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Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Report bugs with the Rainmeter application and suggest features.
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thefowles1
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Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by thefowles1 »

As the title suggests, I narrowed down the culprit to Rainmeter causing a consistent 1.5-second stutter (very brief visual freeze) in games -- mainly Overwatch, because I play it the most. I have my game capped at 150 frames per second, and my computer is able to consistently reach that without issue (i5-6600k, GTX 1070, 16GB DDR4).
Here is video evidence of the stutter I'm referring to when Rainmeter is open. The upper yellow graph that shows the white pillars is fps response time consistency; notice how every time it spikes (every 1.5 seconds), the in-game fps meter drops and the game freezes for a split second.
I realize going from 150 fps to 120 fps is not much to complain about, but it's not the fps drops that is worrisome, but rather the nature of the stutter, the split-second freezes that interfere with smooth video response. Normally, the game has no issue keeping right at the 150 fps mark consistently when Rainmeter is not open.
If you compare the two videos, you'll notice not just the severe 1.5-second stutter, but also how in-between the stuttering, the game still has issues keeping at 150fps, dropping down to mid-to-low-140s as I look around. Again, as per the video showing normal behavior, the game normally has no issue whatsoever even when looking around and moving.

I'm using tjmarkham's Win10 Widgets, and my active skins are:
  • Weather exLarge
    Date/time Large
    Hard drive Large
    Volume Small
    Performance - CPU Tiny
    Performance - Network Tiny
(as seen here)

I installed Rainmeter about two weeks ago when I discovered the Win10 Widgets theme; I have not used any other themes, so I am unsure if the performance issues are related to this theme, other themes, or only Rainmeter in general. I am unsure if this issue had been occuring since install and I hadn't noticed it, or if it only started occuring a couple days ago. I've used both the most recent 4.2 beta at the time, the current 4.2 beta (r3040), and 4.1 final (r2989). By disabling the individual skins one-by-one, I learned the Date/time skin in the used theme is the one that causes the severe stuttering (split-second freezing), but Rainmeter in general, while open, causes the in-between fps drop (where the fps drops to the mid-to-low-140s).

Unfortunately, this means that I will have to stop using Rainmeter, as it interferes with my gameplay. I had not seen anything like this reported when I searched, so forgive me if this is a known issue.
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fonpaolo
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Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by fonpaolo »

I don't use that skin suite and I'll never install it, so I can only make suppositions, but, based on my experience, I'm almost sure that it can cause some performance issues.
I'm not saying it could "harm" your computer, only that it's very, very difficult to optimize skins and using some complex calculations to automatically adapt them to any user, it certainly doesn't help, however Rainmeter doesn't use GPU, only CPU...
I can't say it's a known issue, but if you search in the forum here, I remember some discussions about using a skin to completely disable Rainmeter when playing full screen and start it when you close the game.
thefowles1
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Joined: April 24th, 2018, 7:13 pm

Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by thefowles1 »

fonpaolo wrote:I'm almost sure that it can cause some performance issues.
fonpaolo wrote:however Rainmeter doesn't use GPU, only CPU...
I can believe it would cause performance issues on PCs that are less powerful, but not mine.
I assumed as such, too, but even in my task manager, Rainmeter is shown using hardly more than 1% CPU at maximum, ever, and 0 GPU usage whatsoever. I can't imagine it would be possible to bottleneck the system that I have with light programs, so it's absolutely not bottlenecking.
fonpaolo wrote:I remember some discussions about using a skin to completely disable Rainmeter when playing full screen and start it when you close the game.
That might not work for me, as I use a dual-monitor setup and almost always play in borderless windowed, not fullscreen.

I guess I'm mostly surprised that it causes such a noticeable effect on the machine I'm using. It was built to be quite a powerhouse, and something like Rainmeter shouldn't cause even a noticeable dent... but then again, I don't know how the workings of Rainmeter are. :???:
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fonpaolo
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Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by fonpaolo »

I don't use my computer to play games, but sometimes I use almost all its resources with 3D programs, using CPU but also GPU, depending on the rendering engine used, never had a problem and contrary to you I'm using more than 30 different skins, even when the CPU is used at 100% or my dated GPU is calculating a rendering, neither Rainmeter nor my system are affected.

Could there be a video driver problem?
I don't know what to suggest to you, if you're running your game in a window, not full screen, you can always use a skin to detect if the game is running and disable Rainmeter.
On the other hand, try to find which skin is causing this problem, unload all of them and load one at a time.
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jsmorley
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Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by jsmorley »

While Rainmeter itself uses practically no CPU resources, at the end of the day it is a toolkit, and what you make with it certainly can. You need to figure out which skin or skins in particular are giving you this issue.

I also have a bunch of skins running all the time, and have never had any issue with games, even ones where FPS is a big factor in winning or dying a horrible death... I do tend to stay away from things in Rainmeter like endless animations, and audio visualizers, which can use a lot of CPU and GPU.
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fonpaolo
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Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by fonpaolo »

jsmorley wrote:... I do tend to stay away from things in Rainmeter like endless animations, and audio visualizers, which can use a lot of CPU and GPU.
This was also my first thought, but he isn't using any audio visualizer...
As I said, I don't want to dig into the code of that Win10 Widget to understand how it works and if it's causing these issues, but optimization is very problematic, there's always the possibility that a small mistake can cause big problems and affect performance.
thefowles1
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Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by thefowles1 »

Wow, thanks a bunch for your replies, guys (or girls).

I did narrow down the sole proprietor of the severe stutters to the date/time skin. It makes some sense, considering the skin regularly updates, but the stuttering is not on the same cycle as when the skin updates... but, I'm thinking maybe I should just get a new theme. I like this one and all, but if it consistently has to pull repeat information that will interfere, maybe it's best not to use it. :uhuh:
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fonpaolo
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Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by fonpaolo »

I'm glad you found the problem. :17good
However, it's strange that it was caused by a skin that measures time and date... :???:

edit: update, now I can understand why these skins are giving problems... how to complicate a simple thing! :17what
thefowles1
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Joined: April 24th, 2018, 7:13 pm

Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by thefowles1 »

fonpaolo wrote:I'm glad you found the problem. :17good
However, it's strange that it was caused by a skin that measures time and date... :???:

edit: update, now I can understand why these skins are giving problems... how to complicate a simple thing! :17what
Care to elaborate what exactly would cause problems? I'm not very familiar with how the skins are configured.
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fonpaolo
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Re: Rainmeter/theme causes consistent stuttering in games

Post by fonpaolo »

In a word, everything.
If you have a skin, which is using another skin, and a bunch of measures instead of one or two... at the end of the day, it's a problem.
I know, Rainmeter can be used in various ways, so, there isn't only one "right" way of doing things, Rube Goldberg, honestly, isn't the right way.

When you described which skin has caused the problem, you made me curious: how it's possible that this type of skin can give problems?
I don't know if you're using the "free" or the "paid" version, even there, I remember discussions regarding the possibility of selling something which is free, then, I downloaded the free version and giving a look... I remembered others complaining about how it was build.
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