thing to do. Software gets tested more in the first day after release than it does in months in development. The more people submit bug reports, the sooner we can give Squeenix an idea of what's actually going on. "I'm doing my part" and all that. Squash them bugs.

I gotta say though, the next time a shady company approaches Squeenix peddling some weird audiophile placebo-effect software that only five people are going to care about and suggest their biggest game be overhauled to accommodate it during the release of a major expansion, all the while begging for ear pics, I sincerely hope someone immediately calls security. This has been a profoundly effective advertisement against Immerse Spatial Audio and I will make sure not to have anything to do with Embody ever.

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This is exactly why I feel so incredibly insulted by the replies we got in this thread. I've worked in software testing for a major company before. This was a continuous delivery app as well - like FFXIV. Any company who does anything software has people to JUST collect customer feedback and relay it to QA and Development. There's also people specifically doing "Validation", who do nothing but constantly check in with customers to see whether the product they are making is the right product for their consumers, and help inform decisions on features to come. Their observations also get relayed to QA, Development and testing and inform decisions about future patches etc.

The fact that they decided to actually implement the whole spatial audio thing is a testament to how bad their QA/Validation pipeline really is. Even if Square has the best of intentions, even if the producers and devs bring about their finest work... It doesnt make their product better, if QA/Validation/testing doesnt do their job.

This has been an ongoing issue in the AAA industry that has only gotten worse with releases in the last 2-3 years... And FF XIV has finally shown itself to suffer from the same negligent patterns. Just for clarities sake - the company I worked at had around 230k people employed and makes around 50billion dollars a year. It's not just a problem with videogames companies.

Devs may not have time to read through these threads. But there sure as hell are people who get specifically paid do do just that. And so far I have not spotted a reply from any such person. On the contrary, the reply infers that they are completely uninformed and will remain so. Because they cant bear sitting a guy down and actually "investigate".

Instead they give you the good ol "lel just buy a new iphone"

I'd like to point out that even NEWER machines are having this audio popping/stutter shit going on. You know, 2020/2021 made hardware? I saw a conversation in novice network on a newer alt (I mean still going through arr, older alt I haven't touched for awhile) of mine about it. Like, for real?

It's not on the users' end; IT'S SE'S HARDWARE AND ON THEIR END. STOP. BLAMING. THE. USERS. WHEN. IT. IS. ON. YOUR. END. SE.

I can't imagine trying to raid with this shitty audio stutter when Savage drops. I'm betting there won't be any fixes until well into next month. I'm starting to get migraines from the radio static. I hate playing without sound--it's hard to do dungeons with certain boss mechanics having audio triggers (easy for me to get into position when I hear the cue). I'm not paying extra for some crappy "Immerse Gamepack", when the basic game sound is broken beyond belief.

I'm beyond insulted saying it's "our problem" when it clearly isn't.

I've been having this issue since day one of Endwalker release, but had no issues from 1.0 until now. It was fixed during the emergency maintenance on all worlds, then after this recent patch, the audio must have gone back to the new system.

It's not us; it's Square-Enix. In most cases, "The customer is always right" is incorrect, but in this case, SE, it's your fault, not ours.

Please fix this. The game is unbearable without sound.

I see, so the official answer is "just buy a new PC".

Even though there's an ongoing semiconductor shortage and hardware prices are through the roof and we couldn't plan for it in advance because we got NO warning the new audio engine might break on older CPU, and the benchmark ran smoothly with no audio issues at all.

Honestly, I'm not even mad because it's a hardware problem, I think if they were going to do an update to the audio engine that could potentially cause problems with older hardware we should have been warned of this possibility months ago so we could plan for it.

Edit: Also adding that my setup is perfectly capable at running on high(desktop) with 60 fps with no graphic issues at all. It's just the audio that's lagging. There is no way my hardware is below "minimum recommendations". It's just error 2002 all over again, when we were basically told to get better internet.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Elliah-Seraheart

This is exactly why I feel so incredibly insulted by the replies we got in this thread. I've worked in software testing for a major company before. This was a continuous delivery app as well - like FFXIV. Any company who does anything software has people to JUST collect customer feedback and relay it to QA and Development. There's also people specifically doing "Validation", who do nothing but constantly check in with customers to see whether the product they are making is the right product for their consumers, and help inform decisions on features to come. Their observations also get relayed to QA, Development and testing and inform decisions about future patches etc.

The fact that they decided to actually implement the whole spatial audio thing is a testament to how bad their QA/Validation pipeline really is. Even if Square has the best of intentions, even if the producers and devs bring about their finest work... It doesnt make their product better, if QA/Validation/testing doesnt do their job.

