With PSO2 Open: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PVPVGcE-Rc Without PSO2 Open: https://youtu.be/rnDUiWLIweU
This is a video of the microstuttering my PC has while gaming and then as well as persisting outside the game when it is closed. I did a full reinstall of the game and have 0 stuttering for 3 hours. Today when I booted it up now my PC is all sorts of laggy again. It wasn't laggy until I ran the game.
On game launch in system eventlogger I get this message. I have allowed interactive services and it still gives this error.
The nProtect GameGuard Service service is marked as an interactive service. However, the system is configured to not allow interactive services. This service may not function properly.
Also, a bunch of of COM Server permission errors are spamming the logs as well.
The application-specific permission settings do not grant Local Activation permission for the COM Server application with CLSID
{2593F8B9-4EAF-457C-B68A-50F6B8EA6B54}
and APPID
{15C20B67-12E7-4BB6-92BB-7AFF07997402}
to the user SID (S-1-5-21-1920866998-2229843818-3982440411-1001) from address LocalHost (Using LRPC) running in the application container Unavailable SID (Unavailable). This security permission can be modified using the Component Services administrative tool.
The timing is always relative to when I start the game. My entire computer lags for a good 30 minutes AFTER I close the game as well as during the majority of time I am playing.
I have tried PSO2 Tweaker and without it. My previous topic mentioned GameGuard sticking around even after the game is closed, and I believe this is related to the above event message. It might be continuously trying to fully activate and can't and is causing issues with my pc?
EDIT:
Another error. This occurs after a full system reboot. I didn't even click anything related to the game and this error shows up that gameguard is trying to do something. Why is it running without the game opening?
Cryptographic Services failed while processing the OnIdentity() call in the System Writer Object.
Details:
AddWin32ServiceFiles: Unable to back up image of service nProtect GameGuard Service since QueryServiceConfig API failed
System Error:
The system cannot find the file specified.
This isn't necessarily related to PSO2. I had robotic super static sounds in other games at one point in the past. What happened was my Audio Driver was all messed up because Windows Update installed one version on top of the previous one I manually installed. It was causing weird driver selection issues.
Try downloading your audio drivers, nuking all audio drivers on your PC, setting windows update to NOT install drivers, reboot, reinstall drivers from the download you just got.
This fixed static issues I had in other games.
Sadly the fix is to use the PSO2 Tweaker and install outside of the windows store following their instructions.
The windows store installation keeps full game old versions even after uninstall & reinstall. It is some weird functionality of the Windows Store. It keeps old versions in a folder called "WindowsApps/MutableBackup/". Every previous install,reinstall, or "check files" modification is in there.
My game was breaking and I had to keep reinstalling. I had 300GB of installs in that folder. Ever since I nuked everything and used the PSO2 tweaker install method, it is just 1 game.
It's because of gameguard. Nzxt cam has kernal access to read temps and stuff. Gameguard being a root kit anti cheat, conflicts with nzxt and tries to fight it.
Your PC is not at 100*C. It is gameguard breaking nzxt cam and causing it to not be able to read the temps. As a failsafe to prevent the fans from underperformung cam reads 100. It's in Pso2 tweaker discord list of applications gameguard hates.
The solution sadly is to set your fans to a fixed state then close cam before playing. I set mine to 65% speed as a safe high level. There are other applications gameguard fights over that you should look at.
Expect GG to be the pain to your existence if you have a decent pc. A lot of the management software we use is hated by GG.
A little bump/update.
There is no service entry in services for npggnt64.des, only the 32 bit entry. The 64bit entry continues to run in a hidden process even after the game closes. Using PSO2 Tweaker to "fix gameguard" troubleshoot, it fails every now and then because npggnt64.des is still running. I try and run the fix every startup due to it is the highest chance of not getting the stuttering.
The reason I say its hidden is because the service.msc entry that does exist never goes to a "running" state when the game is running. But gameguard starts for sure, it just never is visible anywhere.
This issue has occurred with and without the PSO2 Tweaker for NA. Next time it happens I will check for that service. Thanks for the info regarding that. But based off other games that use GameGuard, I read its essentially a rootkit when its running. That is why it can cause so many issues. Most games that use it run into compatibility problems apparently.
Even after closing the game and restarting, GameGuard appears to still be tampering with Windows and is causing insane stuttering. PC/Windows visually lags for a split second every .2-.3 seconds. This is only a graphical lag. There is 0 processing lag. Audio works 100% fine. The only 100% fix I have found is 100% uninstalling the game and reinstalling. This removes the stuttering in Windows itself. Sometimes after not being in the game for 10-15 minutes the problem goes away. But it comes back the second micro-stuttering starts again in game.
For curiosity sake I have uninstalled my NVIDIA drivers to see if it was graphics card failing due to the visual lag. After removing the drivers, my PC goes back to normal until I reinstall them back. I followed guides online to make sure certain software on my PC isn't conflicting with GameGuard. I have NZXT Cam and EVGA NU audio, which are on the list of bad perpetrators. Before running the game I ensure both those things are completely stopped. However after closing the game, NZXT Cam will not open for about 5 minutes. It starts loading then crashes. On the troubleshooting it says because Cam accesses the Kernal for hardware monitoring and such, that is why GameGuard hates it. So I definitely think GameGuard is still running after the game closes even though nothing appears in task manager.
TLDR: I think GameGuard is attaching itself to some service/driver in Windows and not cleaning itself up properly at game close. It is causing microstuttering inside Windows. If I drag a window, it stutters/lags every .2-3s almost exactly.