Re: Lockup issues! Post here please

[Nyarlathotep]

Just to confirm, you did try the -c and +w behind the game's shortcut right ?

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

I came across something for GeForce 2 users who might experiance the "cannot create 3D device":

****

If you have nVidia TnT or GeForce / GeForce 2 card and you are running in 16-bit mode, you must check in D3D settings "Adjust Z-buffer depth to rendering technique".

"Adjust Z-buffer depth ..." option can be found this way:

Right click on desktop >Properties >Settings >Advanced > Geforce bookmark >Additional Properties > Direct3d setting.

****

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

Any response anyone ?

:D

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

Digital, another thing I need for you to do if the previous posts didn't help:

Please locate the VMCDP.VXD file in "C:WindowsSystemVMM32". Check what version the file is (probably will be 4.10.1413). If so, do the following:

1) Extract the VMCDP.VXD file from Windows 98 cabs (Version should be 4.10.1998).

2) Copy this file to "C:WindowsSystemVMM32", overwriting the existing VMCDP.VXD file.

3) Reboot your system and see if it helped. If so, the problem is due to DirectX/multimedia files overwriting that file, without checking if it's newer/older.

Please let me know how it's going.

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

More suggestions:

****

Try setting the following options in the BIOS of your PC. Please be aware that some of the below options may not be present.

Video BIOS Shadow

Video BIOS Cacheable

System BIOS Cacheable

C8000 - xxxxx Shadow: Try disabling these values

Peer Congruency

PCI Streaming

Assign IRQ To VGA: This MUST be enabled

VGA Palette Snoop: This MUST be disabled

Reset Config Data

Enable ESCD

Power Management: Try disabling this

Virus Checking: Try disabling this

PnP Aware OS

PCI 2.1 Compliance: Enable This

Turbo External Clock: Disable this

AGP Aperture: Try different settings

In Display Properties, Settings, Performance do the following:

Turn down the Graphics - Hardware Acceleration from Full to None, and then reboot. Then turn up the Hardware Acceleration from none to Full and reboot. This cures completely an inability to run any OpenGL based game. This should also resolve any D3D issues.

If the problem persists please also try disabling Power Management and Virus Checking. Please also try different resolutions and refresh rates. If you monitor is currently installed with the correct drivers, try installing as "standard display monitor".

Disable AGP Turbo mode.

PLEASE ALWAYS BACKUP YOUR REGISTRY BEFORE MAKING ANY CHANGES!!!

****

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

Digital, do you have the 3dfx tools installed ?

(yeah I know, I'm going on and on, but I'm trying to go for as many suggestions a spossible :) )

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

If someone from Westwood is looking at this thread, could you please reply/ask if the following would be possible:

In the "resource.cfg" file, is it possible to add the line: "refresh=0;" or "refresh=60;" ?

Thanks in advance.

Nyar...

[Guest Kio Rautha Harkonnen]

Congrats Nyar!!!!!!!!

I never thought this post would get past the aha! post but hell, well done.

Thanks for the technical support from earlier this year, you succeed where WW fail.

Happy New Year

Supreme Harkonnen Commander Count Kio Rautha Harkonnen III

[Nyarlathotep]

Digital, I searched Creative 3D blaster site, but I wonder if there's anything recent, considering the fact that their "latest" news is dated January the 15th 2001...

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

A small recap of all sugestions till now. If you have any suggestions to add,

which are not listed yet, please feel free to add them in this by now famous and huge

troubleshooting thread !!

"Doc" Nyar...

****

SYMPTOMS

Frequent lockups in Windows 9x

RESOLUTION

There are many situations that may cause system lockups while working in Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows 98 Second Edition. The following procedures should be performed one at a time, checking for improvements after each step.

The first procedure to try is to execute a ScanDisk. This utility checks for errors in your floppy or hard disk's structure. Prior to opening ScanDisk, close all programs that you may have open. These applications will interfere with the ScanDisk operation.