This has been an ongoing issue in the AAA industry that has only gotten worse with releases in the last 2-3 years... And FF XIV has finally shown itself to suffer from the same negligent patterns. Just for clarities sake - the company I worked at had around 230k people employed and makes around 50billion dollars a year. It's not just a problem with videogames companies.

Devs may not have time to read through these threads. But there sure as hell are people who get specifically paid do do just that. And so far I have not spotted a reply from any such person. On the contrary, the reply infers that they are completely uninformed and will remain so. Because they cant bear sitting a guy down and actually "investigate".

Instead they give you the good ol "lel just buy a new iphone"

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Fair point. In the interest of diplomacy, and in my own personal ongoing effort to not be angry on the internet, I didn't want to say it immediately in responding to Zhexos, but the tonedeafness of continuing to blame users' hardware for the game's problems after the 2002 debacle is particularly ironic. If any other company whose games I didn't play tried to pull that one on their fans, I'd be cackling at them, but instead I'm here huffing industrial-grade copium hoping a dev notices our cries. It does feel increasingly like screaming into the void. But they HAVE asked us to post bug reports, they've said they check there (even Soken's tweeted that people with problems should be submitting bug reports) and yeah it's a pain in the ass and we shouldn't have to do it at this point but it doesn't take THAT long to write one up and it seems like the most constructive option available to us for now. It's legitimately the best way to prove to them that the problems aren't on our end, whether they SHOULD get the point from this thread or not. Fortunately there's been quite a few more reports since Zhexos' post, but if everyone in this thread made one, Squeenix would HAVE to notice (or at least I would hope so).

Personally, I'd have unsubbed by now if it weren't for the fact that we just got three weeks of free game time due to the queues. I was able to get on just fine during that time due to being on at weird hours. so for now this is where that time is going for me. If the PR campaign continues along these vaguely defensive and accusatory lines without any substantial fixes, though, yeah, my sub's looking pretty dire.

Also just want to say it's been absolutely infuriating dealing with this while everyone copypastes the same damn memes about grapes. I hate those grapes, I'm glad they're gone, give me my sound back.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Elliah-Seraheart

I'd love to help out. Can you walk me through a way to provide you with the necessary information?

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Someone below I shall be quoting suggested speccy, you can also obtain good information from cpuz found here; https://www.cpuid.com/softwares/cpu-z.html

Everything from memory speed and timings to bios revision and cpu cache.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AeroXaia

CPU: AMD FX-8350 63 °F
RAM: 16.0GB Dual-Channel DDR3 @ 933MHz (10-11-10-32)

Motherboard: MSI 990FXA-GD65 (MS-7640) (CPU 1) 105 °F
GPU: 2048MB ATI AMD Radeon R9 200 Series (XFX Pine Group) 101 °F

I almost mentioned ram speeds before, but I was a bit confused whether to say 933 or that times 2, since it's been a while and I forget how that works.



You can use Speccy to get the info free and easy with the timings just in case (the 4 numbers at the end above), small simple program I've been using for years. It should all be in the bios somewhere too, or other programs can probably get it, but this is just "open, copy and paste".

Speccy is here: https://www.ccleaner.com/speccy

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Yikes! I had almost forgotten to remember how toasty those FX cpus and the older 200 series can get. Anyone can post either it is acceptable as it is just base speed times two. Unfortunately 1866 is the maximum for that FX cpu. :( Darn, I thought I may be onto something. Memory timings are even in acceptable range. Plenty of bandwidth to feed that cpu.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by polyphanes

Computer stats:

• CPU: AMD FX-6300
• RAM: 16 GB Dual-Channel DDR3 @ 722MGz
• Motherboard: ASUSTeK M5A99FX Pro R2.0
• Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 (MSI, 4095MB)

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Hmm, am guessing maximum memory speed for your system is actually 1600 and is just operating memory controller at lower c state. 1600 is also enough :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Teiren

I took a look at FFXIV's CPU usage when stuttering was happening (Intel i7-920, 2.67 GHz), and I noticed it would go to about 40-50, when normal usage is about 18-25.

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You were the one with zee old reliable 920! Was looking for your older post as am surprised the 920 is also potentially suffering here. That was one of intel's better architectures and absolute joy to work with. X58 was fantastic platform (triple channel memory support!). Your i7 920 is stock speed yes?

Many apologies all as I was hoping to give some temporary alleviation to this issue but am off base. Was shot in dark, I suppose. Memory speeds can effect effect various cpu architectures differently (especially Ryzen) and easily starve them if too low. Also with everyone using integrated sound chips that also access system memory (anything realtek).

Have just awoken and coffee to blood ratio is loooooow so post may be more sloppy then I would like.

