Audio popping issue

[Larirawiel]

Another option could be this:
https://eu.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...965cd4dd0ac3af

Set all audio devices to 16 Bit, 44100 Hz.

Maybe it will relieve the propably too small audio buffers of the game. And the sound quality downgrade should not be noticable because 16 Bit and 44100 Hz sample rate already exceeds the abilities of a human ear by far.


Cheers

[Nommers]

Another option could be this:
https://eu.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...965cd4dd0ac3af

Set all audio devices to 16 Bit, 44100 Hz.

Maybe it will relieve the propably too small audio buffers of the game. And the sound quality downgrade should not be noticable because 16 Bit and 44100 Hz sample rate already exceeds the abilities of a human ear by far.


Cheers

Sorry, but this is the very first thing Square Enix told us to try several weeks ago, and as far as I know it didn't work for anyone.

There was another tweet from Soken yesterday promising that fixes will be included in "the next version." https://twitter.com/sokensquareenix/...792569867?s=21 I sincerely hope he doesn't mean 6.1 because that is months off. The post-6.05 Known Issues post on Lodestone mentioned that they wanted to have the two listed issues fixed by the weekend. One's already been fixed. Maybe there will be another patch today fixing the other one that also attempts to address the audio. I don't exactly have my hopes up but I guess we'll see.

EDIT: There's also been a post by a community rep over on the Japanese forums: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post5797104

DeepL translation:

Hello, I've been working on this for a while.

Thank you very much for contacting us with detailed system information and reproducible conditions regarding sound-related problems.
Thank you very much for providing us with detailed information about your system and the conditions under which the problem occurred.

It took us a while to narrow down the conditions under which the problem could be reproduced, but thanks to your help, we were able to reproduce the symptoms.

The symptoms this time are
In the calculation process in the FFXIV game sound driver, there is a point where the adjustment of the number of digits is not performed correctly.
We have found that this is likely to be caused by the characteristics of some CPUs, which cannot keep up with the calculation process.
Although most of the affected CPUs are older than 10 years old, we have confirmed that some of the latest CPUs are also affected.

Based on the characteristics of these CPUs, we are continuing to investigate and fix the problem so that it can be handled normally.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, but we would like to release an additional fix after verifying the pattern for the next patch.
We apologize for the inconvenience, but we would like to release an additional fix after we have verified the pattern for the next patch, so please wait a little longer for the fix.

Together with Soken's tweet, this is very good news. The post immediately following this also mentions that FX series CPUs are a rarity in Japan. Given the apparent inconsistency in how the bug affects other hardware configurations I suppose it makes sense that the issue would take a long time to track down. I'm still praying for a Lodestone post so that we don't have to dig through twitter and filter forum posts through the language barrier. Still, here's hoping this is fixed sooner than later.

[minopoki]

Both Soken and the Japanese rep mentioned the next patch. As far as know there aren't fixed dates for the next patches yet (as there were for 6.01 and 6.05), there being just the information that 6.1 is gonna be out before the end of the first quarter (so, by the end of March, probably).

For those who have been here at the beginning of other expansions, is there a chance of being an extra patch before 6.1 (like a 6.08 or something)?
Or for all other expansions, has it always been X.01, X.05 and then X.1?

[RicaRuin]

There still is the issue with Floor 2 of the current Savage and Shields, so we have another Hotfix scheduled sometime.

[Larirawiel]

Both Soken and the Japanese rep mentioned the next patch. As far as know there aren't fixed dates for the next patches yet (as there were for 6.01 and 6.05), there being just the information that 6.1 is gonna be out before the end of the first quarter (so, by the end of March, probably).

For those who have been here at the beginning of other expansions, is there a chance of being an extra patch before 6.1 (like a 6.08 or something)?
Or for all other expansions, has it always been X.01, X.05 and then X.1?

I guess they are able to pull out "emergency patches" when they are needed. Patch 6.01 was also an ad hoc patch because of this disconnect thingy every 15 minutes and 30 seconds. I can imagine that they could make a 6.06 patch or something very fast when they have a solution.


And the informations from the japanese forums are very interesting. But they are too vague and i can only speculate what the reason for the sound issues is. It seems to me that they have accidently or intentionally chosen a data type for sound processing which is calculated very slowly on some CPUs. It is comparable to when you calculate 64 bit values on a 32 bit CPU. A 64 bit CPU will be faster because it has 64 bit registers and can calculate 64 bit values directly. A 32 bit CPU must split the 64 bit value into two 32 bit values an then make the calculation twice for every 32 bit value. And this is a very simple view on this. You have also to consider things like addition carry over and if you do multithreading then you have to atomic lock the whole calculation because "tearing" could happen etc. This makes 64 bit calculations on 32 bit CPUs way slower.



