freeze

[zamboe]

Doc,

My comp is frezzing often (once or twice a day), when until a week ago it didn't use to frezze (maybe once a week). Here is what happen.

When last weekend and last night as I intented to play EBFD online and happens : 1) game starts fine, but in several ocasions it freezes for about 2-3 seconds, and then inmediately runs again, 2) suddendly it just zooms in 100%, i mean at least 3 times per game. 3) some games i was able to finish but the rest simple my comp froze, i tried Crtl+Alt+del, but nothing happens, I had to go for physical reset. I should mention that those things never happened before. I am not quite sure but in the game, some times I had the impression that the mouse goes quite more faster.

1) The times that my pc frozes while using w98 is much less frecuent than when i tried ebfd.

My pc : PIV2ghz, 256DDR,NvidiaGF2. HD partitioned in two, one part with w98 and the other with xp. New PC, all systems were installed about 3 months ago, 80%of the HD stills empty.

2)Ebfd is in the w98 part(with 13 GB of free space).

Here is what i did b4 asking for your help

1) Uninstalled ebfd and installed it again. Problem keeps happening. (online (yesterday) and in a non-online test i did).

2) Installed ebfd in xp, it doesn't freeze but it suddendly keeps zooming in 100%. (I tried this with no-online skirmish).

3) completely defrag the partition with w98.

4) scandisk (it found nothing wrong).

Other things important,

1) I didn't installed new software of anykind.

2) I didn't update any program.

3) I always use an updated norton antivirus and zonealarm. (this are the only things that are automatically loaded)

4) The only heavy programs I use are CAD programs, but last draw I did was about two weeks ago, ever since I didn't even opened them.

5) Problem is mainly in ebfd. ( I don't have any other games in my HD)

6) Something small happened, the only thing i can remember as a "reason" for this bugs, however i cannot remember if this bugs happened since this event took place. Last week I opened my folder with mp3s and selected about 10 songs, and pressed enter, hoping that winamp would load them all in just one single window, my mistake, winamp tried to open a windows for every file, in the 3rd window it just froze (winamp), so i closed all the winamp windows and selected one song and tried to listen it, winamp was not able to open, a message like "debug ................with file......." showed up, well i reboot and the problems keeps, so i uninstalled winamp and installed it again, now winamp works fine.

I mention this because this is the only rare event i can remember. I don't know if this has any relation with the freezing problem.

I have some ideas of what the problem might be, however i think your input is more relevant now.

Sorry for the long post, but i got this far and i still have the problem.

[Oper90]

I know that this may sound crazy ... but I had similiar problems. I changed out my mouse and the problems disappeared.

[zamboe]

You are not ! . That's the #1 reason i have on my list of possible causes, but i want the Doc's advice first.

However this mouse is just 3 months old.

[Nyarlathotep]

Never appologize for a long introduction. I'd rather have someone explaining in detail the story, then 'comp freezes, any ideas ?" (yes, I do get them via e-mail frequently).

First thing that comes to mind is, have you tried the win9x compatibility mode in XP ? If so, what happend ? Also, freezes are usually caused by incorrect drivers. Please make sure you update all your drivers, especially for XP.

[zamboe]

ebfd is and was installed on w98 ever since i play this game, and there is not more to update for w98. There is were the main problems are as I explained before.

With xp, I remember that a month ago I updated both the graphics card drivers and the sound card drivers. However I only installed ebfd on xp yesterday in order to find out if the same problem happened as in w98, and it did, at least the situation when in the middle of the game and with no reason it just zooms in 100%.

The bug started in windows 98 and if some the problem continues when I installed the game in Xp, then it makes me think it's no the OS that is not working properly but something else, but please you tell me if i am wrong and what can I do. thx.

[Nyarlathotep]

You might want to try and use the suggestion Oper did. Let's eliminate possibilities..

[zamboe]

Doc,

I updated both sound card and video card drivers, problems keeps happening.

I will try to get a mouse to test it today, I will post asap.

thx

[zamboe]

Doc,

Well, I got this different mouse and i made a few test on ebfd (non online), no problems so far.

But now a different situation happens, windows98 just don't start most of the times, and i have to go to "safe mode start against errors" (I guess that's the way it should be in english, since my w98 is in spanish), the only possible explanation i think is that this mouse is not a USB a my own mouse, and maybe w98 is not recognizing it.

But please tell me your opinion, because it seems that the original problem is solved, but now this new thing comes up......

[Nyarlathotep]

Try removing all mouse devices you see in device manager. Then reboot. It should only find your "new" mouse.

[zamboe]

Done.

I had to start in the "safe mode", had no choice, then removed the mouse devices, there were two.

I run w98 again, and i was able to enter the normal mode, I checked the device manager and just one appeared "Mouse for a serial standart port", is this a right one ?

I will check with some online programs this mouse now.

[Nyarlathotep]

Yep, that's the right one.

[zamboe]

Well, I played a few games online to test, no more bugs happened, so I think that the problem with the freeze thing was the mouse. Thx Doc and oper90. :D

[Nyarlathotep]

Excellent, happy gaming.

Thanks Oper :)

[Oper90]

Well, I played a few games online to test, no more bugs happened, so I think that the problem with the freeze thing was the mouse. Thx Doc and oper90. :D

Was glad to pass on help with your problem. I though I was going crazy when it started happening with me ... freeze ... zoom in 100 percent ... even rotated views ... got to the point where I was in a hard fought long game and the pointer simply disappeared (I was so ticked - don't normally win long games).