Weird stutter/hitch occurs randomly.

[miaou_ml]

Toggling the v-sync off is the first thing everyone who has this problem has tried.
It doesn't matter on or off, any hz number, FPS capped or not, the game still stutters the same exact way with every single setting.

[DiasFlacOg]

I have a "basic" setup. It's a 4K monitor at 60hz. It's a photo creation monitor and not a gaming monitior. So no gsync or anything like that.

Normally the game runs perfectly fine. It's always at 60fps even in Limsa when it's full. I have the in game fps at 60 and my windows 10 refresh rate at 60hz etc etc. However changing these settings doesn't do anything to fix the issue.

It's funny because the "random" stutter usually always causes a 1fps drop on the fps counter. So it will be a perfect 60 and once in a while for literally no reason (as far as I can tell) the fps will drop to 59 causing a little hitch/stutter.

The hitch/stutter is strong enough to be annoying when it does occur.

When I say it's random I literally mean random. For example yesterday I did a run of the newest alliance raid (Jouno or whatever it's called). Right before entering the first boss room for no reason the game stuttered then at the very end while fighting the final boss randomly again it stuttered when he was in the middle of his "sword attack" (when he slashes certain parts of the map).

Now today on reset I did it again for my coin, with zero stutters haha.

Other times it can also just randomly stutter on the first boss too (while fighting her).

It's always a 1fps drop (at least according to the RTSS app).

It's like the game "pauses" for a split second.

I hate when it happens during raids like the newest unreal. Funny enough this week when I did my unreal I had zero stutters. Last week I had a couple.

You see what I mean by random?

At this point I kinda just deal with it now sadly. It's not game breaking just annoying.

[EveningBird]

I have the exact same issue.
I have a 75hz monitor, i cap it at 75fps, the game is inevitably gonna stutter once it drops a frame. I have a greesync monitor, but ive tried various combinations including turning freesync off, to no avail.
I knew I wasn't crazy... More people have this issue. It would explain why it started so randomly

The only "workaround" i have for now is setting my fps lkmot at 70/69fps. Which is not ideal, but eh.

[Yeol]

I remember reading that the in-game FPS limiter behaves differently when the game is running Full Screen V.S Borderless Windowed. Hence why people report having this issue with FF only and not any other game.

Sometimes NVIDIA update changes game settings for some people.

If your default preference is Full Screen, it sometimes changes the Presets and Frame Rate under System Configuration.

[EveningBird]

Negative.
I've tried Borderless, Windowed and Fullscreen. All have the stutter.

[Yeol]

https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/s/hGIa6XGmfR

This reddit post caught my attention. Seems windows 11 24H2 update has caused problems for some players.

Edit: Another discussion on the matter
https://discord.com/channels/1004639...68236551737385

[EveningBird]

Yeah but the thing is, I've tried it without freesync and it still causes trouble.

[DiasFlacOg]

Ok so I would like to give an update on my situation just to bring some awareness or hopefully can help someone else.

I decided to dig up an old driver from late 2023 to see if it would make a difference. I got the last driver I used in EW when my game was still running perfectly smooth with zero stutters or hitches. That driver being 537.58 from October 2023.

To my surprise using this old driver my game works perfectly. Those weird random 1-2 frame stutters/hitches that would randomly pop up while doing raid/dungeons/pvp/or just randomly in the world are completely gone now. My game is perfectly smooth. I been playing with it for the past 2 days and I can confidently say that it fixes my issue.

I knew it was the drivers. I say this because even back in EW certain driver revisions would cause this issue. However the 537.58 driver fixed that issue (even back in EW).

Also anything starting from at least 555.99 has this issue (the random stutter/hitch). Unfortunately Nvidia no longer has drivers from Nov 2023 to May 2024 so I can't test those out.

But anything from 555.99 all the way to the newest one 572.47 has this annoying issue.

I would also like to add that I play on a "normal" basic 4K monitor at 60hz (nothing fancy like freesync/gsync).

With this old driver my fps stays locked at 60fps with zero stutter or hitches.

The only problem now is that if I want to have perfect smooth 60fps gameplay on DW I have to use an old driver from late 2023 hahaha. Luckily DW works well with it I don't see any visual differences with 537.58 vs any of the newest drivers. But again it sucks that I have to use a driver from over a year ago to get the game to stop stuttering/hitching randomly.

[EveningBird]

Sadly it doesn't fix it for me. I've tried these drivers two times (537.58) and other drivers too, my stutter issues persist.

[Veritas-Ancora]

This also happens to me! It seems to only happen in dungeons or areas heavily populated. Never on the world maps.

It makes no sense, no other game does this to me.