[Linux 64] Mint 17, Mesa & fglrx, Crash/hang after loading level

zfkdnopzfkdnop Texas Join Date: 2014-09-10 Member: 198331Members
edited September 2014 in Technical Support
Let me start by saying I've just installed NS2 so I have the latest version (build 269) and this is a relatively fresh install of 32bit Linux Mint 17 3.13.0-24-generic (about a month old) on an AMD Phenom 9850 with an AMD/ATI Radeon HD6870. Unless I've overlooked some posts/guides I feel like my situation is slightly unique as I haven't found much help for the problems I'm getting...

I'm loading NS2 via the Steam GUI and everything works: I can edit my settings, I can browse servers, I get decent FPS (40 - 50) etc.

Maybe it's worth noting that when I first load the game my screen becomes distorted like this: link to http://image.bayimg.com/38471dd5bf44879c48ee78bdf53a20741d6617cb.jpg ... but that's not my issue:

After a few moments the game comes up normally and I get pretty good FPS... For ex, here's part of my settings: link to http://image.bayimg.com/3ddc671d0da7b9299bbc11114bf8f3d05f62f97d.jpg

When I try to go into the Training mode the game takes a very long while to load (the screen stays relatively responsive) but when it finishes loading the game silently crashes without error. The log doesn't even contain an error.

Here's some log information. The following logs are from when I was using Mesa drivers ("OpenGL version string: 3.0 Mesa 10.1.0")

Here's my glxgears OpenGL info:
http://pastebin.com/DprkniNN

Here's my sysinfo:
http://pastebin.com/ydGU36fC

Here's my ~/.config/Natural Selection 2/log.txt after the game crashes (after trying to load the Training tutorial):
http://pastebin.com/qzKZKFZt
Of note: nothing is erroring.

Here's my ~/.config/Natural Selection 2/log.txt after I get a 'cannot connect to server' error:
http://pastebin.com/eZNBBi3D
Of note: "[271.156] MainThread : Error: Attempted to load remote options from a file that does not exist."



Here's some more log information. The following logs are from when I was using ATI/AMD fglrx drivers ("fglrx-14.10.1006.1001" listed as version 14.4 on their site, "OpenGL version string: 4.4.12874 Compatibility Profile Context 14.10.1006.1001")

Here's my glxgears OpenGL info:
http://pastebin.com/823ywmyv

Here's my sysinfo:
http://pastebin.com/3hai3nvt

NS2 log.txt after the game finishes loading the level (it doesn't crash when using fglrx drivers, it just hangs)
http://pastebin.com/jY1VH9Rj

I wanted to offer some gdb output for you guys but idk which process to attach to:
zfk@pczdnop ~ $ ps -e| grep ns2
2724 ? 00:27:55 ns2_linux32
2743 ? 00:00:00 ns2_linux32
3677 ? 00:00:57 ns2_linux32
3696 ? 00:00:00 ns2_linux32



** Just recently (with fglrx) my game got stuck at "Starting Local Server..." it just stayed on that task. The UI didn't freeze.

** Although this isn't my primary problem I did notice that sometimes, seemingly randomly, my screen becomes unresponsive. The game is running fine, the rain keeps coming, the menus keep flashing etc but I cannot click on anything. I'm forced to close the game and restart it.

** Also, I cannot seem to connect to any servers via the Server Browser. I get an error like "cannot connect"
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Comments

  • zfkdnopzfkdnop Texas Join Date: 2014-09-10 Member: 198331Members
    Alright so I've since installed Mint 17 64bit. The issue remains:

    Training mode finishes loading but the game hangs (stuck on an unresponsive loading screen)

    NS2 log:
    http://pastebin.com/FR42rqV9

    sysinfo:
    http://pastebin.com/qR5Avr6i

    glxinfo:
    http://pastebin.com/R7mtD02r

    Using: the 64bit fglrx 14.4 from http://support.amd.com/en-us/download/desktop?os=Linux x86_64
    "AMD Catalyst™ 14.4 Proprietary Linux x86 Display Driver"
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  • murraymurray Join Date: 2012-12-22 Member: 175880Members, NS2 Playtester, Pistachionauts
    AFAIK the game will not work with the AMD Catalyst 14.4, because it fails to compile the shaders. I think someone mentioned here in the forums, that the game is working with the latest beta. So could try to upgrade the Catalyst/Fglrx driver to the latest beta (Catalyst 14.6).