- To open ScanDisk, click on Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, and click on Scandisk. At the ScanDisk window, select the drive to scan. This should be the drive containing Windows (Primarily C : ). Place a check mark in front of Standard for a quick scan of the files and folders in your system, or check Thorough for the same type of scan including a hard disk surface scan, which examines the physical surface of your hard drive. Once selected, click Start on the ScanDisk window and the scan will begin. * Refrain from using the computer's functions while this function is taking place, or the scan will be interrupted and automatically restart. * Once ScanDisk is finished, perform some functions in Windows and check for lockups.

If Windows is still locking up, there could be some temporary files on the system that Windows does not need. These files can interfere with proper functionality.

- To remove them from your system, click on Start, Find, and click on Files or Folders. In the Named field, type *.tmp, clear the Containing Text field, and verify that you are searching for the files in the root of your primary hard drive (C:). Delete any file that is found.

Now, replace *.tmp in the Named field with *.chk and delete what is found. Once you have done this, empty the Recycle Bin by right clicking on the icon labeled Recycle Bin and click Empty Recycle Bin.

If you are still experiencing lockups, you can try executing Disk Defragmenter. This utility organizes the cluster data on your hard drive. Before you execute this utility, close all applications that may be open so that the Disk Defragmenter will not be interrupted during operation. You will also want to turn off any screen saver you have enabled.

- To open Disk Defragmenter, click on Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, and click on Disk Defragmenter. When you are asked Which Drive Do You Want To Defragment? Select the drive containing Windows and click OK. This will start the defragmentation. Remember not to interrupt this operation or, like ScanDisk, it will restart.

If lockups are still apparent, try renaming the CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files. This will eliminate conflicts with DOS based configuration files.

- To do this, open the Windows Explorer by clicking Start, Programs, and click on Windows Explorer. You will see two panels. One on the left, and one on the right, separated by a vertical divider. On the left, click on C:. This will display the folders and files in the C drive. Locate the CONFIG.SYS file, right click on it, click Rename, and rename the file to CONFIG.OLD or something other than the original filename.

Also, you need to rename AUTOEXEC.BAT.

For Windows 98 users, click on Start, Run, type msconfig, and click OK. On the System Configuration Utility, click on the Startup tab. This window lists all of the programs that are executed when Windows starts up. The only programs that are listed here that are essential to proper functionality are SYSTRAY/SYSTEM TRAY. To increase system resources, uncheck every box in this window, excluding SYSTEM TRAY/SYSTRAY. Click OK and restart when prompted.

If these steps are still not preventing Windows lockups, try disabling Advanced Power Management. To disable in the system's BIOS, look for an option in the BIOS called Power Management and disable it. If you need help performing this task, you will need to contact your motherboard manufacturer. You can also try disabling Advanced Power management in the system's Device Manager.

- You can access the Device manager by right clicking on the My Computer icon and clicking on Properties. Click on the Device Manager tab and locate the System Devices category. Click on the plus (+) to the left of System Devices to expand the category and locate Advanced Power Management Support. Double-click on this listing and insert an X in the box next to Disable In This Hardware Profile. Leave the box blank next to Remove From This Hardware Profile.

One last task to try is to remark the LOAD= and RUN= lines in the WIN.INI file. To do this, open SYSEDIT by clicking on Start, RUN, type SYSEDIT, and click OK. Locate the WIN.INI file in the System Configuration Editor and click on it to bring it to the front. Next, find the entries LOAD= and RUN= and insert the letters REM before them. They should now be labeled REM LOAD= and REM RUN=. Save the changes and exit the System Configuration Editor.

****

If the game freezes, or turns black, try the following (Don't know if it'll work, but if so, it's your video card which is causing the problem):

Win 98, right click on the desktop and select proporties. On the Settings tab, click Advanced.

Click the Adapter tab. Use the Refresh Rate box on the Adapter tab to manually

reset the video refresh rate for your monitor. To do this, follow these steps:

On the Adapter tab, click Adapter Default in the Refresh Rate box.

