Stuttering and random freezes in World of Warcraft

I have this delicate issue. Recently I bought a new laptop for gaming and looking forward to playing World of Warcraft at high settings.

At first, the graphics were stuttering every 10-20 seconds for 0.1 seconds. Really annoying, but it was playable. I also got this occasionaly random freeze happening with 1-2 hours between.

I've been searching lots of thread at WoW EU and WoW US (No help to get of course) and I've been searching threads here at NR for similar issues. This has made me update drivers for sound, VGA, Ethernet, Wifi, Chipset and I've also tried disabling Wifi and installing RightMark CPU Utility to make sure my processor runs at max clock when my AC adapter is plugged in.

Result: The stuttering is as good as gone. There are some stutters from time to time, but they can be caused by HD, opening programs, antivirus scan etc. At least I consider the stutter issue solved. On the other hand, the freezing happens a lot often now. It can happen when I log on, after 5 minutes, after 30 minutes, after one hour/several hours. It's totally random.

When the game freeze I can just Alt+Tab and carry on with whatever I do in Windows or in other games, but World of Warcraft will stay frozen until I terminate the program. The stuttering also happened in Team Fortress 2, but that game never froze.

(I've checked temperatures right after a freeze occured, but there's no alarming temps. Last time I checked, CPU was at 42 degrees celcius when World of Warcraft froze.)



Here's my hardware:

CPU: Mobile DualCore Intel Core 2 Duo P8600, 2400 MHz (9 x 267)
Chipset: Intel Cantiga PM45
VGA: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260M (1024 Mb)
HDD: SAMSUNG HM251JJ ATA Device (250 Gb, 7200 RPM, SATA-II)
LAN: Realtek RTL8168C(P)/8111C(P) Family PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet NIC (NDIS 6.20)
WLAN: Intel(R) WiFi Link 5300 AGN
MEM: 2 X TRANSCEND 2GB DDR3 SO-DIMM 1066MHz


Software:

OS: Windows 7 64-bit (also tested in Vista 64-bit)
World of Warcraft patched
Updated drivers for chipset, soundcard, nVidia, ethernet, wifi



So, anyone got some more troubleshooting or possible solutions I can try?

 

Hey,

If you've updated all the drivers and such, but still have the freeze situation you could be experiencing a memory leak. This is a stretch, but I'm not seeing any other possibilities.
When you launch WoW, and get in the game, alt tab out of it and see how much system memory it takes. Play more, etc etc, and then alt tab and see how much it's currently using. If it's the same, then it's not a memory leak.

Have you tried running the game barebones (No other apps in the background, all low resolution, no add-ons, etc etc) and see if it freezes then?

 

That system shouldn't even stutter on wow... I was playing it decently on a 1.9ghz amd turion with a 7000m geforce.

Are you playing it on a wireless connection? Maybe your wifi card is bad, or your internet connection is just really bad.

 

for one, you could try not using a pre-release version of windows, with pre-release drivers.

nothing against windows 7, but try windows [insert variety here] sp2 or higher

 

Thanks for the feedback.

I tried disabling Wifi and use Ethernet. Didn't solve it. I also tried with Vista, as stated, and had the same problem.

After I wrote the thread I lowered the graphics settings in WoW a tad and that seemed to make the freezes less frequent, but they're still there.

What I've also noticed is that when I get a stutter I also get sound distortion. Like when there's sound in many channels and all the sounds together make a mess. I have the latest drivers for my sound card though.

I will try to look after a memory leak and see if there's any.

 

I did some monitoring of the memory usage right and here are my results:

When I started WoW, it used 894 552 K memory.
After 29 minutes, it used 1 009 584 K memory.
When I closed WoW 50 minutes later, it used 1 015 556 K memory.

I wouldn't say it has a memory leak. After talking to friends, it seems that my WoW uses a tad more memory then them, but I think that's just because my computer can with it's 4GB of RAM.


Another thing that may be relevant is that my sound is crackling when many sound channels are used. I tried lowering the amount of sound channels used in WoW, but without luck. The sound still crackles, both in WoW and Ventrilo.

 

Is it a sager by any chance? NP8662?

