Portal - Annoying stutter problem

[Rider]

I decided to play through Portal again so I installed it and fired it up only to find out that it's got the stutter!

It's not a performance problem as the game runs smooth as a baby's bum and setting the graphical options to lower settings doesn't resolve anything, but every so many seconds (it varies) the game hiccups for a bit. The sound, the graphics, they all jerk for a bit before getting back to super-smooth mode. I thought Valve had fixed this issue ages ago with Half-life 2?

A bunch of Google searches later didn't wield any results so I turn to you, the 3DRBB crowd. Can anyone give me any pointers on what I could do to try and fix this? Pretty Please?

Below are my system specs and every thing I've already tried but has failed so far.

AMD64 XP3800+ Processor
Windows XP (SP2)
1GB DDRAM
GeForce 8800 GT 512MB
C-Media Soundcard (CMI8738)
--

+ Tried reinstalling my Sound driver
+ Tried reinstalling my Graphics Driver
+ Tried installing the latest stable Graphics Driver
+ Tried installing the latest Beta Graphics Driver
+ Tried Setting Vsync on/off
+ Tried Lowering Graphical sets
+ Tried Lowering Sound Quality
+ Tried Defragmentating the local cache
+ Tried Disabling all Virusscan software
+ Tried Disabling Windows Update and BIT service
+ Removed the Nvidia Firewall

[Daveman]

Try defragging the game's files. It's in the "Properties" of the game in the Steam menu.

[Rider]

That didn't work either... thanks for the suggestion though, keep 'em coming!

[Denz]

Quit every other application it must come from that.

Or it could be steam or the game itself.

[Danule]

might be an issue with the nvidia firewall

[Zztx]

The same thing's been happening to me with Quake III Arena. Runs fine, but every once in a while it'll just stutter for 15 - 20 seconds. Annoying as hell.

Very well could be other programs running in the background in my case. *shrug*

[Phayzon]

Do you have a program such as a virus/spyware scanner that might be running a scheduled scan or something? Every now and then avast will randomly begin scanning and stutter my PC.

[NutWrench]

The Windows update service? Try disabling the Bits (Background Intelligent Transfer) service and see if the problem stops. If it does, you either have to stay offline while you play or just let Windows finish updating.

[Rider]

Originally Posted by Danule

might be an issue with the nvidia firewall

I uninstalled that one already, so it can't be that...

Originally Posted by Phayzon

Do you have a program such as a virus/spyware scanner that might be running a scheduled scan or something?

No, in fact, I disable my Virusscanner before I play so it won't interfere.

Originally Posted by NutWrench

The Windows update service? Try disabling the Bits (Background Intelligent Transfer) service and see if the problem stops.

Windows update , I tried disabling the service with msconfig (even though I, apparently, already stopped it) to no avail.

Thanks for all the responses!

I'm beginning to suspect it might be steam-related... wasn't there a way to run the game steamless? It's been too long since I last used it that I don't remember much from then (where 'then' is the time HL2 was released).

It's either that or an engine flaw that only affects a minute userbase, of which I happen to be one

[MAT]

Stuttering is an exclusive Source Engine problem. I had stuttering with Half Life 2 when it was newly released back in 2004 and I had tried everything to solve it to no avail.

I got rid of the stuttering when I bought another computer with 2GB RAM.

So do you experience stuttering in every Source engine game or just with Portal?

Adding an extra 1 GB RAM might really help.

[Daveman]

I don't know, they ironed all that out already, and that was mostly just sound stuttering. I get the impression that this is something different, and it shouldn't be happening with a gig of RAM. Maybe it's your sound card.

[Zztx]

Dammit! I was trying to play Serious Sam: The Second Encounter today and more stuttering. Like when I was playing Quake III Arena, the "stutters" pause the game for 15 - 20 second intervals.
The game isn't hard for my computer to run at all - I turned the settings in Serious Sam all the way down (320 res, fer god's sake) and that didn't help at all.

It very well may be AVG, but it's never happened before. I'm confuzzled.

[Inanimate Carbon Rod]

Uninstall / Reinstall.

[Llama Gibbz]

If it does it in different games,its a more than likely a software problem.
Background app,antivirirus,firewall,drivers,spyware ect.

However on 3 different machines i get stuttering and lag on counter strike source,portal and dark messiah.
So i am guessing there some issue with steam or source it self?

[KaraBulut]

That happenes to me in Audiosurf shutting down Anti Virus programs seems to make them less but never completely end them

[Rider]

Yay I found it!

Thanks to Alterum who told me to disable my second monitor I was able to fix this issue as well!

huzzah!

[Daedolon]

I got this weird problem with SyGate personal firewall. Everytime I launch Portal and start to play, SyGate takes over 40% of ym CPU usage and I need to alt+tab to windows, open SyGate and wait for a minute to fix the problem.

[Betelgeuse]

never mind, im an asshat

[Superczar]

Originally Posted by Rider

Yay I found it!

Thanks to Alterum who told me to disable my second monitor I was able to fix this issue as well!

huzzah!

Oh shit, I had thought about posting that as a suggestion to you earlier and didn't, sorry. I set in the nVidia control panel as a global setting to force single monitor. I had the exact same problem with Call Of Duty 2...

[Daveman]

Yeah, I don't know why it defaults to dual monitor setup sometimes.