Click OK. If you are prompted to test the setting, click OK.

If the setting appears to function properly, click Yes.

If the setting does not function properly, click No.

If the above doesn't work, follow below:

Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.

Double-click System. On the Performance tab, click Graphics.

Move the Hardware Acceleration slider until it is one notch to the right of None (the Basic acceleration setting). Click OK, and then click Close.

When you are prompted to restart the computer, click Yes.

****

If the game locks up when you start it, try to disable Direct3D hardware acceleration, follow these steps:

Restart the computer.

Insert the CD-ROM for the game. Press and hold down the SHIFT key when you insert the CD-ROM to prevent the program from starting automatically.

Click Start, and then click Run.

In the Open box, type the following line, and then press ENTER

cd-rom:setupdirectxdxsetup.exe

where cd-rom is the drive letter of your CD-ROM drive.

Click to clear the Direct3D Hardware Acceleration Enabled check box.

Click OK.

****

Verify that the correct version of the Ddraw.dll file is installed, follow these steps:

Click Start, point to Find, and then click Files Or Folders.

In the Named box, type ddraw.dll.

In the Look In box, click My Computer, and then click Find Now.

In the list of found files, verify that the Ddraw.dll file is installed in the WindowsSystem folder, and then rename any copies of the Ddraw.dll file that are not in the WindowsSystem folder. (make it something that you can remember easily, so when it doesn't do you any good, or when something else stops working, you're able to change it back !)

****

SBLive! users !!

If the game stops responding, try the following (make sure you've updated Liveware! to the latest version !):

Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.

Double-click Multimedia.

On the Audio tab, click Advanced Properties under Playback.

On the Performance tab, move the Hardware acceleration slider all the way to the left. Click OK, and then click OK again

Close Control panel.

****

When using the "Hardware Acceleration slider", try different positions on the bar, probably a light slide to the left already might work...

Another thing, which I know it's been posted before, but here goes again: Try to reduce CD-ROM caching and prevent read-ahead activity:

Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.

Double-click System.

On the Performance tab, click File System.

On the CD-ROM tab, note the current settings, and then move the Supplemental cache size slider to the Small position.

In the Optimize access pattern for box, click No read-ahead.

Click OK, and then click Close.

When you are prompted to restart your computer, click Yes.

If these steps do not successfully resolve the issue, repeat the steps to restore the settings to the original values noted in step 4, and then proceed to the next method.

****

Voodoo 3 users, try the 1.04 drivers. As addition, try using the drivers with the option -c and/or +w

behind the short cut. Here's a link where you can download the drivers: http://www.gamers-ammo.com/v3.html

****

The options that you can put behind the shortcut:

- you can add "+w" (without the quotes) to the Target line in the game's shortcut. This will force the game to preload each movie into memory before playing.

- If you have a Voodoo card, you may experience display problems due to texture compression. To disable the texture compression, you will need to add "-C" (without the quotes) to the Target line in the game's shortcut.

- If you are running two video cards, the game may choose the video card you do not wish to use. You can force it to use your alternate card by adding "-ALTVID" (without the quotes) to the Target line in the game's shortcut.

- Also try the +v option. Still not sure what is does, but it helped out some before..

- The option -s will disable sound when starting EBFD.

****

Make sure that the GeForce card is not sharing IRQ with any other device, except for 'IRQ Holder for PCI Steering' (Right click on “my computer” on desktop and select “properties” Go to device manager and select “settings” Here you can view IRQ resources for all devices).

****

Check if you have screensaver enabled. If so, disable it.

****

Try setting the Video BIOS shadowing option to disabled (in the BIOS).

****

Try setting your desktop colours to 256.

****

If you are using a non-Intel chipset based motherboard, make sure you download and install the very latest AGP drivers from your chipset manufacturer's website.

****

Try turning off V-SYNC in the NVIDIA control panel

****

If you're overclocking your system (or GeForce), try putting it back to default.

