Game freezing - GeForce2

[Guest]

Hi all,
While playing Halflife or Homeworld, my computer freezes randomly in mid-action between 2-15 minutes of play and I have to press reset. I've tried the video resolution to D3D @ 1024x768x32, D3D @ 800x600x32, and D3D @ 800x600x16. No luck.

Drivers/patches installed:
DirectX 8
Liveware 3
Detonator 3
Running the most recent patches for the games.

System resources:
SB Live IRQ 10
GeForce2 GTS IRQ 11
3Com905b IRQ 5
(no other cards installed)

Cooling: For starters, Leadtek's GeForce 2 card has a fan ontop of a big heatsink. Additional, I have 1 fan in the front of the case drawing air in, 1 fan in back blowing air out, 1 fan in the powersupply, 2 fans on the cpu, and 1 additional fan mounted on the side of the case blowing directly on the cpu and videocard (hole cut in the side of the case). The video and sound card have an empty slot between them for added cooling.

Any insight into this problem would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
Erik

 

[Guest]

What OS and what amount of Ram? If your ram is low there is a possibility the freeze is cause by thrashing your harddisk (using Virtual Memory). Make sure you have the latest driver for your harddisk controller.

What Motherboard you got? Look thru the menu and place those PCI cards in the PCI slot that are not sharing with each other.

Hope this help.

 

[Guest]

Sorry, I forgot to put that stuff in.

Win98SE
Athlon 700 (not O/C)
256MB PC133
Asus K7V

I have no sharing IRQ's.. at least not with the NIC, sound, or video (the only cards I have).

The more posts I read, the more similar problems I see. Wonder if there is some problem w/ DirectX 8, or the Detonator 3 drivers?

I'm going to rebuild tonight and will just install DirectX 7 and reference drivers. I'll give an update when I'm up and running.

 

[Ncogneto]

Hey dude, got the exact same system with the a7v except with an athalon 850 and a leadteck gforce 64 ddr. Right down to the same nic. And guess what I am about to play homeworld with my son across my network. I am using the much alignned nvidia d3 drivers and I never had an issue with them. That takes us down to dx8. Why everyone is so anxious to throw that into there system is beyond me I would bet that is where your problem lies.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[Guest]

Yeah, I'm in the process of rebuilding that computer right now, and DirectX 8 WILL NOT be going on!

Thanks for the reassurance though
I thought that was the problem.

<font color=blue>Buzz Lightyear's hero,
Erik</font color=blue>

 

[Ncogneto]

I highly recomend running homeworld using opengl instead of dx,also there is a way to make a shortcut on your desktop that enables 3dnow for homeworld are you aware of it?

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[Guest]

Check out www.3dfiles.com cos they often have game patches for D3d and other stuff that really helps out - my system is pretty high spec, yet Deus Ex runs like a dog. Change one DLL from 3dfiles, and it's now smooth as silk.

===
Do unto others before they do unto you...

 

[Guest]

Thanks, you two, for your help! I'll check out the site. I'm not familar with
"also there is a way to make a shortcut on your desktop that enables 3dnow for homeworld are you aware of it?"
I'd like to know what that is!

I ended up rebuilding last night and Homeworld ran great for about 45min but then froze. I'm playing it with OpenGL now, and it seems to be running great!

Thanks again for the replies!!

<font color=blue>Buzz Lightyear's hero,
Erik</font color=blue>

 

[Ncogneto]

Yeah, opengl in homeworld rocks! There are some other tricks for better homeworld play that I will share with you that are taken of there website.
1) Make sure that the "always on top" check box is unchecked in your taskbar properties menu. This will cause homeworld to crash to desktop and the most inopertune time.
2)AMD users to enable 3dnow in homeworld you need to make a shortcut on your desk top. To do this first navigate in your startup menu to the homeworld game ( start>sierra>homeworld>homeworld) right click on it and send it to your desktop ( ie create shortcut) ok now on the desktop icon ( shortcut) you just created, right click on it and click propeties. In the target column you will see the following "C:\Sierra\Homeworld\homeworld.exe" This is the string command that needs to be edited to support 3dnow. Change the target directory to the following exactly as it is typed including spaces.

C:\Sierra\Homeworld\homeworld.exe /enable3DNow /disableavi

You will see an additional switch that I use in there as well. The /disableavi switch takes you right to the start screen of homeworld without having to see the to "movies" at start up every time. there are even more of these swithces at the homeworld site if you do a little seaching, it has been so long I cannot tell you exactly where anymore. I do know these work and work good on my machine however. I think, and this is a matter of personal opion, Homeworld kicks Quakes butt any day of the week, kinda more like playing chess as compared to playing checkers.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!