Possible Hitching on New PC (G-Sync)

Libretro
#1

I’ve upgraded to a new build tho my GPU and monitor remains the same. I’ve only tested one core so far, BSNES with a standard game and Super Game Boy 1 and the video seems to have hitching while scrolling that I thought I was rid of. I used the “sync to exact content framerate” and set the monitor to it’s max refresh rate (144 tho tho my result is odd, RA reports 144.001 but i’m not sure if that’s normal or not) I’m using the latest RA stable via Windows 10

My specs- GPU- Asus GeForce GTX 970 4 GB STRIX Mobo- ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero AM4 AMD X570 Memory- G.SKILL Trident Z Neo (For AMD Ryzen) Series 32GB (2 x 16GB) 288-Pin RGB DDR4 SDRAM DDR4 3600 (PC4 28800) OS storage- WD_BLACK 1TB SN850 NVMe Internal Gaming SSD Solid State Drive - Gen4 PCIe Extra storage- WD Black 6TB Performance Monitor- AOC G2460PG

2 Likes
#2

Does the behavior persist on other games than Super Game Boy 1? I ask because the SGB1 has some timing issues of its own that could be related.

#3

I meant to try SGB2 but didn’t yet. The only other game I test was 3 Ninjas Kick Back in the same core and seemed to noticed some hitching here & there…

#4

Update- Tried SGB2 and while smoother because of the timing differences, it still hitches Also tried Genesis via BlastEM with Revenge of Shinobi- smoother but seems to hitch every few frames I hope this isn’t some super obscure issue due to my hardware. I don’t recall standalone Mame hitching at all so far

#5

You should really try the scrolling tests in the 240p Test Suite ROMs instead. You can Google them or download them from RetroArch’s updater. They’re the most reliable way to test for scrolling stutter, since they run at a perfect 60FPS with no frame drops. Native GB games tend to have lots of hitches on real hardware. Shinobi might have had mostly perfect scrolling on real hardware with a few dropped frames here or there.

For refresh rate I just use the “Set Display Reported Refresh Rate” option.

1 Like
#6

Update- Tried Bsnes HD and played the Super Mario World Widescreen patch. I know SMW has some mild hitching baked in the game but it seemed even worse. The evidence really comes out in the first castle when you climb the gates, the hitching issues are absolutely glaring here, this certainly didn’t exist in the original! There seems to be an issue somewhere and I hope I can get to the bottom of it

I’m gonna go ahead and use the 240p Test Suite ROMs on both Genesis and SNES

#7

Did a brief capture to focus on the reported framerate- It changes and maybe that could signify the hitching issues I’m having. I honestly don’t know if the inconsistency in framerate like that is normal but it seems to happen in all cores and I’m not sure if it’s supposed to be locked in place or not

#8

That looks pretty bad from the capture. My RetroArch FPS counter mostly sits at 59.93 in BlastEm with the scrolling test, but can vary from 59.89-59.95. All with no noticeable hitches/stuttering. bsnes is 60.09-60.11, also without noticeable problems to my eyes.

Have you made sure Gsync is active when running RetroArch? Some displays have built in refresh rate counters you can enable that should match your FPS when Gsync is active. You can also enable a Gsync indicator in the Nvidia Control Panel: img_57cf562a0932e

1 Like
#9

I have G-Sync enabled in the control panel but only for full screen mode, not both fullscreen and windowed I’ll enable the option for fullscreen & windowed and the G-Sync indicator too and see what happens

#10

Also I want to reiterate, my monitor, according to RA, reports 144.001, I dunno if that sort of thing is normal

#11

It’s best to leave it for fullscreen only, since windowed Gsync is unpredictable. Sometimes it works poorly with windowed games, sometimes it turns on with apps like Paint.Net and makes everything choppy. As long as RetroArch is fullscreen and “Windowed Fullscreen Mode” is off, fullscreen only Gsync should just work. Vsync should be left on in RetroArch as well; I get stuttering under vulkan when it’s off.

Shouldn’t be a too weird; mine shows as 143.998.

#12

This is what i’m getting with “Sync to exact content frame rate” option OFF. If i turn it ON everything is smooth on my 240hz freesync monitor.

#13

That’s the weird thing, I have it turned ON yet I still see some bits of hitching depending on the core…Gonna go ahead and delete everything and start over but actually make some of these changes within RA then manually edit the config afterwards

#14

Some cores may have their own options to prevent hitching.

Flycast would hitch for me all the time, regardless freesync options. I finally fixed it by disabling a multi-threading option (IIRC) in the core options.

But other than that, i don’t think i had issues with any of the other cores. Even arcade games with weird refresh rates should be smooth in RA using a fast, VRR monitor.