****

Try assigning a IRQ to your VGA in the BIOS.

****

Try the following settings in the BIOS:

- Video BIOS Shadow - Disabled

- Video BIOS Cacheable - Disabled

- C8000 - xxxxx Shadow - Disabled

- Peer Concurrency - Enabled

- Concurrent PCI Host - Enabled

- PCI Streaming - Enabled

- VGA Palette Snoop - Disabled

****

Try installing the Intel chipset drivers from:

<http://support.intel.com/support/chipsets/driver.htm> for all versions of Windows 9x.

****

If you have an 'AGP Driving Control' setting in your BIOS, try switching it to 'BA' or another value instead of 'Auto'.

****

Check the AGP4X setting in the BIOS (If it's there that is).

****

Disable non-essential add-in devices except video one at a time in Device Manager. For example:

- Network card

- Sound card

- TV card

- Scanner interface

See if lock up behavior is resolved. If not, physically remove the add-in cards and run the game again. Once you get a stable platform, start re-installing/re-enabling devices

****

All users with AMD chipset based motherboards should also install AMD's latest AGP Miniport Driver. You can get it at the following webpage:

<http://www.amd.com/products/cpg/bin/>

****

Make sure that there is adequate cooling for your GeForce, your AGP chipset and your processor. You can see if overheating is the problem by leaving your case lid off and using a desk fan to blow inside the case.

****

Try disabling Advanced Power Management in the System Control Panel.

****

Try switching on AGP Turbo in your BIOS, turning up the Front Side Bus speed slightly, or setting your AGP ratio to 1:1 (in that order).

****

Try going into the System Control Panel, Device Manager, System Devices, Direct Memory Access Controller, and changing the Access Restrictions (on the Settings Tab) to restrict DMA transfers to memory below 16MB.

****

Things to experiment with:

- AGP aperture size (keep it above 16 as setting it at or below 16 will disable AGP)

- AGP 2x/4X mode

- Be sure card is on IRQ 11 and no other devices share same IRQ

- Be sure you have Via 4 in 1 driver ver 4.25 or later (If Via chipset)

- Be sure you have latest Ali AGP driver (if Ali chipset)

- Try the card in a different system if possible

- Reformat if you’ve had other video cards in system before

****

A post from a user:

http://forum.matrox.com/mgaforum/Forum10/HTML/003139-2.html

Check out what bjergand's message. He has in AGP Aperature @ 256 and no Video Shadow in BIOS configuration either. Game settings are Shadows off, 1024x768 @32bit, and all other settings at maximum.

So I decided to try his setup, and it fixed the lockup for me. Recall that the game completely locked on me before at any AGP Aperature setting above 16meg.

(Thanks Jeromeku !)

****

Taken from Soundblaster.com:

"Q7. Where can I download Creative's Windows 2000 drivers for my Sound Blaster Live!?

Windows 2000 support for the Sound Blaster Live! is now available through :

Live!Ware 3.0 for Windows 2000 ( includes core applications & driver )".

So if if you've downloaded and installed Liveware 3.0 for Win200, you have the latest SBLive! drivers.

****

Taken from another thread:

Voodoo 5 users:

please use these modified 3dfx drivers:

http://www.gamers-ammo.com/3DFX/MODS/Vs-w2k-1.04.00-rv1.zip

It will solve the startup screen and movies in emperor on a voodoo5 5500 AGP

(Thanks Ridge71).

****

Here's what I did to get the game working:

1. I disabled maintenance manager, shutdown all running programs, and turned off all background tasks except systray and explorer.

2. I disabled screen savers, virus protection and set my energy saving features to always on (no system stand-by, no blank screens, hard drives always up).

3. In my BIOS, I also got rid of virus protection, palette snooping, video ROM BIOS shadowing and video ROM caching. I have my AGP aperture set to 64megs.