    Regarding to the problems with the mesa driver. I am not sure, if the current build runs with Mesa 10.1 for someone. Maybe it also fails with compiling the shaders (you could try to attach the gdb after launching the game for getting a backtrace). I am using the Mesa 10.2.x driver and the game loads slow for me, but it is running. If you want to upgrade to Mesa 10.2, then you must possibly also upgrade to a newer linux kernel. I think at least to kernel version 3.15.

    Before you upgrade your drivers/kernel, you could try to start the game with the precompiled shaders and your current catalyst version. Look here for more informations.
    http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/134613/linux-workaround-for-amd-catalyst-users-update
    If this workaround doesnt work, then the precompiled shaders are possibly too old for the current ns2 version. Then I'll will upload a new archive.
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  • zfkdnopzfkdnop Texas Join Date: 2014-09-10 Member: 198331Members
    edited September 2014
    murray wrote: »
    AFAIK the game will not work with the AMD Catalyst 14.4, because it fails to compile the shaders. I think someone mentioned here in the forums, that the game is working with the latest beta. So could try to upgrade the Catalyst/Fglrx driver to the latest beta (Catalyst 14.6).

    Regarding to the problems with the mesa driver. I am not sure, if the current build runs with Mesa 10.1 for someone. Maybe it also fails with compiling the shaders (you could try to attach the gdb after launching the game for getting a backtrace). I am using the Mesa 10.2.x driver and the game loads slow for me, but it is running. If you want to upgrade to Mesa 10.2, then you must possibly also upgrade to a newer linux kernel. I think at least to kernel version 3.15.

    Before you upgrade your drivers/kernel, you could try to start the game with the precompiled shaders and your current catalyst version. Look here for more informations.
    http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/134613/linux-workaround-for-amd-catalyst-users-update
    If this workaround doesnt work, then the precompiled shaders are possibly too old for the current ns2 version. Then I'll will upload a new archive.

    I tried using your precompiled shaders but it didn't seem to make any difference. When I was doing that I noticed that my original cache folder looked identical to yours:

    My original ~/.config/Natural Selection 2/cache folder: (using fglrx 14.4)
    http://pastebin.com/xkecnE3K

    Your ~/.config/Natural Selection 2/cache folder:
    http://pastebin.com/nDMqVDCW

    I will try NS2 with the the 14.6 fglrx driver later on today. Thank you for the suggestions! :)
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  • zfkdnopzfkdnop Texas Join Date: 2014-09-10 Member: 198331Members
    zfkdnop wrote: »
    murray wrote: »
    AFAIK the game will not work with the AMD Catalyst 14.4, because it fails to compile the shaders. I think someone mentioned here in the forums, that the game is working with the latest beta. So could try to upgrade the Catalyst/Fglrx driver to the latest beta (Catalyst 14.6).

    Regarding to the problems with the mesa driver. I am not sure, if the current build runs with Mesa 10.1 for someone. Maybe it also fails with compiling the shaders (you could try to attach the gdb after launching the game for getting a backtrace). I am using the Mesa 10.2.x driver and the game loads slow for me, but it is running. If you want to upgrade to Mesa 10.2, then you must possibly also upgrade to a newer linux kernel. I think at least to kernel version 3.15.

    Before you upgrade your drivers/kernel, you could try to start the game with the precompiled shaders and your current catalyst version. Look here for more informations.
    http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/134613/linux-workaround-for-amd-catalyst-users-update
    If this workaround doesnt work, then the precompiled shaders are possibly too old for the current ns2 version. Then I'll will upload a new archive.