 

Hmm, definitley not a memory leak then.
Have you checked your ping on the server you play on? What is it's average?
There should be no reason you have graphical lag in the game with those specs. It may be the connection?
Have you tried to roll a toon on a different server and see if it happens there? Check the ping to multiple servers in your geographical location.
Also, run traceroutes to each of these servers. Here's how to do it (Courtesy Blizzard EU):

First, Log into game and into the server, theb ALT TAB out.

1. Click Start and in the Start Search field, type cmd and press Enter
2. The search should find a program called cmd.exe
3. Right-click on the cmd.exe program and left-click on Run as Administrator
4. Type the following into the Command Window that appears:

netstat -n -p tcp -b | more



You will see a line like this one (depending on World of Warcraft):

TCP XXX.XX.XX.XX:XXXX YY.YYY.YYY.YY:3724 ESTABLISHED ZZZZ [WoW.exe]

The X is your IP address, please include this in your email with the information above.
The Y is the address of the server you are connecting to. The 4 digit numbers after the : in both cases indicate the port used.
The Z is the process id for World of Warcraft on your computer.

5. Now we need some information on your connection, in the same command window, type in:

tracert YY.YYY.YYY.YY > C:\tracert.txt



Important: When using the address from the Netstat command above for YY.YYY.YYY.YY, ensure that you use the number values given and remove the :3724 from the end. A file will be created on your local drive (C called tracert.txt which will contain the trace route information. Please note that you must have administrator privileges on your C: drive in order to create this file.

 

Are you using any addons in Wow? A common cause of WoW freezes is outdated addons, not actual hardware. So if you are using any, make sure they are up-to-date. Had this issue as well and it turned up to be old Atlas and some old map coordinates mod, after updating, freezes were gone.

In respect of stuttering, i had them on my old computer but never managed to solve it. WoW played fine for like 1 year on that computer, and after that it started to stutter randomly like you described, every while for like 0.1s. I updated all drivers, i changed both RAM modules, swapped 5400rpm drive for faster 7200rpm, but it never went away. Laptop specs were well over recommended. I solved it by buying a new laptop (M1730). Was rather frustrating as it always stuttered in most critical moment in Arena or in raid when immediate reaction was required and i couldn't do anything. I still don't know what was the cause of those stutterings, but never occured on new computer.

 

I love this solution

 

I've played on four different connections and problems were always the same.

Tonight I've had an alarming increase of freezes in Ulduar (raid instance) which is more demanding than other places in WoW. I also checked memory usage when that happened and it was lower than what I reported earlier.

I can live with the occasional 0.1 sec freeze (it's a lot less frequent after several changes I've done). It's just that damn freeze that cracks me up.

I will try updating all addons and see if it works.

The computer is a Kunshan M860 from the Norwegian webshop Multicom.no.

EDIT: Updated all addons and remove a bunch of old ones. I hope it works!

 

Also, once you update all addons and you still get freezes, try to run WoW without any addons at all. I know it's painful, but that way you eliminate any chance of conflicting addon. Even most up-to-date addon can be a culprit if it's corrupted or badly coded. And don't forget to try and delete the famous "W T F" folder (these forums seem to censor everything, even legit folder name). You will lose all settings but there's a chance that a file with cached data might be corrupted. If nothing of that helps, there's a chance that some core game file is corrupted, have you tried running "repair.exe" from WoW folder?

 

I dont think this has to do with add ons. Does this happen in other games?

 

No answer to my question?
(WHO MAKES THE LAPTOP)

HDD or Northbridge could be overheating...
Audio bitrate could be set too high
And drivers may need an update

Must FIX STUTTERING!
I know how bad it can be man.
What tool are you using to monitor temps, and is it running 24/7?

 

I hasn't happened in other games yet. I've seen small tendencies of stuttering in Team Fortress 2, but that's gone now. Still, it's the freezes I want to get rid of.

It's that computer company online ( www.multicom.no) that makes the laptop. As far as I know, they build it almost from scratch.

How to I lower the audio bitrate? What values should it be?

VGA, chipset, audio, processor drivers are up-to-date as far as I know.

I use HWMonitor to check temperatures. I don't run it 24/7.

