Recently installed Rage on a new computer system. During the course of game play noted the following issues:

1: Frame rate "micro-stuttering" occurs when transitioning from inside to outside areas, and vice versa. When this occurs, the frame rates ( normally 60 fps ) drop to 45 fps ( on average ) for approximately 1 second. Also noticed a frame rate lag that occurs when I access the player character's inventory screen. In this instance the frame rates drop to 34 fps, which causes a 1 second lag/freeze to occur, before inventory items/text appear.

2: A 2 to 4 second "freeze" ( effectively 1 fps ) occurs when using emp grenades against Authority mobile generators. When emp grenades detonate on/near the mobile generators, there is a "flash" effect that locks up the screen for 2-4 seconds. Sound is unaffected, and the issue resolves within the time indicated, but I never experienced this issue when playing the game on a 32-bit ( Windows XP ) system.

3: A intermittent ( occurring approximately 20% of the time ) drop in frame rates during combat. For example, in a situation where I'm dealing with multiple mutants or Authority soldiers, the frame rates will drop to 51 to 54 fps ( resulting in a micro-stuttering effect ) when I shoot and kill an enemy. This can become distracting in intense combat situations.

4: A consistent texture loading lag that occurs throughout the game, regardless of map. As I'm looking around any environment ( outside or inside map ), I notice a 1 second lag/delay in the loading of certain textures ( particularly floors, walls, rocks, etc.). Note that this texture loading lag is NOT accompanied by a drop in frame rates, but occurs independently of the frame rate issue.

I've already attempted the following troubleshooting/tweaking options:

1: Enabling/disabling the following video options in the game's main menu:

Vsync: Enabled & Disabled
Texture Detail: On & Off
Anisotropic Filter: All settings attempted
GPU Transcode: Enabled & Disabled ( don't even know what this does )
Antialiasing: Set from 0 to 4 ( never any higher )
Resolution: Attempted 1280 x 1024 and 1600 x 1200 ( using a CRT monitor ).

Also ran the "Transcode Benchmark" option in the main menu, which gives a result of 149 Megatexels/Second.

2: Created and installed a "rageconfig.cfg" file in the Program Files (x86)/Steam/SteamApps/common/RAGE/base folder with the following settings:

seta image_usecompression "0"
seta image_anisotropy "4"
seta vt_pageimagesizeuniquediffuseonly2 "8192"
seta vt_pageimagesizeuniquediffuseonly "8192"
seta vt_pageimagesizeunique "8192"
seta vt_pageimagesizevmtr "8192"
seta vt_maxppf "16"
seta vt_maxlockedpages "256"
seta vt_minlod "-2"
seta vt_lodBias "-2"
seta vt_maxaniso "4"
seta vt_qualityhdplossless "1"
seta vt_qualityhdppower "0"
seta vt_qualityhdpspecular "0"
seta vt_qualityhdpnormal "0"
seta vt_qualityhdpdiffuse "0"
seta vt_qualitydctpower "100"
seta vt_qualitydctspecular "100"
seta vt_qualitydctnormal "100"
seta vt_qualitydctchroma "100"
seta vt_qualitydctluma "100"
mt_genCompression "none"
vt_vmtrcompression "none"
seta vt_restart

The aforementioned settings were derived from the following sources:

http://rage.wikia.com/wiki/Tweaks

http://www.overclock.net/t/1218995/rage-tweaking

None of the aforementioned solutions/tweaks produced any discernible improvement. Considering that my system is new, has up-to-date drivers, and MORE than exceeds the game's minimum system requirements, I'm at a loss to explain the issues I've outlined. Here are my system specs:

OS: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1

MOBO: Asus Z87-Deluxe

CPU: Intel Core i7-4770K @ 3.50GHz

GPU: EVGA GTX 770 Classified ( 4 GB )

RAM: Corsair Vengeance Pro ( 2 x 8 GB ) 1866 mHz

Hope someone can advise. Many thanks in advance!