Ohhh right! One additional thing; Can anyone confirm if this issue is occurring on ps4/ps5? Am remembering reading something that it might have been but am uncertain. Checking options on ps4 and the "spatial audio" option doth not even exist there. Are ps4 and ps5 still using legacy sound engine? Am most curious now.

Yeah, stock. I would be too nervous to overclock it or anything like that. Though maybe it has some dynamic form of it? I wouldn't know, but I highly doubt I've pushed it much. It's interesting to hear that CPU was really nice for its time; I didn't even realize what I was picking back then. I guess that's how everything's survived this long, haha, since January 2011. I just kept procrastinating on getting anything new besides the graphics card and RAM.

Oh, speaking of, this is the RAM, along with other things, just to have it all together:
CPU: Intel Core i7-920, 2.66 GHz
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 970, 4 GB
RAM: 12 GB Triple Channel DDR3, PC3-10700 667 MHz (9-9-9-24)

Anyway, sounds like you were onto something, but not, huh...technically, it could be anything.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MiaShino

Ohhh right! One additional thing; Can anyone confirm if this issue is occurring on ps4/ps5? Am remembering reading something that it might have been but am uncertain. Checking options on ps4 and the "spatial audio" option doth not even exist there. Are ps4 and ps5 still using legacy sound engine? Am most curious now.

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I've seen some people complain in shout channel, novice network about PS4 stutter, possibly PS5 as well. Mostly complaining about how noticeable in the newest content in raid 4 majority. I haven't found any videos about it, but I will link any I come across.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Teiren

Yeah, stock. I would be too nervous to overclock it or anything like that. Though maybe it has some dynamic form of it? I wouldn't know, but I highly doubt I've pushed it much. It's interesting to hear that CPU was really nice for its time; I didn't even realize what I was picking back then. I guess that's how everything's survived this long, haha, since January 2011. I just kept procrastinating on getting anything new besides the graphics card and RAM.

Oh, speaking of, this is the RAM, along with other things, just to have it all together:
CPU: Intel Core i7-920, 2.66 GHz
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 970, 4 GB
RAM: 12 GB Triple Channel DDR3, PC3-10700 667 MHz (9-9-9-24)

Anyway, sounds like you were onto something, but not, huh...technically, it could be anything.

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It was a monster cpu for the price when it launched. Hmm, I believe it was 180 dollars for the one my partner was using and held stable overclock of 4 ghz until the board experienced demise. The cpu never became unstable, I still have that cpu and a spare for server hosting. You even have proper triple channel twelve gig config. :( Aye, I believed there may have been lack of memory bandwidth but that is definitely not issue as everyone who put memory information is running well within spec (quite close to what myself and partner are currently using).

If it were I could have suggested enabling xmp, tweaking timings, purchasing second stick if running in single channel for anyone willing until Square fixes software reason for issue.

Slightly off topic-ish? Overclocking on X58 is not too difficult if you ever wish to attempt some day. You can easily gain 30+% performance increase on those 920s without having to touch voltages. They will run nice and toasty though! Must have decent cooling (I used all in one liquid cooling then later noctua nh-d15).

Also aye, even the old 920 had turbo boosting as all modern cpus do. Partner's overclocked 920 regularly turboed to 4.2 ghz while undervolted. Would give Bloomfield S-tier, it was not bad.

Real permanent solutions for this are down to software and would be fantastic if Square were willing to post the specifications of their testing setups. This would help us tremendously!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Breezelyn

I've seen some people complain in shout channel, novice network about PS4 stutter, possibly PS5 as well. Mostly complaining about how noticeable in the newest content in raid 4 majority. I haven't found any videos about it, but I will link any I come across.

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Many thanks! Am curious about the consoles because PS4 uses Jaguar(based upon Bulldozer aka FX architecture if am remembering correctly) and PS5 uses Ryzen cpu and both are within systems reported suffering from audio stuttering.

It's incredibly insulting that they keep telling us our computers are too crappy, when 1. It's happening to brand new, high-end computers, 2. our hardware meets the minimum specifications listed by Square Enix when we bought the game, 4) the benchmark they gave us to check to see if our computer could run Endwalker said our computers could run it just fine, and 4) it's happening to console users. If the game doesn't work on the hardware they advertise it as working on, and then they blame US for not having hardware it works on, then that's a case of false advertising.

Upgrading your computer isn't going to help when it's happening to new computers. Asking us to upgrade our computers when they can't upgrade their servers, when they advertised their game as being playable on our computers, is... I don't even have a word for that.

It's okay if they don't understand what's causing the problem. Bug fixing takes time. They could just say they are looking into the issue. But instead they are choosing to blame it all on user error, even though it's happening on such a wide variety of hardware.

… We are aware everything worked fine before the release of endwalker, but now you all need a new computer…. The audacity. Fix the problem already, there’s no way these issues should have made it to the launch date, you’re out here looking like a bunch of amateurs.

