I felt it was time to try to put together the best or known to help PC solutions and work arounds that have been found by the community and other places. I take no credit for these, other than organizing and clarifying these fixes and how they work.
Feel free to link to this thread as needed to help others! If you are looking for help, please make a new post with your issue! This thread is primarily for providing a list of known solutions. It would be wonderful it were pinned, but that’s up to the forum mods.
Disclaimer:
Use of these fixes are at the user’s risk. If you don’t know, not sure, have questions, ask first!
Basics:
Restarting Windows.
Yes, believe it or not, this is a great first go-to fix. But to do it correctly, you must choose Restart from the Start Menu. Shutting down and turning it back on will NOT restart the system correctly thanks to Fast Start in Windows 10 & 11.
Network and Internet
Yes, your internet can have issues. Sometimes powering down any routers, extenders, modems, etc and powering them back up can fix a lot of problems. You should do this if you are having issues with your game connection, WiFi stability, that sort of thing. Also other network devices can cause issues on a network, it may not hurt to restart them as well.
Windows and software
Its a good idea to keep track of what programs are running and any maintenance of the computer software, updates and cleanup that can be done. Only running the programs you need while gaming, shutting down or removing un-needed software, and doing a disk cleanup or optimization occasionally. There are times when some programs can fight with other programs and cause issues, so disabling, exiting or removing a program to check for this is helpful.
Cleaning the computer
Your system when in use normally has air pulled through it. This air brings in dust. It can also bring in pet hair and other things. Needless to say, its a very good idea to clean out the computer internals every so often. Never use a vacuum cleaner as these generate static that can damage your components. You can use compressed air or a small portable air blower. Canned air is okay but never let it spray liquid into your computer. Don’t let the air spin your fans too fast! You can hold them gently from turning when cleaning. Always make sure the system is off and unplugged. But cleaning it keeps it in good condition, prevents heat issues and helps the system performance!
Working with the battlenet app for Diablo IV:
Installing/downloading game files/updates
When it comes to downloading updates or installing the game, the speed is a known problematic issue. There are a couple of things you can try to resolve it:
- You can setup a bandwidth limit using seven 9’s → 9999999
- You can simply pause the download, then resume it after a second or three.
Also, do not use the Play button till your installation or download is complete even if it allows you to. This is known to cause problems.
Command Line Arguments
Command line arguments are used to help the game run on your system by disabling or preventing some things from happening or enabling some things prior to launch. To access the settings you do the following:
- From the Battlenet App game page for Diablo IV, click the Gear Cog to the right of the play button.
- In the menu that appears, click on Game settings.
- On the next page, you should have an option for Additional command line arguments. Click the check box to enable.
You now should see a box that you can type in. Here are some common commands that I’m aware of that can be used here:
-disableds- This is used to disable Direct Storage-bypassgpudrivercheck- This is used to force the game to skip checking the driver for the GPU.-windowed- This is useful if you are getting a black screen at launch. It may let you get in, then you can attempt to change resolution with the game settings directly. Just be sure to remove the argument later.
You can find a full list here:
https://gamingwithdaopa.ellatha.com/diablo4/client-launch-parameters/
Battlenet App Performance
There are a few settings in the app that can minimize its impact on your system performance:
- You can set the app to exit when launching the game. But you will have to re-launch it once you exit Diablo IV.
- You can have it minimize when launching and restore when closed.
- You can have the app start with Windows or not.
- You can customize the home screen as well as how your friends list interacts.
- There is an option to use hardware acceleration. If you are going to run the app while playing the game, sometimes turning this off can help performance in some cases.
These settings are found clicking the App logo top left, then Settings.
Battlenet App hanging or not launching game etc,
Now in the case of problems with the battlenet app working correctly, IE hanging, stuck trying to download a file, not launching a game, some of these solutions may help:
- Anytime you see it having login issues, make sure there isn’t a service outage first. A problem with the login server or a Blizzard server outage or a scheduled maintenance can cause login issues.
- My first suggestion is restarting the App, or restarting the computer as directed above. Also checking the internet connection as well.
- Next would be to log out of the app completely, then exiting the app. Next restarting the app and attempting to log back in. You can also log into the website via your browser to ensure your account can log in properly.