    I tried using your precompiled shaders but it didn't seem to make any difference. When I was doing that I noticed that my original cache folder looked identical to yours:

    My original ~/.config/Natural Selection 2/cache folder: (using fglrx 14.4)
    http://pastebin.com/xkecnE3K

    Your ~/.config/Natural Selection 2/cache folder:
    http://pastebin.com/nDMqVDCW

    I will try NS2 with the the 14.6 fglrx driver later on today. Thank you for the suggestions! :)


    Using 14.6 I still have the same issue.

    Here's the log.txt:
    http://pastebin.com/n7vWXVeh

    I then tried deleting ~/.config/Natural Selection 2/cache and running the game
    Here's the log.txt:
    http://pastebin.com/bdAq9vjq

    Here's what was generated in the new cache folder (note: 14.6 and 14.4 both seem to be compiling shaders successfully because the cache folder gets populated):
    http://pastebin.com/x0KXCnRj

    Here's gdb output (i only attached it to 1 of the processes) (the game froze like usual so i killed the process):
    http://pastebin.com/zdTjFF3J

    And a new copy of the log.txt (still looks the same):
    http://pastebin.com/743CXXRK


    I don't know what to do at this point. The other day I think I read somewhere I could email Unknown Worlds to get some sort of personalized support... is that a thing? If so, what's their contact info?
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  • murraymurray Join Date: 2012-12-22 Member: 175880Members, NS2 Playtester, Pistachionauts
    I will switch my driver back to Catalyst later this day (if the driver is compatible with my current kernel and xorg) and try to reproduce this problem.
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  • murraymurray Join Date: 2012-12-22 Member: 175880Members, NS2 Playtester, Pistachionauts
    edited September 2014
    Ok.. I switched to Catalyst now. Started the game and tried to start a sandbox game. But the game froze during the loading process. I killed the game manually and restarted NS2. This time I had no problems to start a sandbox game and it loads much faster than with mesa now. I have a loading time of several minutes if I use the Mesa driver. With Catalyst the game loads within a minute.

    Edit: Also joining a server doesnt make any problems. But the performance isnt very good, only 10 fps after joining a server.
    And I think I have a newer Catalyst driver than you:

    glxinfo
    OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc.
    OpenGL renderer string: AMD Radeon HD 6800 Series
    OpenGL core profile version string: 4.4.12968 Core Profile Context 12.10.17
    OpenGL core profile shading language version string: 4.40


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  • zfkdnopzfkdnop Texas Join Date: 2014-09-10 Member: 198331Members
    edited September 2014
    I'm now back on 14.4 but before I switched I compared our glxinfo; I think we had the same version string but either way does this mean this is some weird compatibility issue?
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  • WeTDreamzWeTDreamz Join Date: 2013-08-30 Member: 187247Members
    edited September 2014
    Delete your ~/.config/Natural Selection 2 directory.

    Use the latest beta driver.

    It will work but it is broken. You get like 10FPS because NS2 isn't correctly using the GPU, it software renders once you are in the server. This didn't happen prior to CDT.

    Mesa works but FPS is all over the place.
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  • zfkdnopzfkdnop Texas Join Date: 2014-09-10 Member: 198331Members
    edited September 2014
    WeTDreamz wrote: »
    Delete your ~/.config/Natural Selection 2 directory.

    Use the latest beta driver.

    It will work but it is broken. You get like 10FPS because NS2 isn't correctly using the GPU, it software renders once you are in the server. This didn't happen prior to CDT.

    Mesa works but FPS is all over the place.

    This didn't work either

    log http://pastebin.com/396BqFsE

    the cache folder gets sucessfully populated with a bunch of shader files and a maps folder
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  • WeTDreamzWeTDreamz Join Date: 2013-08-30 Member: 187247Members
    edited September 2014
    If you switch between mesa and fglrx you MUST delete your cache folder. As far as loading is concerned, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. I believe there is a crappy workaround for this. It's an issue with the NS2 linux port. There was even a thread where NVidia devs had said this.
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  • zfkdnopzfkdnop Texas Join Date: 2014-09-10 Member: 198331Members
    I guess I'll just have to wait 'til they fix it :( I got this game specifically because it had a linux version
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