Graphics fine, stutters every 3-4 seconds [Confirmed Bug]

[Thorintar]

I had a similar problem with another game with Steam. The problem was caused by the web-shop inside Steam. The frontpage of the Shop scrolls automatically to show the recent games and offers. THAT causes the shuttering for me. To avoid this just click the shop and click, for example, Comunity activity. That page shows the statistics of the players in Steam and doesn't have any type of scrolling. Then launch the game and check if that was the problem.

[Igaku-Kusuri]

I had a similar problem with another game with Steam. The problem was caused by the web-shop inside Steam. The frontpage of the Shop scrolls automatically to show the recent games and offers. THAT causes the shuttering for me. To avoid this just click the shop and click, for example, Comunity activity. That page shows the statistics of the players in Steam and doesn't have any type of scrolling. Then launch the game and check if that was the problem.

There's nothing like that in Shogun 2 as I can see though. There's a button for Steam store, but it just opens it in a window in the Steam Overlay.

By the way, the best way to test/confirm this issue in-game for me is to:
1. Uncheck "Automatically sign into friends when I start Steam" in Steam > Settings > Friends
2. Restart Steam
3. Start Shogun 2, paying attention to the camera movements in the main menu (they should be pratically smooth).
4. Open Steam Overlay > View Friends (bottom right corner) > set status to Online
5. Pay attention once more to the camera movements in the main menu (it should now seem to stutter/hitch/skip a frame exactly every 5 seconds)

[Thorintar]

When you play the game Steam is on the background and a lot of people has the shop-tab as primary display (default). Even if you dont, just checking the shop is the same story. The important thing is not to have the shop in the background scrolling offers.

Steam friendlist is not the problem, don't know how it worked for you.

[justyhawk]

Igaku I've tried both your methods and the slight stutter is still present, and I've also tried Thorintar's advice but it still has a stutter.

The stutter I get is definately not as bad as that shown in your video post.

[Igaku-Kusuri]

When you play the game Steam is on the background and a lot of people has the shop-tab as primary display (default). Even if you dont, just checking the shop is the same story. The important thing is not to have the shop in the background scrolling offers.

Steam friendlist is not the problem, don't know how it worked for you.

But I don't have the Steam window open in the background. And my default page is the game Library.

I don't know about you but for me and at least another 1 or 2 users running Steam in Offline mode or disabling friends automatic sign in and restarting eliminates the 5-second stutter.

Igaku I've tried both your methods and the slight stutter is still present, and I've also tried Thorintar's advice but it still has a stutter.

The stutter I get is definately not as bad as that shown in your video post.

Well then your stutter doesn't seem to have the same origin I'm afraid. Also, how many friends do you have? I wonder if that could affect the stutter I notice. I have about 104.

I've also been able to clearly see what is causing the stuttering, at least in my case, thanks to Process Explorer: I right-clicked Steam.exe to check the properties and then Performance Graph.

Graph while online: http://i.imgur.com/8angF.png
Graph while offline: http://i.imgur.com/rEOHq.png
Graph from offline to online: http://i.imgur.com/KK8NF.png

You can clearly see a lot of big spikes for Steam.exe in the online graph and those spikes appeared exactly every 5 seconds at the same time of each stutter.

[Tyer032392]

For some time, I had teh stuttering going on for Shogun 2 as well, but in the battles, but have not had any problems as of lately. Have you defraged your computer and run an error ann-alysis, and also run the cache checking integrity and game cache defrag in steam as well?

[justyhawk]

Tried all the above so far but the stutter is still there, though I think Igaku's advice has made it a little more difficult to notice.

[Igaku-Kusuri]

For some time, I had teh stuttering going on for Shogun 2 as well, but in the battles, but have not had any problems as of lately. Have you defraged your computer and run an error ann-alysis, and also run the cache checking integrity and game cache defrag in steam as well?

Defragged drive and checked integrity, yes, no difference.

Game cache defrag in Steam doesn't do anything though, I think it's only meant for Source games that are usually packed in .gcf files.

Tried all the above so far but the stutter is still there, though I think Igaku's advice has made it a little more difficult to notice.

I guess that's because it stopped the Steam friends stutter, but you must have something else contributing to the still-present one. By the way check my post above, I edited with some Process Explorer graphs right before you replied.

Curiously I had, just now, about 1 minute of no stuttering even with Steam online (and Process Explorer confirmed it in the graphs), but it soon came back and haven't seen it happen again... I wasn't doing anything, just idling and looking at it.

Never had any stuttering in offline mode, though.

[Tyer032392]

Tried all the above so far but the stutter is still there, though I think Igaku's advice has made it a little more difficult to notice.

Is your computer's drivers up to date? Some times that might be the problem. You should check the company website who makes your drivers and compare that to what your computer version is.

[Igaku-Kusuri]

Is your computer's drivers up to date? Some times that might be the problem. You should check the company website who makes your drivers and compare that to what your computer version is.

According to his dxdiag his drivers are dated 4/29/2012, so they're not very old.

I just updated mine yesterday with 301.42, dated 5/22/2012, but no difference.