Cheers

[Nommers]

And the informations from the japanese forums are very interesting. But they are too vague and i can only speculate what the reason for the sound issues is. It seems to me that they have accidently or intentionally chosen a data type for sound processing which is calculated very slowly on some CPUs....

I might be totally off-base on this, but this seems to line up with what RinKaenbyou was saying here: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post5794011

[minopoki]

Your processor is so hot it is throttling itself to prevent damage. Cool it off.

Back to this subject, I've finally been able to lower my temperatures.
It turns out the problem wasn't my coolers being too old, but, and I am ashamed to say it, but because my radiator was FILTHY
After CLEANING it (and only superficially, for I haven't removed it to clean it), my temperature average dropped about 20ºC
The image below shows how it got after playing the game for about 10-20 minutes, much much better than my previous temperature numbers:

So, when my CPU stays at 4.1GHz, game doesn't stutter (although, I'm not sure if it's 100% good), but the thing is my CPU STILL THROTTLES.
When the Temperature #1 of the image above gets to 58-60ºC, the CPU throttles, and goes down to 1.4GHz, and stutter keeps happening.
(Differently to what I have said before, Temperature #1 seems to be the MB CPU Socket temperature, and not the MB temperature, which is likely to be Temperature #2)

Before cleaning the radiator, it would throttle at 75ºC, but now at 58ºC, which is weird, considering the specifications say my CPU max temperature is 70.5ºC.

Lowering the game graphical settings to the lowest, and even FPS to 30, makes it throttle less, but it still happens.

I still have some things to try the next few days:
- a better cleaning of radiator, by removing it and taking out all of the dust that's still there;
- one of my 3 internal fans (not the CPU ones) is not moving, so replacing it might help;
- trying other suggestions from this thread to relieve stress.

But if someone has any suggestions on how to avoid throttling, I would appreciate it.
Not sure if GPU being around 70ºC makes any difference. I heard this value was ok for GPUs...

[Larirawiel]

I might be totally off-base on this, but this seems to line up with what RinKaenbyou was saying here: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post5794011

Umm, i don't know. The poster meant "buffers". But "buffers" is an abstract concept and can mean many things. I guess the poster means soundbuffers in the game application. If so then it has not really something to do with that what i meant. I meant very low level things on CPU register level. If you choose a not fitting data type then the CPU has to emulate it. And emulations are usually very slow.

So, when my CPU stays at 4.1GHz, game doesn't stutter (although, I'm not sure if it's 100% good), but the thing is my CPU STILL THROTTLES.
When the Temperature #1 of the image above gets to 58-60ºC, the CPU throttles, and goes down to 1.4GHz, and stutter keeps happening.
(Differently to what I have said before, Temperature #1 seems to be the MB CPU Socket temperature, and not the MB temperature, which is likely to be Temperature #2)

The two temperatures are your motherboard temperatures. Your CPU temperature is the third one under AMD FX-8370E. And 48,6 °C is very good.


Cheers

[minopoki]

The two temperatures are your motherboard temperatures. Your CPU temperature is the third one under AMD FX-8370E. And 48,6 °C is very good.

Yes, but from the information I found on Google, one of them, although measured by the motherboard, is the temperature of the CPU Socket -- not from the CPU itself, but from the part of the motherboard where the CPU is connected.
When i go to the BIOS, after resetting just my PC, I can see there too, two measures of temperature, one of them described as CPU Temperature, whose value is about the same that was shown in the Temperature #1 value just before I reset the PC, rather than the value shown under AMD FX-8370E.


Anyway, combining the two suggestions below along with the overclock, seems to have helped reducing CPU throttle and consequently, audio stuttering too. I have to leave right now, when I'm back tonight, I'll check these things better, thanks people.

1. Download DXVK, the dxvk-1.9.2.tar.gz from https://github.com/doitsujin/dxvk/releases/tag/v1.9.2

2. Open it with 7-zip or another tool which can open tar.gz-files.

3. Navigate into the x64-folder.

4. Copy the files: d3d11.dll and dxgi.dll into the FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game directory of your FF14 installation

5. Restart the client

If you have an amd processor the game is not using all your cores, and is bottlenecking itself. Easy fix is too overclock your cpu till the official fix comes through. Luckily for AMD even if something is only using 2 cores, if you over clock enough you can get as much throughput as using all of them. To test this, try setting affinity to 2 cores in the game.

[Au-ro]

I have found that when the stuttering and lag are at its worst, if I hit the windows key, the game will still be up when the start menu pops up. I can still see the game, but it's kinda of in the background. Letting it sit like this for a few seconds fixes the issue 80% of the time.