Screen Freezing And Locking Up

JEBUs · May 2005

<div class="IPBDescription">When I join a server, Look---></div> Ive been playing NS fine and all, but now when I try to start it I join the server and spawn in the RR that little Ding gose off and replays about 2-3 times and the screen gose a little darker and it freezes. It locks up completely, I can't even press the windows key to exit. So I have to restart my computer and it still dosn't work..

Hope I added enough detail.

Thanks,

JEBUS

DarkFrost · May 2005

Have you changed anything in system bios lately?

AGP aperture size. (too high)

DRAM CAS latency. (too low)

Those two are the only two I can think of right now that would cause a *crash* like that.

As to me it sounds like a memory issue, only its managing to use so much memory that the "Out of RAM" error message cant even appear.

On the other hand. Have you tried a fresh install of steam? As steam updates are not as good as an actual fully updated installer.

I get the "symtoms" of your crash almost every 2nd time I start any steam game, but I always manage to get the "close app now" window to show.

I will say, if its got anything at all to do with drivers, its nothing to do with GFX drivers. More likely motherboard driver related, just find out the model of your motherboard.

Open case and look at it is fastest, write down anything you see here *sorry to sound patronising, I don't know how literate you are* and google them, generally the southbridge (roughly 1/2 and inch square chip, near the PCI slots (the lightest coloured ones)) wont have a heatsink on it, and will have a model number on it, although in some cases, especially gigabyte motherboards the Northbridge (the big culprit in almost EVERY GFX related problem) who controlls the CPU, RAM and AGP slot, will be a different manufacturer.
<a href='http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=177' target='_blank'>Download this</a> to find out the chipset directly, without opening the case, longer but faster way of doing it. (probably easier too)

This all goes on the assumption your PC dates from or later than 1999, as *ANY* PC from that time forwards will, or can be forced, to run ANY HL based game. (aslong as it has a 3d graphics adapter =] *this is based on experience, for NS a Duron 800, 256mb SDRAM, riva TNT2 WILL run at 85 - 100 FPS, with the correct chipset drivers*)

Oh, if your motherboard turns out to be VIA chipset, and you run windows XP, make sure that you right click the installer .exe, and change its compatability mode to windows 2000, otherwise windows own AGP bridge drivers take prefference and no improvement is noticed.

JEBUs · May 2005

Wow, thanks every much man but I found my own way to solve it. THanks for your time though.

JEBUs · May 2005

Well it was working fine then it crashed and its happening all over again. Anyone else know what is going on, no offense DArkFrost but there has to be an easier way than that!

DarkFrost · May 2005

Sorry I couldn't help you.

Breakthrough · May 2005

Does this happen with Natural Selection only, or other Half-Life mods? Could you please post your system specifications (motherboard model, CPU model/speed, video card, etc), as it could help the problem.

Also, how did you fix it the first time, and how long did it last before reverting to the old state of freezing and locking up?

tojomojo · June 2005

I am seeing something very similar to this. It's definately an ns thing, half life runs fine, as well as a bunch of other games (including other opengl).

I never saw this issue before the most recent update.

It always happens when the scoreboard is up. Well, I should say, I have never seen it happen when the scoreboard wasn't up, sometimes I can view the scoreboard no problem, but something with the scoreboard is definately part of it. It seems like whenever I open the scoreboard after the round has started (beeping has stopped), I get a crash. Other than that the game seems to run fine.

By crash I mean screen goes a little darker (like when opening console/menu)

Windows does appear to be unresponsive, but it's really just hiding behind the game. Using the keyboard (CTRL-SHIFT-ESC, H-L, ALT-E, SPACE) I can terminate half life and get back to my desktop. I have a fresh install of ns, but not half-life/steam (half life and steam are working fine, also checked CS and scoreboard there)

So there's the steps to reproduce: join a game and hit tab. Obviously this isn't an issue everyone is facing <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile-fix.gif' />

EDIT: two more notes:
In case you were thinking this is a different issue, if I hold tab down before the countdown starts and continue to hold it, I get the exact issue described above.

Also happens in windowed mode FWIW.

DarkFrost · June 2005

Does this happen when you load from an external server browser only?(including steam) Or do you load the game, than browse for servers?

tojomojo · June 2005

I have done it with:
in game browser
steam browser
desktop shortcut (with +connect)
connect xxx;

In all of these situations I get the same deal.

DarkFrost · June 2005

Hmm, I get this problem, since the last steam update, but only using external browsers.

However, its not as severe, it just says "Half-Life Laucher error" and I move that window away to the bottom right of the screen, and I can play as normal, but If I click OK it closes Half-Life.

tojomojo · June 2005

Looks like this was actually related to CPU overheating. I guess the scoreboard must do some unusually intense calculations or something. Other issues lead me to investigate my cpu temp, and after fixing my case's cooling and replacing a fan things are going fine.

Screen Freezing And Locking Up

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