New thing: frequent 0.5sec pauses

[defektive]

I've not had much trouble running this game since release, save for the micro-stutter that almost everyone experiences, but as of a few days ago the game has started to stall every minute or so: everything locks up, even the sound, for 0.5 seconds. This only happens with online play, doesn't do it in single player.

My ATi drivers aren't the latest (Cat. 11.8) but have been running fine up until now. Game cache varifies okay. System isn't infected with anything nasty. Nothing else is running that shouldn't be. On demand packet sniffing security tools are all off during play. No hardware or system changes of any kind have been made. I've not changed any game config settings, and I've also forced the game to regenerate the config dir. then reverted back to the old one as it made no difference. Net connection isn't the greatest in the world (steady 5Mb down, 0.4Mb up) but has worked fine and continues to do so for other FPS online play games. I'm not sure what else to try!

These constant pauses make the game barely playable bordering on rather annoying. Any ideas what this might be?

 

[=GG= Mr Moe]

I have noticed this the past couple of days as well and I never had this before. Every couple of minutes for a split second or so its as if everything freezes up and then continues.

Very strange since I haven't changed anything nor have I done anything with drivers etc.

 

[Gudenrath]

I am experiencing this as well. I have had them since release, but then they were so infrequent that I could get on fine. Then they mostly seemed to occur when the "Objective captured" or "Objective lost" music triggered, or in other situations where extra background sounds played. If there are any connection with the sound I don't know, since it also somtimes seemed to happen outside of those conditions.

But recently they have become much more frequent, perhaps every 2 or 3 minutes, and yes, it is making the game borderline unplayable. I mentioned this while playing on a server just now, and a lot of other players recognised this problem and said they also had this happening to them.

I just noticed it downloaded a patch just after I left the server. It may have helped this issue, I haven't played post-downloading, but I will return with a report if it still happens.

 

[Anoobis]

Yeah...here too. I ve never experienced theses freezes before...just since the last patch.

 

[Ondrrej]

Patch solves nothing. Unfortunetly...

Playing this game is sometimes like torturing

-splashscreen issue
-crash issues
... and now this

 

[defektive]

Glad it's not just me!

As I was typing the OP the latest patch was downloading so I tested it as soon as it had completed: didn't fix the issue, game still pauses every minute or so for ~500ms. Annoying.

The pause doesn't stop my avatar in its tracks tho; when the pause happens and I'm holding down the W key (forward) the game resumes ~500ms later in the position I would be if I was moving normally, i.e., this pause doesn't seem to stop my avatar in its tracks. Weird.

 

[Eule]

here too

here too

These freezes/lags.....i have since yesterday too.

I search in forum.....and i may found the problem:

They established "Punkbuster Screenshots" since 1-2 days.

They cause these lags.
In BFBC2 same problems were on Punkbuster screenshot enabled server.

"Solution":

I do not know if you can shut off the "PB screenshot-crap" itself, but i guess that you just have to find a server without Punkbuster...that should help.
I know that is difficult enough (500 players and 2-10 full servers).....these servers are rare.

 

[BL4Z3>FAS>]

Im getting this too now ,....it seemed fine before , but now it seems like I'm getting a freeze every minute or 2 ,.... I have the newest drivers ,...I dont understand what has changed , the only thing I can think of was there was a windows update?


ASUS CROSSHAIR V FORMULA REPUBLIC OF GAMERS EDITION MOTHERBOARD
AMD PHENOM-II X4 975 3.6GHz BLACK EDITION CPU
ASUS HD 6950 2GB DDR5 VIDEO CARD
PATRIOT 8GB DDR3 1600Mhz LOW LATENCY KIT
CREATIVE X-FI PRO TITANIUM FATALITY EDITION SOUND CARD
ASUS VE28 24" LED MONITOR
COOLERMASTER HAF 932 CASE BLACK EDITION
Logitech X-530 5.1 Surround System
Razer Diamondback Mouse

 

[Mekhazzio]

This appears to be an issue caused by the Punkbuster update on 11/14.

Edit:

It's definitely Punkbuster related, doesn't occur on servers with Punkbuster disabled. Short-term solution, bug the server admins to turn PB off.

 

[SolitarioSoldat]

This game is falling apart, only game I had hope for,the only one........

EDIT: I didnt knew that there is a post made about this issue,otherwise I wouldnt of opened a new thread in General discussion.

 

[=GG= Mr Moe]

This appears to be an issue caused by the Punkbuster update on 11/14.

Edit:

It's definitely Punkbuster related, doesn't occur on servers with Punkbuster disabled. Short-term solution, bug the server admins to turn PB off.

Makes sense since I had it start before the Nov 15 Patch.

 

[defektive]

This appears to be an issue caused by the Punkbuster update on 11/14.

Edit:

It's definitely Punkbuster related, doesn't occur on servers with Punkbuster disabled. Short-term solution, bug the server admins to turn PB off.

Tested, confirmed: it's PB enabled servers that frequently stall.

All of my favs and current clan server are PB enabled. Deep ____ing joy.

 

[Gudenrath]

Hopefully TWI will be able to convince PB that whatever the f*** they did in that patch it needs to be undone, since it is ruining their game.

 

[=GG= Mr Moe]

Well its been happening consistently on the 2FJG Clan's server for the past couple of days. I just couldn't take it I had to quit playing

 

[Mekhazzio]

Yeah, we need to pester server admins to turn PB off. The pauses are intensely frustrating.

 

[Ducky]

This appears to be an issue caused by the Punkbuster update on 11/14.

Edit:

It's definitely Punkbuster related, doesn't occur on servers with Punkbuster disabled. Short-term solution, bug the server admins to turn PB off.

Switch of PB??? Would this not cause the server to become unranked?

(great oppertunity to get rid of the ranking system )

 

[Lush]

You dont need PB turned on to keep the server ranked

Turning it off would be a last resort for us but we dont want to ruin peoples game time so may have to until it is fixed

 

[zeep]

Same here. Only notcied it today because i haven't played for a few days.

Started since the last 2 patches. Never had any stutter issue before!

Q9650 @3GHZ, 3GB RAM, GTX 570, WIN XP SP2

 

[r5cya]

oh wonderful! as if we didn't have enough annoying little bugs, (my sound's still cutting out) now we got pb causing even more? i hope someone who can make a difference, takes note of this and drops a hammer.

 

[Schmidt Fritz]

Confirming this new phenomenon.