Flameshot

I'm curious, why exactly are you getting a SATA PCI card? It's not necessary for a USB enclosure. The USB enclosure itself will have either IDE, SATA or the ability for both inside it. Then from that enclosure, it connects to your PC through USB.

It's a serial port.

If memory serves me right, there is in fact an adapter you can get. Serial to USB to be precise. Where you would get it, I haven't a clue. Most likely any computer shop in your area would carry them. Although I don't know how available they'd be anymore.

The whole 60's acid trip makes believe the card itself is going and or has an issue. Manufacturing defect maybe? Coupled with the fact that it's happening in 2 different operating systems...

I hate to say it, but it might be the card. :/

Do you know what temp the card is running at?

Sometimes what can happen is the game believes you are hidden, even if you're not. One of the workarounds I've found is simply clicking on the Hide button in your globals window and checking all the boxes. Apply that and then go back in and uncheck everything. Once you've applied that, the game finally understands that you are not hidden in anyway and most functions like adding globals return. At least until the game randomly decides you're hiding again

Everyone is going to experience operating systems as well as applications differently. The main reason being hardware configuration and the differences between each individuals system.

That being said, you should absolutely make the jump over to Windows 7 64-bit. It is well worth it. Anything that was compatible in Vista, is compatible in Windows 7 software wise. Windows 7 has higher hardware compatibility than Vista so chances are nearly everything you have should be found and or will have drivers. In the end it will come down to your own experience with Windows 7 but there's no point in waiting. It's here, it's ready and you should upgrade

Ignore me. I'm on crack >.>

Check this out: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=143598

Between fixes by Microsoft and drivers by video card manufacturers, MOST people can do away with that nasty little bug.

If you're not running the latest drivers for your video card, I strongly recommend updating them ASAP. I also recommend getting any updates from Microsoft if you haven't done that in a while. Are you running SP1 for Vista?

Edit: Make sure you read through all of that thread before making any changes as someone may have said something pertaining to your particular machine which could allow you to resolve the issue without having to go through some of the steps and what not.

Not to downplay je_saist's suggestions by any means,

But you can build an extremely decent machine without even having to go with a Quad-Core as well. When I upgraded a little over a year ago, here's the components I bought:

1 x Motherboard/Core2 Duo 2.2ghz Processor Combo
2 x 1gig DDR2 RAM (Recently I've upgraded to 2 x 2gig DDR2 RAM)
1 x nVidia 8600GT video card (Recently I replaced this with a GTS 250 1gig card)

My grand total was $380 for all of those components. That was including shipping. My point is, you can upgrade components of your PC (important components) for such a ridiculously small amount of money these days, and get so much out of the new hardware. Even before I upped the RAM and video card the second time, that machine had no issues running CoX and I was even able to multi-task (browse, listen to music, run other software and also run at full native resolution on my new 22" flat screen) without so much as even a hiccup.

Not that a Quad-Core isn't nice, it's not absolutely necessary. You can futureproof yourself with a decent dual core system as well. It all comes down to how much you're willing to spend, and how far into the future you're concerned with

Just as a side note, since upgrading my video card to the GTS 250, I've tried out some games I never would have even thought of trying with the 8600GT (which was not a horrible card btw). The graphics are stunning with the GTS 250 and this 2.2ghz C2D processor coupled with 4gigs of RAM is a dream. I haven't come across any bottlenecking issues now or before.

Take the time to look at sales on Newegg, Tigerdirect or any other site you'd be willing to purchase from. Even check local Ma n' Pa computer shops in your area. They can have some awesome deals. Don't hesitate to throw a machine together (on paper) and post it here. Someone will definitely help you pick stuff out

Absolutely.

Although the driver may use the same setup file/driver version, the drivers itself is configured differently per each specific model.

I'd also like to chime in here with the same results.

I can play for a decent amount of time (Usually anywhere from 1-3 hours) and can almost predict each crash simply by looking at the insane amounts of memory being eaten and not released. I also used /unloadgfx to free up memory before i16 and have found that it's useless since i16 hit live. I also creep up to 1.5gigs of memory usage and crash almost immediately when going to either train or use the market.

I can switch characters after playing one for a period of time only to log onto another character and immediately crash simply because of the memory usage.

This memory "leak" seems to appear with every issue, only to get worse with each passing one. After a few patches/fixes we usually see it calm down quite a bit, but this time it doesn't seem to be going anywhere.

I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this might be something from an IO set? I've been getting it like crazy on my level 50 who is IO'd out. I haven't noticed it on any toons that don't have some sets.

Hopefully someone can, shed some light. I'm curious as well.

I never install anything to C: personally unless the software itself forces it (And most times I refuse to install it if that's the case). I've never had this issue using a secondary drive for all my software/games. Whether it's a virtual drive or an actual drive. Sounds sketchy to me.

I'm seeing it leak to around 1.4GB. I have 4GB of RAM so it's not horrible, but it's definitely annoying as the game start to become unstable very quickly from there.

Didn't read through the whole thread, but was wondering if anyone else has had the following issues:

1.) The game's memory usage has a leak....again....

2.) After playing for a while if I log to the character selection screen to play a different toon, I click on the toon and click on the arrow to enter the game, the game freezes and I have to manually end the process and restart the client. This has happened ever single time I've changed toons today.