Random Crashes / Freeze problem.

NC support suggested I check / test my memory. And indeed it came up with errors. I am now testing banks and modules seperatly. To see if I find a working combo. Then test again if the gaming (gfx card) stays stable.

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I am having this problem quite frequently, personally using 175.16 drivers (will not go to 175.19 as heard alot of problems so far).

I have the following:

Quad Q6600 @ 2.40
4GB ram
Vista ultimate 64 bit
Asus P5K
2 x 8800 GTS 640mb sli

I have completely wiped my gfx drivers and reinstalled, still no improvement. I also reinstalled windows last week so all drivers are up to date.

My screen goes black and i can do anything to get back into windows.

edit: i have active subs on WoW, AoC and vanguard, this doesnt happen in any of those or indeed any crashing/frezzing issues.

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Quoting my old post just to update. I tried to install the 177.35 driver several times but my PC refuses to do it.. downloaded the driver a few times to see if it was broken and i did use driver clean pro to remove all of my old files etc. So.. went on to try the latest 175.19 which worked for a couple of hours (1 bsod and 2 freeze ups). I can get to my desk top now when the game crashes but i now have a strange problem: i cant log in at all without the game freezing. Getting quite frustrated with this now after trying 3 different drivers and taking up my whole saturday to try and fix it.

not tried just disabling the SLI?

Indeed. CoH is well known to NOT work well with SLi configurations. You will have to disable the second card.

Nah, just the SLI, can run two cards as long as they are for independent displays.

yes my sli is disabled. I also cannot run the game even in safe mode.

Just a quick update again.. i have reinstalled the drivers for about the seventh time and can now log on. Using 175.19 because its the only driver i can install and crash to desk top within game. Heres hoping it doesnt do the same as yesterday again :x

Suggestion. Have those getting lots of crashes tried running CoH in Windowed mode, instead of full screen?

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Suggestion. Have those getting lots of crashes tried running CoH in Windowed mode, instead of full screen?

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Yes i am currently running on windowed, have tried both with same results. cross fingers though, all is well today so far.

step one, uninstal vista and use xp SP3 x64
step 2, get a better mainboard, asus is known for it's crashes.
problem solved!

Step 1. Do NOT install XP64. Vista supports FAR more hardware than XP64 does, and is way more stable.
Step 2. Use Asus, as they make some of the best and most stable boards on the market.
Step 3. Don't listen to Sorudo.

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Step 1. Do NOT install XP64. Vista supports FAR more hardware than XP64 does, and is way more stable.
Step 2. Use Asus, as they make some of the best and most stable boards on the market.
Step 3. Don't listen to Sorudo.

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What he said. ASUS make some exceptional hardware, have done for years.

Recently I was having the same issue (using XP x64 and nVidia 177.66 drivers). Replaced XP with Vista Ultimate (x64) and the whole system is much more stable now. CoX still crashes out after a few hours (under XP this was about 5 minutes) but that's just driver instablility. Haven't tried Omega drivers as yet. Might be worth looking into.

Again I will post.

To the guy that says ASUS are known for crashes. My whole system is ASUS and my laptop is ASUS. I have had no problems with these for as long as I have had them. They are the best machines/components I have ever had.

The problem I have had with my ASUS 8800GT has been with device drivers.

Last night I reinstalled the latest nVidia drivers and had a driver not responding crash again within 10 mins.

I followed my adviced again from above (see below) and played for the rest of the evening (4hours or so) with nothing. Change the drivers people.

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I am also having similar problems, although the occasional error message I am getting is that the graphics driver has stopped responding, but the symptoms are the same.

My setup is

AMD Phenom 9750 (125W edition dont ask what a pain that became) Quad 2.4GHz
ASUS M3A Motherboard
4GB DDR2800 RAM
1GB 8800GT
Windows Vista 64 Ultimate.

Any help would be appreciated. The OS is fully updated as is all the drivers ect.

Edit: So that you know the game runs smooth (lowest I have seen the FPS drop is in a big 8 man team and then it only drops to about 43 from 60).

