Periodic FPS slowdown?

My copy of Path of Exile enters these really strange periods of horrible lag every so often- fps lag, not latency. About every 3 to 5 minutes, my game will drop from 60+ fps all the way down to 5 fps- and stay there for 2 minutes or so. When this happens in combat, I can usually struggle through it, but I really don't want to enter higher difficulties of this game and have this bug kill me. My graphical settings are all as low as possible, shadows off, etc, and the game is fullscreen at 1440x900 which is my native resolution.

CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) 2 Duo CPU E8500 @ 3.16GHz 3.17GHz
RAM: 2GB
OS: Windows 7 32-bit
GPU: Nvidia 9600GSO

My fps/latency charts:
http://imgur.com/mJ2mm

When your framerate drops, do you hear/feel extreme hard drive activity (I don't trust HDD activity lights :P)?

Nothing is audible from where I'm sitting, no.

since you say it lasts around 2 minutes in this stage, try to use this time to check if some tasks in the background do things that may cause hdd or cpu load. could be related to updates (windows/antivirus etc) or other tasks - smells like something scheduled, from your description...

I will next time, but I doubt this is the case. no other game lags like this, nor so frequently. I'm fairly convinced it's something to do with the game itself or the way it interacts with my GPU.

I'm having the same problem.

Game runs fine, and then every 3-5 minutes enters a period of "FPS slowdown" which can last several minutes. During FPS slowdown the framerate is reduced to 5-10 frames per second. Other games run fine - this issue is specific to Path of Exile.

Modifying the game's video settings doesn't have any impact. This "FPS slowdown" can occur while standing still in an area with no activity.

This issue needs looked into.


Operating System: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit (6.1, Build 7600) (7600.win7_gdr.120830-0334)
System Manufacturer: Gateway
System Model: P-7811FX
BIOS: Ver 1.00PARTTBL
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU P8400 @ 2.26GHz (2 CPUs), ~2.3GHz
Memory: 4096MB RAM
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
---------------
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: NVIDIA GeForce 9800M GTS
Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Chip type: GeForce 9800M GTS
DAC type: Integrated RAMDAC
Display Memory: 2285 MB
Dedicated Memory: 495 MB
Shared Memory: 1789 MB
Current Mode: 1280 x 720 (32 bit) (60Hz)

Damn, forum gobbled my forum post, clicked submit and was basically 404ed. Devs: Whoever works on the forum can you please ask them to sometime look at getting the forum to retain forum text/content when someone clicks back? Cheers.

I've shortened this post a ton.

I had the same FPS problems except it was like every 5-10 seconds it was slowing down to 1-10 fps, as if the game was loading an effect into RAM for the first time.

After uninstalling my AMD graphics driver, rebooting into safemode, running driversweeper then installing the latest version of AMD Catalyst driver suite I no longer get those frame rate dips.

I'd like to note a few other issues I have though regarding frame rate:

My examples are while hanging out in the act 2 town to make them more reliable readings.

If I open the main options menu, I go from 60FPS down to 15FPS, if it's on the GRAPHICS or KEYS tab. If it's on the SOUND or UI tab it goes down to 30FPS instead.

If I push enter to open the chat and there's some messages in there frame rate goes down to 20 or so which can be quite bad. It also slows down a bit when text is on screen from player party chat.

Push C to see the character sheet, frame rate dips down to 15. Sell menu on shops goes down to 30FPS with no items in the list, whereas buy shop list doesn't.

Normal inventory area with I doesn't have a frame rate decline like the above. Surely viewing these 2D elements shouldn't reduce the frame rate so massively?

The passive skill tree goes down to 15-25FPS depending on zoom level.

The social menu on the friends tab goes down to 30FPS, create party tab 20FPS, and public parties 10FPS. 10FPS makes it not very enjoyable to view the party list that's for damn sure.

I guess to be thorough pushing tab to view the mini-map brings fps down to 50, but that's kind of a no brainer :P.

I saw a DEV respond here so I thought I'd post the above here in hopes it can be fixed or at the very least added to your "investigate" list =P.

By the way: Been playing since the Open Beta release and I'm enjoying the game a ton, fantastic work guys and I'd love it very much if you guys are able to keep up the awesome stuff you're all doing.

My specs are

I5 750 @ 3GHZ (It doesn't reach 100% on any cores)
AMD 6850 Graphics (This is my main bottleneck, running at 2560x1440, however surely 2D menus shouldn't slowdown a lot)

I'm having FPS problem with Ice Shot, not sure about other Ice Spell cause i just played Ranger only, every time i use Ice Shot my screen will lag, other spell works fine.. thanks.

M5A97 pro mobo.
Fx6100 3.8ghz
MSI 1ghz ed 7770 (13.1 driver)
8gb amd performance ram 1600mhz
WD 320gb hdd (not sure on speed think its the lower 5400rpm)

However I get the same problem I get around 80/ 150 fps depending on settings then no matter the res or settings i get dramaticfps drops made me die once in beta on an account i was given (not this account) The only other game ive ever had this problem with was diablo 3.

I've played far cry 3 perfectly fine and play guild wars 2 a lot both run fine and stable? really wanna get this fixed. Maybe my hdd can't keep up?

if anyone has any answers please let me know