Game Freezing.

[Elarra Hasare]

After installing the new client yesterday i played mainly trouble free for a few hours till i got the oja road fix.Now the game is freezing every so often and am having to kill the planeshift process in task manager processes not applications were most things can be ended normally.Could this be a result of the oja road fix or is it common in this client ?

[AryHann]

What do you mean with \"freeze\"? you see the screen and you can\'t do anything any longer, or do you get a message telling you to save a diagnostic file?
Or something else?

[Goldir]

I\'ve been getting the same problem since the new release.  I don\'t think it is the Ojaroad fix, because it was doing it before I fixed it.  

By \"Freeze\" it just stops functioning.  Locks up.  No typing, no clicking, no error or dump file, and if you change windows, the PS window doesnt refresh.  It also makes my CPU overheat if I dont terminate the process immediately, because it starts using 50-75% of my processor.  I have a HT processor so nothing uses over 50% unless it is having problems.

My system specs are as follows:

Asus P4P800 Motherboard
P4 2.8Ghz w HT
1GB PC3200 DDR
Geforce FX 5700 w/updated drivers from Nvidia
Onboard sound
Onboard 10/100/1000 LAN
WinXP SP2
75GB free HD space

[sreamah]

i dont get the freeze thing, but i do get my cpu reaching 100% i dont have a cpu heat monitor on my pc, so i dont know if its overheating, had to put a huge zalman heatsync on last summer for overheat issues. i was wondering about the cpu usage when i saw it yesterday, in task manager it was also taking over 500000k in mem usage, i do have keep regions loaded.

im running an

AMD 3000+
on asus board
1.5gig ram
GF 6600GT 128M
on windows 2k [no HT]

[Bereror]

There is a parameter in the game options: Options --> Graphics --> Details --> FPS gap.

I set it to 20 and got my CPU usage down to 20-40%. The game actually started running smoother than before.

[Nilrem]

It\'s true that in certain regions the cpu usage is still too high, what Bereror proposes is a tweak on the \"target\" amount of frames per second that the game should display.
I think it\'s set by default on 65, but there\'s a warn (actual fps may vary) that leads to think that the number is more or less an aproximation to a real value, rather than a stable mantained number of fps. So the actual fps must be around that value that we set in options.
I personally think that 20 fps is a too low number (that yes, can be perfect to lead to a cpu usage of 20-40% but perhaps also add a non smooth frame transition) but, on the other hand, I see this as a great chance of debating.
Probably since PS isn\'t a first person shooter game, it would not need a high refresh rate, and perhaps we could all agree on a standard fps setting, that both gives us the impression of smoothness at the same time that reducing the cpu usage (inherent to the CS system not being fully perfectioned) so it can be used as a default setting in the future, rather than the actual 65.

Testing with 30 fps

[Goldir]

I lowered my FPS to 20 and that does help with the CPU use issue while PS is functioning, but I still get the lockups.  More detailed specifications on my system setup are as follows:

Windowed mode
1024x768 pixels
Sound is turned off in pssetup
Keep maps loaded is enabled

It occurs at random locations, and no dump file or error appears.  It just freezes and my CPU use jumps immediately to max.  I have to terminate using task manager.  I have noticed that it only happens when I am standing still.  It may have something to do with incoming/outgoing messages, because I am usually chatting with people (/tells) when it occurs. I will also disable keep maps loaded to see if that makes a difference.

[mateuszzz]

I have the same problem - after about half an hour of playing game in window stops (described by Goldir) wherever I am. This didn\'t happen in previous relase nor in the temporar version of .14 for linux.

[Risky]

I too am noticing more freezes ( and for some reason it is taking it forever to close using end task).

there are no dump files and all I get is a spinning hour glass like it is trying to think and just not comming up with anything.

seems to be random.  will start keeping a log of it tho and see if I can notice a pattern.

[Levander]

Same problem and same setting as Goldir. I also have noticed that it happens while chatting. In Fullscreen mode it also completely freezes, meaning I have no chance to shut down anymore [cannot reach the task manager]. In the normal mode everything is fine. Tried everything in the settings cannot find a solution must be some kind of bug. Any solutions?

*edit*

*everything is fine= the freeze can be turned off through task manager, still a forced shutdown but at least my computer is still working

Please avoid posting two or more successive posts before others have replied. Just edit your last post to add new information :) Thanks! --Karyuu
Sorry and thank you I don\'t post that often so will do from now on

[Ganinos]

I too am having the same problem.  It started with the release of 3.014 & has continued with 3.014b.  It seemed that I was freezing up at a regular interval so I decided to track the time between log on & freeze up.  I found that I was freezing up every 49 to 50 minutes.  This happened 5 times in a row.  Since my system clock doesn\'t show seconds, the time could vary by up to 2 minutes, so these times a very consistant.

HP ZD7000 Laptop
Pentium 4 CPU 3.06 Ghz
512 MB RAM with 2 GM Virtual Mem
Nvidia GeForce FX G0 5600 Graphics Card with updated driver
Windows XP (Home Edition) with SP2

Gan, "Long Beard"
Leader White Dragon Clan
Dragon High master

[Mordaan]

Same here.  These freezes are getting quite annoying.  I don't have to shut down through task manager I just click somewhere and my client says "(not responding)" so I close the client and I get a dialog box to shut down.  But it takes soooo long for that to happen.  My pc is just 'red lighted' for a few minutes.

Any updates on a fix?

[Karyuu]

I don't think we quite know what's causing this, first. I never get such freezes at all :/

[Mordaan]

And the added problem is there is no diagnostic option to save.   

[neko kyouran]

I thought I had responded to this, guess not.

Anyways, I used to have this problem and determined it to be graphics related, as at that time, my vid card was 4 years old and it just couldn't run the game like it could before (right after the update to 3.12 I think)  Any way, symptoms were, random freezing, if I clicked, it would display an hour glass, letting it go didn't do anything as after 15 minutes it still was hung up, etc, etc.  I found it to be that it would freeze while it had to wait for my vid card to process what it needed to be displaying but never got caught up and so it just hung.  I had to lower the setttings down in pssetup and they went away.  I changed the texture downsampling from a 1/1 to 1/4 ratio, and the problems went away. 

It may be that when it freezes you are having the same types of problems.  I'd suggest try to play around with the options to see what happens.