I recently built my first gaming PC with an MSI B850 Gaming Plus WiFi motherboard, 32GB of DDR5-6000 CL30 memory, a Ryzen 7 7800X3D, an MSI 850W power supply, and an RTX 5080. Performance is excellent in demanding games such as Cyberpunk 2077 at 1440p with maximum settings and full path tracing, but I get noticeable micro-stuttering in games like ARK, Palworld, and Black Myth: Wukong. Temperatures seem normal—the GPU reaches about 60–63°C and the CPU around 80°C during heavy use—with no apparent thermal throttling. EXPO is enabled, the monitor is connected directly to the graphics card, and I have already disabled overlays such as Discord. What could be causing the stuttering, and what troubleshooting steps should I try?
4 Answers
Overlays and monitoring programs can sometimes cause stuttering, especially combinations involving an overlay or frame limiter. Since Discord is already disabled, also check whether software such as MSI Afterburner, RivaTuner, recording tools, or other hardware-monitoring utilities are running. Temporarily close them all and test the same game with a clean background session. Antivirus scanning and other background applications are worth checking too.
Unreal Engine games are especially prone to stuttering when compiling shaders during gameplay. That can happen even on very powerful hardware, particularly the first time you enter a new area or encounter new effects. Check whether the stutters become less frequent after playing for a while, and look for a shader-precompilation option in the game's settings. Compare the frame-time graph rather than just average FPS, since frame-time spikes are what reveal the problem.
Use a monitoring tool to watch frame time, CPU and GPU usage, temperatures, clocks, and power draw while the stutter happens. A frame-time graph can show whether the spikes line up with CPU usage, shader compilation, a clock drop, or something else. Also confirm that Resizable BAR is enabled in the BIOS, then consider reinstalling the graphics driver with a clean-driver utility if the issue persists.
The 850W power supply should generally be sufficient for this setup if it is a good-quality unit and the proper graphics-card power cable is being used. I wouldn't jump straight to buying a 1000W unit unless monitoring shows power-related crashes, severe dips, or instability. The storage drive and game installation are also worth checking—make sure the SSD has free space and that the affected games are installed on it. EXPO being enabled is fine, but if the system remains unstable, temporarily test with EXPO disabled to rule out memory settings.
My temperatures look fine and I haven't seen throttling. I haven't tried a clean driver reinstall yet, so I'll test that and monitor the frame-time graph.