(04-24-2014, 05:34 PM)rythven Wrote: Ok I did it! I realize this should be obvious but maybe not everyone has the same issue. I got everything running with no lag by checking the "Disable desktop composition" in the compatibility settings of Dolphin. You get there by right clicking on Dolphin, properties, then compatibility tab. If it's greyed-out, disable UAC. Basically, if you have Windows Aero on, vsync is happening whether you realize it or not. If your fps drops below 60, vsync immediately drops to 30fps. That's what I was experiencing. Now everything feels amazing.
Don't know why I never noticed this post before, but this is a major issue with Windows right now. I've noticed it across several games, and if a Direct3D-based game or piece of software is run without vertical sync in a window or non-native fullscreen, it tends to cause this sort of stuttering since Aero will basically do what I've been calling a "post-process vsync". I'm not sure why more people haven't noticed the problem. Perhaps Microsoft will be able to hammer out a fix one day.
My primary recommendation is for people to force vertical sync at the software level whenever possible. If you have an NVIDIA GPU, you can do this in your control panel. If you're like me and have an AMD GPU, then you know that AMD sucks at drivers, but there are third-party tools that will allow you to force vsync (among other things). That almost always fixes it. I don't know how bad the problem is for Dolphin though, and I'm not exactly the best person to do testing because I shy away from the Direct3D back-end altogether.