I am a user of Avast Free 21.11.2500 (compilation 21.11.6809.528) with the firewall module, which I have enabled in the Avast installer (it was not enabled by default).
Since then, I have started experiencing periodic stutters in the Tekken 7 game. From what I have read online, the stutters can happen when the game detects a hardware change, because it has to check whether the new hardware is a controller (a HID device). To confirm this theory, I kept the Device Manager open on my second monitor while playing the game, and every time it stuttered, there was a refresh happening on the Device Manager side. The exact same refresh as you would have when you plugged/unplugged a USB device, for instance.
So I have confirmed that something on my system makes Windows think I am constantly plugging or unplugging something and that causes Tekken 7 to stutter. After some investigation, it was the Avast Firewall module. After "modifying" my Avast install, unchecking the firewall module and rebooting, the problem never appeared again. No more random refreshes in the Device Manager, and Tekken 7 works smoothly.
I know it seems strange for the firewall to periodically trigger a "hardware changed" event, but it certainly happens, at least on my setup. It would be nice if the team could take a look at this. The Tekken 7 part of my report is irrelevant. The main point is that when the firewall module is active, Device Manager periodically refreshes the list of the devices, so it thinks that some hardware change has occurred. When the firewall module is not present, it does not happen. The Tekken 7 stutter is just a consequence of that behaviour.
