GL Driver half performance windowed mode after Fall Creator's Update

[Danfun64]

I've been using RetroArch on my Windows 10 laptop for a while now, and it ran full speed with the GL driver on both windowed and full screen modes. Then the Fall Creator's Update happened, and now when I use the program with the GL driver on windowed mode, the "estimated screen framerate" is half of that of the "Vertical Refresh Rate". However, it still runs at full speed in Full Screen mode for whatever reason. I am running the best drivers for my system (Catalyst 15.6 Beta, which is older than the latest). Out of curiosity I tried the latest ones (15.7.1 the last certified, and 16.2.1 the last to run on my hardware), and still had the same problem.

Here are my specs: http://paste.debian.net/992049/

I first noticed the problem when running the latest stable build of Retroarch (1.6.7). I have tried the latest trunk builds, but got the same result.

[inactive123]

Tried rolling back update 1709? If that brings your performance back then I would raise the issue with Microsoft, if GL performance in windowed mode drops in half after an update to 1709, that seems like MS' update is at fault, and I don't see how you can expect us to correct a mistake they did, we pretty much implement the GL API and that is it, there is no way to work around whatever regression they made.

[Danfun64]

I was hoping to avoid rolling back update 1709 because of stable Windows Subsystem for Linux...

[Awakened0]

I get stuck on a black screen after exiting RA with the GL driver sometimes on Nvidia hardware now after getting the Fall Creator's Update, so maybe both AMD and Nvidia have things to fix in their drivers.

[andres-asm]

The first creator's update was a bitch too, had all kinds of breakage

[Awakened0]

Maybe it's because they rolled it out to me really quickly this time. Last time it was a month or so late until it showed up on my Windows Update.

[Danfun64]

Radeon said they'd never update the drivers for my hardware again about a year or two ago...so as much as i wanted to avoid it, I downgraded back to the Creator's Update. Naturally Retroarch is at full speed again...

[Danfun64]

Oops. Meant to say i have the original Creator's Update and it was the Fall Creator's Update that broke everything. Sorry...

[inactive123]

Is there a way for you to report this back to MS?

[daninthemix]

I had a similar issue (terrible GL performance after Fall Creators Update) and it turned out to be a shader problem. Might be worth turning shaders off just to test.

[Danfun64]

Shaders were already turned off.

[rz5]

@Danfun64 - Please try the following, right click on RA's exe, Properties > Compatibility, set things like this:
https://snag.gy/OZY3Vy.jpg

Windows 10 has been having some funky behavior related to exclusive fullscreen apps, namely forcing those to run in an 'optimized' borderless fullscreen mode, which may explain your perf drop.

Read more about it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/645ukf/windows_10_cu_fullscreen_optimizations/

[Danfun64]

Bit too late for that, as I already reverted to the original Creator's Update. I noticed that setting, and found it odd. To reiterate, Retroarch with the GL driver worked at full speed at full screen and even windowed fullscreen modes. It was just in windowed mode that performance was cut in half. For whatever reason I was worried that if i disabled the fullscreen optimizations, it would lower performance for Retroarch all around instead of raise it.

[ghost]

This seems to be a common problem among all applications/games, not just RA:

glfw/glfw#676

https://steamcommunity.com/app/262060/discussions/1/1457328392101258809/

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/overwatch/topic/20752045032

In the future, perhaps consider testing other applications as well in case it's not just RA.

[Danfun64]

So...what do you suggest? Something involving DPI settings?

[Ryunam]

There is definitely something fishy going on with build 1709 of Windows 10, causing a lot of inconsistent framedrops and performance in Exclusive Fullscreen and Windowed modes alike. It is a widespread problem that is affecting a lot of users in different ways.

I have opened a thread on the r/windows10 subreddit to further discuss these issues and hopefully have someone from Microsoft address the problem directly: https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/79utn0/fall_creators_update_build_1709_causing/