4. In my Win98 settings, my desktop runs at 800x600x16. In the game, I run 1280x768x32. I have hardware acceleration set to full for video and sound. My CD-ROM is set for maximum caching. Windows manages my virtual memory settings.

5. In the game's video settings, I run shadows low, detail, modeling and everything else at medium settings. In the hardware options I have multi-texturing enabled. Sometimes I disable multi-texturing but I don't see any difference.

6. On the command line I use the +w and -c options for texture compression and movie playback.

(Thanks Spiderlee !).

****

From another post:

"I had the problem with crashes for some time. I had tried contacting westwood technical support or searching through forums, but found no solution. I have msi 6330 mainboard and geforce2 mx400 graphics card. After a long time I have finally found solution myself and I'd like to post it in case any other user has the same problem. Upgrading mainboard BIOS to version 3.1 (it can be downloaded from msi page, www.msi.com.tw) solved the problem with Emperor, it also helped with Red Faction & 3DMark2001. I hope this will be helpful to someone."

(Thanks Domek !)

****

Win XP users:

I found a program called 'Application Compatibility Toolkit' (Microsoft) when I was looking for WinXP tweaking tools. In there is a program called 'Application verifier' that runs in the background and checks what happens when you run a certain application. I tested it on Emperor of course. I think it made some interesting remarks helpful in solving or at least knowing the cause of my crashes (which I sent to WW). And finally, although I have only tried it 3 times, that program made me able to play even internet games.

(Thanks Rajzor !)

****

PROBLEM

Game either wouldn't boot, would freeze on loading screen or would bring up the usual "Error in Game.exe" message after installation of DirectX 8.1 (over DX7)

SOLUTION

Decreased AGP aperture size from 256MB to 128MB. Game now runs at maximum graphical quality with no problems. Appraently some of the new DX8 features make certain files too large to handle if your aperture is set too wide.

(Thanks pr8cjb !)

****

CloneCD 3.2.1.1 breaks EBFD! I should have paid closer attention to Nyar's suggestion that CloneCD is the possible culprit. I installed 3.1.1.0 with no problems starting up EBFD.

(Thanks Rees & pr8cjb !)

****

When trying to run EBFD and it crashes right back to desktop, try running your desktop resolution to 16bit

and 1024x768 (especially if you have a videocard with less or equal to 32mb memory). Try to run the game now.

****

Running EBFD on Windows XP and it crashes ? Make sure you've updated all your drivers with the ones from your manufacturer (not the ones that come with Windows XP). And with all, I mean also your CDROM/DVD/CDRW drivers (I've heard of cases where updating the DVD drivers solved EBFD from crashing ??) !!!

****

If you have nVidia TnT or GeForce / GeForce 2 card and you are running in 16-bit mode, you must check in D3D settings "Adjust Z-buffer depth to rendering technique".

"Adjust Z-buffer depth ..." option can be found this way:

Right click on desktop >Properties >Settings >Advanced > Geforce bookmark >Additional Properties > Direct3d setting.

****

Try setting the following options in the BIOS of your PC. Please be aware that some of the below options may not be present.

Video BIOS Shadow

Video BIOS Cacheable

System BIOS Cacheable

C8000 - xxxxx Shadow: Try disabling these values

Peer Congruency

PCI Streaming

Assign IRQ To VGA: This MUST be enabled

VGA Palette Snoop: This MUST be disabled

Reset Config Data

Enable ESCD

Power Management: Try disabling this

Virus Checking: Try disabling this

PnP Aware OS

PCI 2.1 Compliance: Enable This

Turbo External Clock: Disable this

AGP Aperture: Try different settings

In Display Properties, Settings, Performance do the following:

Turn down the Graphics - Hardware Acceleration from Full to None, and then reboot. Then turn up the Hardware Acceleration from none to Full and reboot. This cures completely an inability to run any OpenGL based game. This should also resolve any D3D issues.

If the problem persists please also try disabling Power Management and Virus Checking. Please also try different resolutions and refresh rates. If you monitor is currently installed with the correct drivers, try installing as "standard display monitor".