I can play crysis on high settings with no problems and no crashing. Same goes for Call of Duty 4.

It only appears to crash whilst playing CoH.

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I am still experiencing the display not responding problem, and i have tried the latest nVidia driver.

I have now uninstalled everything and have re-installed using the omega drivers. I will let everyone know how that works out.

System is

AMD Quad 9750 @ 2.4 GHz (125W)
ASUS M3A Mobo
4GB RAM
1GB ASUS 8800GT
Vista Ultimate 64 Edition SP1 and fully patched to 11/07/08


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THE SOLUTION THAT HAS WORKED FOR ME SINCE THE 11th JULY AND AGAIN LAST NIGHT AFTER TRYING NEW NVIDIA DRIVERS

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OK I didnt have any problems at all last night so things are looking up (Usually happens 2-3 times a night).

I firstly uninstalled all nVidia drivers.

Then booted my machine in safe mode (press f8 whilst posting).

I then ran Driver Cleaner Pro (As FFM said earlier in the thread 1.5 can still be downloaded for free with a little seach using google)

Then whilst in safe mode I installed the latest Omega Drivers (I downloaded them previously from here. At this point I should really point out that these drivers are unsupported by nVidia and if you have any worries about using them you probbably shouldn't) The reason I installed them whilst in safe mode is that Vista installs some stuff for the 8800 when it starts up and wanted to make sure I was using the omega drivers for all of the software.

Restarted my machine, and am running the game on max settings with 60fps and so far no crashes.

If the crash number changes I will post in here.

Thanks

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All that happens now is occasionally ( I mean like 5 times since the 11th July) is that the screen freezes for a second or two. I see the Vista circle thing running. I think I have crashed and then it continues to play as normal.

Hope this all helps.

I also have another prob.. driver change towards Omega helped a lot. But when I tried to directly access my gfx card 8800 GST 512, I get a blue screen every time.

Checking for hardware errors several softare found some. In the memory access. the memory modules checked out fine, my banks not. This board (ASUS) I have has obvious problems with the 1066mhz memory I am running. As its still new I let it be replaced by a board that actually can run what it says on the box.

I wil prob get the P5Q instead of the P5E... a friend has run this board without probs using the 9800 card

Then I will test again.

trying the omega drivers now to see if they work but there are a bit old aint there.but im also getting the display error which ive found it is something to do with the DX10 on vista OS systems as the game is DX9 i had these issues a few times in AoC and thats wat i found out

I've been doing some research on this problem, and have found this most interesting link.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device...m_timeout.mspx

Looks like the problem is partly down to Vista's Timout Detection and Recovery subsystem. The video driver is busy, so Vista times it out. That link has instructions on how to alter the timeout value, or disable the TDR function.

NOTE: MESS WITH THESE VALUES AT YOUR OWN RISK!!

Other reasons which have cropped up are insufficient voltages and cheap RAM. You can find some suggestions for RAM voltages etc in the following thread.

http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=73614

Again, MESS WITH THESE VALUES ARE YOUR OWN RISK!!

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Step 1. Do NOT install XP64. Vista supports FAR more hardware than XP64 does, and is way more stable.
Step 2. Use Asus, as they make some of the best and most stable boards on the market.
Step 3. Don't listen to Sorudo.

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step 1. vista is junk, just like any other non-useful linux trash
step 2. asus is the worst, they had 4x the chance to prove me wrong but they still don't, so i prove them wrong.
if you're gonna have something good, take ether MSI or DFI.
step 3. don't listen to [censored] about ignoring me, it's the worst idea.

Can I ask what qualifies you to give such information?

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Can I ask what qualifies you to give such information?

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I'll offer mine.

26 years of using computers.
20 years of using them in a professional capacity, both software and hardware.
A qualified microelectronics engineer and system's archictect.
A qualified software architect.
Someone who's owned more brands of motherboards than can remember, and usually comes back to either ASUS, or Gigabyte if I'm a bit strapped for cash.