I will be concise.
I am pissed off.

Now I am done being concise.
My favorite part of this situation is when I reached out to technical support and stated which steps I've tried to resolve the issue.
Where I've noted that I've tried previously to lower the audio quality as per instructions.
2 answers in they are advising me to lower the audio quality.
Then we spend a bit of time over helpdesk tech being confused on how file extensions work and... they are advising me to lower the audio quality.

I don't think they are even trying at this point.
They know exactly what the problem is, they know they can't fix it on player's end.
So their helpdesk just copypastes same stuff over and over again.

Why do that when they could state that they can't help at the moment, but instead provide list of instructions given in latest support post and carry on this information to the 2nd line?
Because screw me, I guess?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ShadowedStranger

I will be concise.
I am pissed off.

Now I am done being concise.
My favorite part of this situation is when I reached out to technical support and stated which steps I've tried to resolve the issue.
Where I've noted that I've tried previously to lower the audio quality as per instructions.
2 answers in they are advising me to lower the audio quality.
Then we spend a bit of time over helpdesk tech being confused on how file extensions work and... they are advising me to lower the audio quality.

I don't think they are even trying at this point.
They know exactly what the problem is, they know they can't fix it on player's end.
So their helpdesk just copypastes same stuff over and over again.

Why do that when they could state that they can't help at the moment, but instead provide list of instructions given in latest support post and carry on this information to the 2nd line?
Because screw me, I guess?

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That's another thing - they are so very clearly not listening to us.

We tell them the exact steps we take to fix the problem, and their response is to take those exact same steps.

We tell them what our hardware is, which is less than ten years old and meets minimum specifications, and they tell us our hardware is more than ten years old and doesn't meet minimum specifications.

They're clearly in damage control mode, and they're only making it worse.

Would really be so hard to say "We don't know, and we're working on it"?

I've been trying to be patient and understanding thus far, but their responses to us have made this impossible.

Oh, it's happening even on the consoles? Now that's interesting. That points to this being even more of a last-minute thing than I suspected. Because surely they would have tested heavily on consoles of all things and come across this issue? This'll sound cruel, but I'm kind of glad it's happening on consoles because they definitely have to take it seriously then, so it gives me hope they'll go back to 5.5 sound engine, something known to definitely work on the consoles. It's not like there's anything people on consoles can adjust like you can with Windows or PC hardware.

I'm also having this issue, funny thing, I didn't have any audio stuttering until "After" the patch. Before the patch it worked perfectly, so it looks like 6.01 is the real problem.

My computer is too old? Really? Over 10 years? Even though I bought it for the Stormblood expansion release? Even though a friend of mine who has an older PC has no audio issues whatsoever? Okay then SE.


Seriously, what kind of reply is that. I am almost tempted to cancel my sub and never come back but I love this game so much. Also all their suggestions for "fixes" just made it worst on my end. So no, I will no try anymore of their "fixes" they suggest until they start fixing things on their end.

The patch dropped, and suddenly the problem got worse. According to Square Enix, the moment the patch dropped, everyone apparently installed older, worse hardware. It couldn't possibly be the patch's fault, noooo.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kazemon15

My computer is too old? Really? Over 10 years? Even though I bought it for the Stormblood expansion release? Even though a friend of mine who has an older PC has no audio issues whatsoever? Okay then SE.


Seriously, what kind of reply is that. I am almost tempted to cancel my sub and never come back but I love this game so much. Also all their suggestions for "fixes" just made it worst on my end. So no, I will no try anymore of their "fixes" they suggest until they start fixing things on their end.

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The elephant in the room, is that the game is designed to run on the PS4 which is nearly 10 years old. I sympathize with you on the canceling the sub, if it want for my love of this game I’d have done the same already. Was hopeful 6.01 would have fixed it, not made the issue worse…

Everyone, please PLEASE submit a bug report, ESPECIALLY if you have a newer computer or are on console. Be specific what hardware you use. If you go to Config in the FFXIV launcher, and click 'display' next to System Information, it provides your system info, all ready for copy and paste, you don't have to look everything up yourself. We can't let Square Enix brush this under the rug as something that only happens to 10 year old computers.

I’ll second this, did mine yesterday! When I finally had enough since the issue wasn’t fixed with the patch.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Zhexos

Greetings,

As we continue to investigate the matter, we have confirmed that after the fixes we applied in Patch 6.01 the issue continues to persist for some of our players who may be using CPUs that are older than 10 years. However, due to the fact that there are various types of CPUs available we still have not isolated the cause of the issue.

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The FX-8350, which multiple people here have posted they have (and also which I have) was released in October 2012. It is not limited to CPUs in double-digit age.