any cure for stuttering gameplay?

[TheBandit]

When I first started playing, I used to use the premium graphics constantly.  After the updates, I cannot use premium as it causes choppy gameplay and stuttering for unknown reasons.  It hasn't really bothered me for awhile, but I want to start using premium again.  I used to use it with no issues at all.  I'm just curious if maybe there might be a fix for the stuttering problem.  If not, feel free to lock this topic.

System specs:
Q6700 2.6ghz quad core
9800GTX+ GPU
2 gig of ram
Windows XP SP 3

[blue_h3x]

Up-to-date drivers?

[TheBandit]

funny story about drivers.  http://www.geeks3d.com/20100305/forceware-196-75-can-kill-your-geforce-card/

I'm running 196.21 for the time being.

[blue_h3x]

Any background tasks?

[Passerby]

it has to be a bad drivers or a background task i run the game with the excat same video card on a 2.8 ghz quad and 8gb ram so the olny big difference is ram.


what settings do you play.

[TheBandit]

I usually play on enhanced at 1680 x 994 with no problems.  Before the last game update, I could run premium on those settings with no problems.  Most of the time,aside from AVG and zone alarm, the only background programs running are: steam, msn, skype, and Internet Doom Explorer.

[blue_h3x]

If you grab process explorer : http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx
and add the column "process performance > CPU history", play AS and then go back to process explorer and have a look n see if any processes have been using loads of CPU (questviewer.exe uses an entire core, so 25% CPU for you)

[TheBandit]

Alright, I did as suggested.  The highest the physical usage got was around 67%  The performance history for questviewer showed minimal changes, nothing to write home about. CPU usage was around 25% as noted. Commit charge was around 43% I guess I should be a bit clearer on the problem.  It's like....a very very short jolt in play.  You will be going down the track fine, then there is a jolt, the game has to keep up.  some songs its very noticeable, others not so much but it's there.  A game play "tic" if you will.

[ViRUS]

I presume the stuttering goes away if you use Enhanced or any of the other settings instead of Premium, right?

[TheBandit]

that is correct.

[lavacano201014]

Sounds like your graphics card is mad.