Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

Hey Guys,

New to the forum. I've read through countless old threads about random stutters, but I was never able to find a solution. The stutters usually happen during transition scenes or during menus, or certain audio cues. The sound will get choppy and the frame rate will drop. Sometimes to just under 60, other times down to 25 or lower.

For example, in Twilight Princess, 50% of the time when I go into a house it will do it. Occasionally when I'm fighting an enemy. In Mario Kart, it almost always happens when it makes the sound indicating that it is the final lap, and when I cross the line during the final lap. I only have a few games, but they all do similar things to this. Mario Tennis does it when you hit a power shot sometimes.

I've tired all different resolutions, enabling/disabling most settings that I read others had tired; dual core, fastdiskread, basically everything within the settings. I'm using version 5.0, but have used a few other builds that came after, and have had the exact same problems. I also made sure my Windows power settings are high performance.

My emulator machine is getting a bit older:

i3-3320
AMD HD 7770 2GB
8GB's of RAM

but my GPU never goes above 60%, and the processor hovers around 35%. I also use it for Project 64 with texture packs, and never have any hiccups.

I've also tried messing with the Radeon settings.

I think I've run out of things to try, and was hoping someone might have an idea? Or even though my GPU and processor don't seem to be taxed, could they be holding me back?

Thank you to anyone that might be able to help.

Have you tried the very latest development versions of dolphin? Also, post a picture of all of your graphic settings (after updating).

Sounds like shader cache generation stuttering. Try using Ubershaders in the latest development builds.

I did try the latest build with no luck. I will try again with ubershaders though, as I haven't tried that. If I don't have any luck with that, I'll post my settings. Thanks guys.

Also in latest dev build, you have to mark "Compile Shaders Before Starting".

So I tried the newest build, and after just a bit of testing, it seems like it does work better the more I use it, which I believe is how ubershaders work? I'm new to it, but that's how I understood it.

Still the odd drop though, and for some reason, the stuttering seems to be much worse when I use the widescreen gecko hack. I didn't think that would cause issues, but it definitely eliminates 80% of the stuttering when I don't use the gecko hack. Seems to work with the built in widescreen hack though. Anyone else heard of this?

I was also unable to find the "Compile Shaders Before Starting" option. Is that only in certain builds? I just downloaded the newest version from the dolphin website.

(08-13-2019, 05:04 AM)bibble89 Wrote: [ -> ]So I tried the newest build, and after just a bit of testing, it seems like it does work better the more I use it, which I believe is how ubershaders work? I'm new to it, but that's how I understood it.

That's how regular shader compilation works, not ubershaders. Ubershaders are supposed to immediately get rid of the stuttering that otherwise would go away as you play the game.

(08-13-2019, 05:04 AM)bibble89 Wrote: [ -> ]I was also unable to find the "Compile Shaders Before Starting" option. Is that only in certain builds? I just downloaded the newest version from the dolphin website.

If you're using a recent development build (not 5.0 stable), it's at the bottom of the first tab of the graphics settings window.

Thanks to everyone who helped. The ubershaders fixed 95% of the stutters. I still get them when advancing through menus but I can live with that. I do still get stutters in transition scenes in Twilight Princess and a very rare stutter in Mario Kart when using the widescreen gecko code, but I did find another web site stating that this can happen with these two games specifically using the widescreen hack.

Again, thanks guys.

(08-13-2019, 08:28 AM)bibble89 Wrote: [ -> ]... gecko code...

Having cheats enabled can potentially cause stuttering. It changes how the JIT works a bit and can cause some inefficiencies. Even if you don't have any cheats enabled for that specific game you're playing.

Definitely didn't realize that. I certainly try that and see if it helps with the menu stutters.