I have had zero issues with lag till tonight. There can be as much as 5 seconds between a key input and its result. I have not seen any spikes in CPU or Memory and test other text programs and all works as intended (typing this post for example)
I have tried reinstalling Papyrus, restarting my computer, no changes in the lag. My current project does not have any extra additions (notes, comments, ect) just text and under 20K words.
I read another post mentioning page breaks and followed its advice but the setting was already in place.
The program is currently unusable and I have no clue what changed from yesterday’s usage.
Hi @valk1080, Sorry to hear this is happening—it’s a true nightmare scenario!
First, let’s make sure you’ve got a backup of your book, just in case there’s an issue with your computer’s hard drive.
I recommend taking a copy of your book project folder and the entire Papyrus Author Documents folder (which is where any non-project files and unsaved documents are saved) into a usb drive or a cloud drive.
You’ll find Papyrus Author Documents under your computer’s Documents folder.
Once you’ve got backups saved somewhere outside of the computer, I can recommend a few quick fixes:
If you’ve got a Windows computer
Disable Fast Boot:
Especially with laptops, the computer might not fully shut down on restart, and leave a long list of Windows updates hanging, which can cause this kind of trouble. Here’s how to check it:
Open the Task Manager by pressing Ctrl + Shift + Esc, or right-clicking on your taskbar and selecting “Task Manager.”
Go to the “Performance” tab and look at the “Up Time” value. If it’s more than 24 hours, I recommend disabling Fast boot and then restarting your computer. You can disable Fast Boot from the power settings.
If your computer’s hard drive is full, Papyrus Author may run into a wall when trying to save your writing.
Check that your antivirus isn’t mistakenly blocking Papyrus Author
If you’ve made changes to your computer, or installed a new security software, they could be stopping Papyrus Author from saving files into your computer’s hard drives.
Some macOS updates can change the apps’ access to your computer, which may cause problems when trying to save your writing.
Did you see any error messages or alerts from either Papyrus Author or your computer at any point?
If these steps don’t help, let me know what operating system you’re running and what kind of computer you have, and we’ll go from there! We’ll figure this out!
I double checked all suggestion and implemented what I could.
Disk space is no issue, I already had fastboot off, but my computer had been on for some time when the issues started. Even so I had restarted and reinstalled Papyrus and still had the lag issue.
Today the application loaded slowly but did at least load. The lag is must less then yesterday but there is still a delay between key input and text appearing on the screen.
Yesterday when the program was freezing there was no error messages beyond “This program is not responding”
I have made a new writing project and I am still getting lag on a blank project.
I may try reinstalling on a different drive just to see if that might do something (Desktop, Windows 11 btw)
I searched online what else could it be, and my next guess would be an issue with the hard drive itself.
In case the hard drive is damaged, I recommend backing up your files (both Papyrus Author, and others as well) just as a precaution.
This is a great next step to see quickly if the culprit is a failing hard drive. I can also recommend doing a disk check.
Here’s how you can do disk check with Windows 11:
Open File Explorer, go to the “This PC” tab.
Right-click the drive, then select Properties
Click the Tools tab, and choose Check
Select “Scan Drive”
→ This may take a while, especially if the drive has a lot of space.
I hope nothing’s wrong with the drive, but it’s a good idea to check!
While you’re checking out the hard drive, do you have an antivirus software installed? I wonder if it could be limiting Papyrus Author’s performance.
I have tried moving it to other drives including to SSDs and I am still getting long delays when typing. I would blame the change over to Windows 11 (moved recently and never had any lag issues on 10) but as it seems I’m the only one getting lag this bad it must be something on my computer. The fact even blank projects lag leave me at a loss.
I do have Papyrus Author on the safe list for anti-virus. At this point I am going to have to use other programs and try future updates.
Is Papyrus the only application showing that lag? If other applications lag too, then some hardware issue is quite probable. If the lag is specific to Papyrus, then I’d look more into software or network issues.
Yes Papyrus is the only application that is currently showing any input lag. I am not using the software over a network, the program and writing project share the same disk drive.
Is there some settings within Papyrus that could have mistakenly turned on that would cause it to lag? I have used database software that had a setting to search through previous entries with each updated bit of information that would lead to lag. I don’t believe that is anything Papyrus is trying to do.
One other quick thing I forgot to mention, the application sometimes takes over a minute to even launch, and that is with it installed on an SSD. Sometimes its maybe 10 seconds
I just timed it and it too 33 seconds to get to the opening start screen.
The next thing I would check is the font cache which might be broken. We can delete it and upon the next start it will be automatically recreated by Papyrus:
Open a document
File > Open Other > Show Folder of Papyrus Settings
Quit Papyrus
Delete the file “Fonts.cache” in the settings folder
Start Papyrus again
If this doesn’t help, then some font itself might broken. So I would create a new document where another font is used than usual and see if this helps. If so, you’d have to reinstall the broken font.
The first start after deleting the font cache may take longer because the cache needs to be rebulit from scratch. The next starts should be fast again.
You might also try to delete the Preferences/.ini file. and see if that helps.
First export your current settings so you can restore them later: Preferences > User Interface > Miscellaneous > All Settings > Export/Import.
Then use File > Open Other > Show Folder of Papyrus’ Preferences
Quit Papyrus
Delete the papyrus.ini file (Windows) or Papyrus.prefrences file (Mac).
Start Papyrus
Optionally: Restore Settings from the file saved above.
Well it had been behaving for almost a month and now the program is not responding every 10-20 seconds. It has never crashed and if I wait 5-10 seconds it starts working again, but only for a short time before freezing up again. Doesn’t matter what it is I’m doing, typing, scrolling, clicking off to look something up and coming back to the program, it locks up.
I watched the app via the task manager and there are no spikes in processing or memory before or during these lock ups.
I have cleared the font cache and preferences, uninstalled and reinstalled, and so far nothing has changed. I don’t have auto update on for Windows so i know that hasn’t broken it.
At this point I’m hoping the newer version works when it comes out and I’ll have to just use Word until then.
The earlier .dmp file showed an error that might be related to graphics (either graphics card or some other settings). Let’s try running Papyrus Author in a way that adjusts how it handles graphics:
Open the Command Prompt (you can search for it in the Start menu).
Copy and paste this command into the window:
set QT_OPENGL=software && "F:\Papyrus Author\Papyrus Author.exe"
Press Enter.
This will start Papyrus Author with a different approach to handling graphics.
If this fixes the issue, it might be a good idea to check if your graphics card drivers are up to date.
Well so far I’ve been able to work without any freezing. I checked all drivers from video card to mouse and everything is current so who knows haha. But thankful its behaving.
Now was that cmd a one time setting thing or will I need to use it to start up each time for now?
You’ll find Papyrus Author Documents under your computer’s Documents folder.
If you’ve got a Windows computer
If you’re on macOS:
