FFXI Stuttering Only At 60FPS

Installed FFXI on a Win11 laptop with Windower and dgvoodoo, but I am getting significant frame stuttering in-game when FrameRateDivisor is set to 1 (60FPS cap) via the Config plugin.

There is no issue when the frame limit is 30 or when uncapped. However, if I force a 60FPS limit through NVIDIA control panel and uncap the framerate in-game, I can replicate the issue. I've tried with and without Vsync enabled, or forced, through the control panel. Other games don't have any issue at 60 FPS or otherwise.

Any ideas what would cause this problem in FFXI only at a 60FPS limit?

I was stuttering also yesterday at Apollyon, I was thinking maybe from the zone design or the quantitiy of mobs that was pulled wear causing it. I'm on PC.

I have no such issues with the same software setup. I can go up to 250fps without stuttering.

You did not post any details about your hardware setup, running resolution and graphics enhancements... After all, FFXI is running in an environment it was not designed for.

How do you run 250fps, when i do it my character move in a weird way and menus become way fast.

You can use lossless scaling app from steam. Works for some.

Could explain how to run it and what settings to modify ? it will be much apperciated.

This can be caused by addons doing heavy processing in the prerender event. Next time you observe it, try unloading addons until you find the culprit.

Thank you for the responses so far.

One more thing I observed that could help: when I am capped to 60FPS and I view all active windows using the Win+Tab function,
FFXI's frame rate is consistent within the preview window. The problem returns when the window is restored.

This is happening everywhere: from my Mog House to the Adoulin AH. Currently, I am testing in the Mog Garden since the issue is quite evident with the ocean waves.

Laptop, Windows 11 24H2, 14900HX, 32GB, RTX 4070.

Integrated graphics is disabled in the UEFI, but nothing else has been modified from stock configuration. I am running FFXI at 1920x1080 as a fullscreen borderless window. All laptop power save settings and Vsync/Gsync settings are disabled, although the issue occurs regardless of these features.

It's a fresh install of XI with only a handful of basic Windower addons. Dgvoodoo is installed according to the bgwiki page; anisotropic filtering is 4x and VRAM is 2048. I am not using any HD texture packs or replacers.

To reiterate, the only way I've found to get around the issue is to avoid 60FPS cap. Looking out to the ocean at the Mog Garden:
- Config 30FPS cap hovers around 28.7-28.9 FPS.
- Config uncapped FPS hovers around 208-210 FPS.
- Config 60FPS cap hovers around 58 FPS, then dives to 33-48 for one second every few seconds, shoots back up to 58 and then dives again in an endless cycle.
- Config uncapped FPS while using the NVIDIA control panel frame limiter hits 60 FPS, then cycles like above.

I systematically killed every addon and plugin until only the base Windower remained--except Config, of course. No change. :(

It sounds like a setting is causing gpu to stop rendering when FPS reaches refresh rate, which points to some kind of vsync issue.

Nvidia drivers have an "adaptive" and a "fast" setting for vsync, try those.

Adaptive sync experiences the same stuttering at FrameRateDivisor 1.
Fast sync stutters at 1, but when 0 hits a consistent 120FPS.

I ran into this with my new card a few years back (4080) and ultimately I ended up just dealing without FastCS and using NVidia Inspector to lock my FPS to 75. I tried just 60 at first but it still looked off.

75 was high enough to get rid of the stutter, be smooth, but not give laugh-track animation speeds.

Ironically, when I cap FPS to 75 through NVidia and uncap frames through Config, I hit 75 and dip to 57-58 at regular intervals in FFXI. The dip is the framerate I want!

I played in 60 FPS a lot, but my experience with using a FrameRateDivisor of 1 always locked the game to like 57 FPS or something instead of 60. Doing 0 and using an external frame rate limiter was needed to make it actually 60.

It's pretty much impossible to avoid frame dips altogether, but leaving FrameRateDivisor at 0 and capping the framerate externally with a tool like the Nvidia App or RivaTuner results in noticeably more stable frame rates.

FrameRateDivisor 1 should land in the neighborhood of 57-58FPS, as you say, and this should be consistent outside of crowded scenarios like Mireu, Besieged, etc.

I want to at least stand in my Mog House without frames plummeting every other second under FrameRateDivisor 1 conditions. FRD 2 is consistently 28-29 FPS. FRD 0 is consistently 208-210 FPS. I want to uncover the mystery as to why any setting in between uncapped and vanilla causes erratic frame rates.

Uncapping in-game and forcing a frame limiter externally causes the same problem as FRD 1 without an external limiter.

Instead of dgvoodoo, you could try atom0s's d3d8 > d3d9 wrapper and see if it provides a better experience for you. Dgvoodoo didn't agree woth my laptop and his wrapper solved it for me. I had the same problem with stuttering as well. I don't have an exact link for it, but you can find it on the Ashita discord. Good luck.

I do want to remind people if you have gamepad on and you don't have a gamepad plugged in you will get a stutter

Thank you for this suggestion.

I tried out the wrapper and everything felt smoother at first, but then the stuttering set in again. :(

I also noticed the wrapper does not prevent FFXI from crashing when the display settings change, like dgvoodoo, which is a must-have for a laptop.

Yes, I have confirmed the gamepad setting is disabled in the FFXI config.