 

What audio chip do you have in the machine?

You can check in the device manager

 

when you tried those diffrent connections did you try using a cable as well as wifi

 

Yes.

I run with the drivers Win7 installed right now, and I can't see what chip it is. I think it is Realtek HD Audio though.

DxDiag says:

Description: Speakers (High Definition Audio Device)
Default Sound Playback: Yes
Default Voice Playback: Yes
Hardware ID: HDAUDIO\FUNC_01&VEN_10EC&DEV_0662&SUBSYS_15580860&REV_1001
Manufacturer ID: 1
Product ID: 65535
Type: WDM
Driver Name: HdAudio.sys
Driver Version: 6.01.7100.0000 (English)

I found that running this driver currently works better than the latest Realtek driver. This is the link to Realtek's driver:
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads...=24&Level=4&Conn=3&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false

 

Weird. Try to go back to stock-drivers, because for me it sounds like a sounddriver conflict. I had a similar problem on my same computer. It stuttered/freezed every 10 second, and I fixed it when I updated my audio-drivers.

 

try different drivers

 

This may sound stupid but I suggest you try it:
Try playing the game in a window, in the options you should be able to select that and maximize so you wont notice a difference.

Also, there is a very small app somewhere on the internet that stops your wireless from continuously searching for other networks, I cant remember the name of it but it was something like wopt. Hopefully someone on these forums will realize what it is and tell you

 

Install Windows Vista, or XP in a different partition, update all drivers, and Install WoW.
I'm going to go back and think it's Windows 7 as the culprit.
Report back when you do this.
Yes, it's a huge effort, but if you solve, then you know it's Windows at the core and there is nothing you can do except try to see if a works on Windows 7 later.

 

I have always played WoW in a maximized window mode. The freezing also happens with WiFi disabled.

I have tried it with Vista. Same error.


Today the game froze again when I logged on World of Warcraft. This time I had Volume Mixer open and it froze as well. Every other program worked though.

EDIT: I was hoping that the volume mixer had something to do with the freezes, but the game has now freezed twice after that with Volume Mixer closed.

 

Seems like running Ventrilo alongside World of Warcraft makes the game more unstable. I haven't crashed after I tried playing without Ventrilo running in the background. Problem is that I do want to run Ventrilo ^^

 

Go into realtec hd pannel and default the bitrate to 48000mh i think on the last tab.

 

It has always been default to 24 bits, 48000 Hz (Studio Quality). So I can remove that from the to-do list.

 

I kinda have the same as yours but on a diff notebook. What happens is that, sometimes my notebook stuters. I mean when sometimes I play with the mouse pointer on the desktop, type using MS word, I can see that my laptop "chokes" for like half a second.

So what I do is, (Note: This is not advisable!!! I am only sharing this so that you can somehow figure whats the choking part) I lift one side of the notebook about 1-2 inches of the desk and let go of it. Most of the time it works. Sometimes I have to do it twice or thrice.

 

lol im sorry to go off topic but this solution sounds like what we used to do with out old NES... just beat the @#$& out of it and the components will work again lol...

Sorry for going off topic...

Op i hope you dont try this solution of lifting and dropping the notebook... even if the word thrice was used... good luck finding a solution

 

Hi folks, my very first post at this eminent forum.
I HAD exactly the same problems as you when i played WOW. And ive tried all things you have, upgraded, reinstalled and tried one million differnt drivers...but What ive come to is that there is some sort of problems regarding the sound card/driver - a conflict maybe?. Even when i watch youtube clips it stutters every 5-10 second for a brief moment.

I dont have a permanent solution for it - BUT - last night i unchecked the "use sound" in WOW controlpanel and - voila! No more crashes, no more stutter - i runned 10 laps in dalaran with my charger and not once did i see the smallest of stutter and had a solid fps of 30-40. And more important, no crash, which i had in dalaran for sure before.

But most important, no more lag in raids

Give it a try!

/cheers

__________________
HP DV7-1290eo | 17" WXGA | Intel® Core™2 Duo-processor P7450 | 4GB DDR2 | NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT | 500GB HDD 5400 RPM | 64 bit Windows 7 |

 

You turned off your sound?