Someone who's actually USED Vista professionally, as opposed to someone listening to all the carp on the internet about it from people who heard something from a guy who heard it from a guy who saw it on a blog nobody's ever heard of.

Not having as much experience as FFM I am a computer and electronic engineer and as far as I can see the bad word about vista comes from people using it on sub-par systems then declaring it to be rubbish.

If we look back to when XP was introduced, people were installing it on systems with 128MB to 256MB of ram. Nowadays the recognised concensus is that XP requires 2GB of RAM to be anywhere near suitable for gaming.

It is becoming apparrent from things that I am hearing the the 2GB sweet spot of Ram on XP is in fact 3GB on Vista.

I think if people only used vista on machines that were close to a spec capable of running it they would be far more impressed rather than slating it and declaring it to be c**p.

I run a mcahine that was built for Vista and lets just say I am never going back to XP

10+ years of system administrator and on-site support here...

Agreed on Vista being good... but heavy in the system use. Of old I know that if you want a stable system read the specs Microsoft gives and go higher then that. You will do youreself a favor.

Back to the crashing problem... I think I got rid of it!

These are the steps taken. Steps I could do because my system was new and within warranty.

- 4x 1066mhz Kingston RAM + 8800 GST 512mb + ASUS 5PE Formula
Crashes.. black to grey screen nvidia driver crash and blue screens.

Installed Omega drivers which helped some but the problem wasn't removed. Hardware test revealed memory problems even though ASUS tells on the motherboard box it can use the fast RAM. Retour with system...

- 4x 1066mhz Kingston RAM + 8800 GST 512mb + ASUS 5PE
Crashes.. black to grey screen nvidia driver crash and blue screens.

Again Omega drivers made it more stable but didnt remove the problem. NVIDIA test tools installed. When trying to run the exe there I got blue screen everytime. NCSOFT support (where I had a ticket running) told me again memory failure. Which I had to agree upon. Extensive RAM test using 3rd party software and one using the Vista RAM test on the install disc also showed hardware errors. Tested the memore modules. They seemed ok. But the motherboard was not! Retour with system...

- 4x 1066mhz Kingston RAM + 8800 GST 512mb + ASUS 5PQ Deluxe
A friend of mine was running this board without problems. I am still running the Omega drivers but I haven't got any crash sofar. Not on drivers, not on IRQ (blue screen) or the black to grey screen. I have gamed continuasly for over 4 hours yesterday.

I will test a few days more then run the NVIDIA drivers.

Logic indicates that even though ASUS claims it can use 1066mhz RAM in fact often it will have problems. The new tech on the 5PQ Deluxe will actually run it smoothly though.

For now I would advice a direct RAM test using memtest and/or the Vistal install disc RAM test. Just to see if all is oke there.

Ok.. I just removed the Omega drivers and installed the latest NVIDIA drivers. And damn.... the crash returned. Not as often as before.. but it is back. Had it this morning.

Will test more.. but it is obviously a dual prolem.. drivers vs. memory access

With the latest 177.92 NVidia drivers (beta), the ones with the PhysX software incorporated i still have the crash but less often. Following FFM's advice in another thread, checked the NVidia forums. Seems that some people have sorted the problem just by plugging the CPU directly to the wall. Unfortunately I can't do that, but I'll try have it fixed by an electrician asap and see how it goes.

Was also thinking of getting more RAM but as I've seen that the one I have has been discontinued by Corsair I will probably get a brand new set of RAM and replace my existing one.

If all that doesn't fix the problem, will go back to XP until a fix is released.

I will try the beta 177.92 if I still have it tonight.. if that doesnt work its back to the Omega drivers for me.

Putting the right voltage to my existing RAM seemed to work, screen went black twice for less than 1 second but returned to normality, third time it crashed me all right so I really do hope the new wall plug (when the electrician feels like sorting it out, he said it would take 20 min to do but couldn't do it today when he came to see the box, damn him) and the new RAM I ordered fixes it, otherwise I'll go back to XP and slash my wrists not necessarily in that order.