I think i remember reading somewere that loads of people were having a stutter problem when playing Half-life 2. It happens usually when a new section has just loaded and you turn and it seems like the frame rates drop loads and any sounds repeat. It also happens in other places to in the middle of playing when nothing is going on, so it isnt hard for the GPU??? anyone know whats going on, i thought it was a glitch in the engine and that valve would be releasing a patch, but the latest one doesnt fix it Abit KV8 MAX-3 AMD 64 3200+ 754 1Gb Giel PC3200 RAM HIS X800 XT PE 2xWD Raptor 36Gb some power supply Audigy 2 ZS

go on the Steam Powered forums. http://www.steampowered.com/forums they'll advice you better than most here (probably). Radeon 9800 Pro 128Mb/ 4.12 AMD Barton 2800 @ 2.3ghz Asus A7N8X E-Deluxe 512 DDRAM PC2700 @ 360mhz

Louis. I understand your frustration fully. We have all waited a long time for this game and there appears to be loads of issues with it. I too have the major stutter problem which I also didn't expect to get with my settup. It obviously points to a software issue. I have searched every avenue of the steam forum only to find recomendations on how to turn down the graphics quality and the sound quality to make the game run smoother. This is not acceptable. Many gamers, like myself, have spent quite a bit of cash on there machines to get the most out of this game only to find that it's not going to make a blind bit of difference. There has always been word of a patch release to fix the stutter problem as well as iron out other bugs but still no sign. Unfortunatly, most of us will have completed HL2 and moved on to greater thing by the time this patch has been released. Fingers crossed. Thats all steam can offer. Good luck GaryM. Chaintech 9PJL Appogee 800FSB P4 2.8 HT Sparkle Platinum 6800GT 256MB 4*256 KINGSTONE PC3200 dual 40 gig IDE 120 Gig sata DC10+ Video card