Disable AGP Turbo mode.

PLEASE ALWAYS BACKUP YOUR REGISTRY BEFORE MAKING ANY CHANGES!!!

****

Try the 3D ability of your videocard with 3D benchmark. You can download it here:

http://www.3dmark.com/

If it crashes, your problem might be more then just EBFD. It's a good testing program for your system.

(Thanks Gobalopper !!)

****

GENERAL:

Reporting a problem to Westwood tech support:

http://westwood.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/westwood.cfg/php/enduser/ask.php?p_sid=oeU-Tu4g&p_lva=&p_sp=&p_li=

Submit your problem.

To update you question/problem, go here:

http://westwood.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/westwood.cfg/php/enduser/acct_login.php?p_sid=jSB5UZ1g&p_lva=&p_sp=&p_li=&p_next_page=myq_alp.php

Here you'll need to fill in your e-mail and a password to get access to your problem.

****

[This message has been edited by Nyarlathotep (edited 01-05-2002).]

[Edric O]

I want to note that this is now the longest topic in this forum's history. It's even longer than the legendary Murder Plot!

[Nyarlathotep]

Yes I know. I never thought it would grow this big. I do hope to get a warning before it get's closed. I want to have a summary as last post. Once done, I will inform Westwood tech support of all the suggestions made here that have worked for people.

Btw, the biggest post was on the Renegade board. I believe it was somewhere around the 1030. That was the biggest post ever on westwoods boards if I'm not mistaken...

Never the less, this post has become a good troubleshooting thread and I hope people will benifit from it in the future as well.

Nyar...

[Edric O]

Only 1030? Let's take'em down! :D

[Nyarlathotep]

We'll see. But let's agree that we don't post anything like Sniper did, just to get to the 1000 post. I'm trying to make the posts as valuable as I can (and with it, this thread).

Nyar...

[Guest qpklot]

Sometimes i have a problem with my sound:

when i start a game, my sound stops

later in the game, the sound returns.

Is there a sound button? or is it just a bug?

(I have also a problem with my english,

but i am afraid that you cant help this ;))

[Nyarlathotep]

qpklot, you can make yourself understandable in English, so I wouldn't worry about that :)

Does the sound always stop while you start a game ? And after how long does it return ?

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

btw, if you are interested:

http://www.englishlearner.com/

:D

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

Thanks Kio ! I will keep repeating this, it wasn't just me who participated in this thread. A lot of others did as well.

Radar, Digital, Highbones, anyone else:

Any updates ?

Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

True, but then again, it wasn't just me who helped out :D

Nyar...

[Guest Kio Rautha Harkonnen]

True nyar others did contribute, well done to them, but come on who started the whole thing off?????

[Nyarlathotep]

I wonder what happened though to all people that helped out... I know that number6 stopped coming here... unfortunately...

*sigh*

"Doc" Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

Radar, I took the libarty to open a case with Westwood tech support myself and I recieved the automated reply with the FAQ's just once. I opened it this morning and already I have a reply stating someone will look into the issue...

If I'm right, today will be the day that they return to work. Please let me know if you receive an answer from them.

"Doc" Nyar...

[Nyarlathotep]

Gobalopper, do you know if it would be possible to make this topic "float", so that it'll stay on top or have some sort of reference on the general forum page?

Thanks in advance for the reply.

"Doc" Nyar...

[Guest HighBones]

...and fun was had by all!

Hi Nyar, back and you were absolutely correct, it was the video. Took some time to find the motherboard manufacturer, but find em I did. Prob solved with new vid driver, tho I will add a card later for performance. Cheers for everything "Doc", hope to see you around.

HighBones

[Nyarlathotep]

I'm glad it works now for you HighBones, enjoy :D

Some advise, if you have put in the additional videocard, make sure you put -altvid behind the games shortcut !!

"Doc" Nyar...

[This message has been edited by Nyarlathotep (edited 01-03-2002).]