- For instances where the app is stuck either trying to update a game or launch one, you can follow these steps from Blizzard: -Deleting Battle.net Files - Blizzard Support
- If that fails to resolve the issue, then you would go with the directions here for uninstalling and reinstalling the app. -Uninstalling the Battle.net Desktop App - Blizzard Support
General System Hardware Information That’s Good To Know
Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) *otherwise known as a video card*
To run this game, you need a decent GPU. But GPU’s are power hungry, can get hot, and require correct drivers to function within Windows. So the following are tips:
- Make sure you have plenty of power. That means looking up the requirements for power for the card. For example, a 300W card combined with a typical system will need a 600W-750W power supply.
- Use the correct cable(s). If the card has an 8 pin connector, use a proper 8 pin cable. Do not use 6 pin converted to 8, or cables with double connectors. The higher the power requirement, the more important this is. And those cards requiring the newer 12VHPWR connectors need to make sure they are seated straight and fully, especially on high power cards.
- Keep the GPU clean and free of dust. Every few weeks, or months, depending on your environment, you should clean out the fan/heatsink for your video card.
- Check the seating of the card. These cards can work loose sometimes from their slot in the board. This can be due to expansion and contraction of the connector, issues with the alignment if the case and motherboard aren’t fitting the card tight, or shock and movement if the computer is moved or bumped around.
- Make sure the card is supported if its installed horizontally. Especially if its a heavy card. It can bow down on the slot and bend the card or damage the connector if its not supported properly.
- While its always recommended to keep drivers up to date, I usually advise against going with the latest video drivers all the time. Its okay if it runs on a driver that’s a few versions behind the latest. And not all games run equally in this regard either. More on drivers below.
Power Supply Unit (PSU)
Power supplies follow a similar mindset when it comes to maintenance:
- Keep them clean.
- Make sure the cables are connected fully and tightly.
- Have more than enough power to run the system.
You can always use a larger wattage power supply, but one that’s too small will cause you problems. Your system will only use the power it needs. But having more than you need also puts less stress on the PSU. A power supply rated for 600W and attached to a system that needs 500W to run will be operated a lot harder than an 800W unit trying to power 500W.
Computer Processing Unit (CPU)
Processors are the engine for your computer. Obviously keeping it clean helps too. But there are other things to know:
- The CPU should be ran at its recommended defaults by the processor manufacturer.
- It should have a proper cooling device installed.
- The BIOS of the motherboard the CPU is mounted on should be updated or kept up to date as much as possible.
- Overclocking the CPU is not recommended, and may have adverse affects on the game.
Regarding Intel 13th and 14th generation processors:
Currently there are known issues with these CPUs. They are prone to failure depending on the BIOS settings. They have an issue where they can request incorrect power from an earlier or outdated BIOS that has not been updated to fix the condition. This incorrect request can lead to early failure of the processor. Please visit this link for more information:
https://www.theverge.com/24216305/intel-13th-14th-gen-raptor-lake-cpu-crash-news-updates-patches-fixes-motherboards
How you tell if your CPU has damage already:
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7Eyv5d2Rq8
Random Access Memory (RAM)
Memory is pretty straight forward. Its the space in which your OS and programs operate.
While this game has minimum requirements, lets just say that you will want no less than 16GB of memory for this game. I highly recommend 32GB or more.
As for the memory itself:
- Make sure the modules are tightly seated. It doesn’t hurt to remove and reinstall them if you have issues.
- Make sure you are not overclocking the memory. For example you can run XMP features on memory, however this is still an overclock. If you are having crashing issues, you may want to disable this feature or any memory overdriving/overclocking.
- If you continue to have crashing, blue screens, etc, it won’t hurt to run a memory test on your RAM to ensure there are no issues with it.
Drives and Storage
Storage is an important part of your setup. These days, SSD is king, HDDs are regulated to static storage due to their much lower price per TB. First off:
- Diablo IV requires a SSD for it to run properly. And the faster the SSD, the better your game will perform.
- SSDs are not built equal. There are SATA based SSDs, and NVMe versions. SATA ones have a speed limit of up to ~650MB. NVMe on the other hand depending on generation, can have speeds up to 20,000MB+. A typical common NVMe operates at 5000-7500MB.
- SSDs don’t like to be near full. The fuller an SSD, the faster it can wear out due to its wear leveling features. The quality of the SSD also matters, but point is, not to run an SSD with more than 66% of it in use if you can.