Severe Problem - PS Causing System Lockups

[Moogie]

I\'ve been trying to figure out why Planeshift suddenly started causing my system to lock up after anywhere from 5-30 minutes of play (usually in the lower boundaries of that).

This problem appeared several days ago for no reason- no new hardware had been installed recently, no drivers had been installed or removed, not even any new applications or games have been installed either. No other applications installed on my system cause these problems; it\'s just this.

Untill recently, Planeshift has worked fine for me with little problem (the occasional crash to desktop, but nothing serious or frequent like this). I\'ll try to give you as much info as I can here.

System specs:

AMD Athalon 2000 (1.6ghz)
512mb RAM
GeForce 4 MX 440 (with latest Detonator drivers)
64k Cable Modem

I\'m running DirectX8.1 as my system has a severe allergic reaction to version 9... None of my current driver versions have been changed before or after Planeshift started causing lockups.

[Edit: I\'ve also tried reinstalling the game several times, with no success.]

As of yet I\'ve only tried OpenGL and D3D modes (by editing planeshift.cfg). I will load PS now in Software mode and see if the problem persists.

Really hope somebody can help me with this. I don\'t mind rebooting every ten minutes, but it does get a little tedious after a while, you know?

Thanks in advance.

[Keldorn]

You didn\'t mention your OS.

It is rather strange that your OS doesnt like directx9.0. If it\'s related to this problem, couldn\'t say.

[Moogie]

My OS is Win98 Second Edition.

I don\'t think it\'s a DirectX related issue, myself, as I\'ve tried reinstalling it to fix this problem and nothing changed. Planeshift usually works fine with DirectX8.1 on my system.

Software mode hasn\'t locked up my system yet (it\'s been 10-15 minutes now) but then again sometimes it can take 30 minutes or even an hour. I\'ll keep it running for now.

I don\'t want to have to format my PC just to play Planeshift if there is something I can do to fix this. I formatted only a couple of weeks ago and finally all my previous problems have been resolved. However, I will try re-downloading the game and installing from them, as I\'m starting to suspect somehow the backup CD copy I made may have slightly corrupted somehow.

If there is absolutely no solution... I don\'t know what I\'ll do. Either put up with it untill Crystal Blue or format again.

[NEWSFLASH: I\'ve just come back from having successfully locked up while in Software mode.]

[tangerine]

Do you play it fullscreen ? Maybe only the game locks up and if you were running it in a separate window, you could terminate it.

[Moogie]

I\'ve always  played the game in windowed mode, 32bit colour, 800x600 res in OpenGL mode. I\'ve made no changes to the norm, and yet all this suddenly...

[tangerine]

Is your mouse moving ? Isn\'t your processor overheating ?

[Moogie]

Ah! That\'s what it was after all! My CPU temperature when standing idle was a constant staggering 60 degrees. When playing graphic intensive games such as Planeshift, the temperature would rise to the 75 degree limit, where my PC would lock up or reboot.

I\'m going to buy some powerful case fans and heatsinks, but for now, I\'ve got the case off and a big fan facing the insides. And all is well!

Thanks for the help guys!

[Vengeance]

Good grief, I had no idea PS could do that. :-)

Let us know if the fans help, Mogura.

[Moogie]

They certainly do. It probably wasn\'t only Planeshift that could cause the problem, I havn\'t played any other graphic-intensive games recently otherwise I would\'ve known it was a heating issue sooner.

Well, thanks for the help.

[chrischoo]

Usually idle temps of 60C are an indicator that your CPU and heatsink are not attached properly or that the fan is not doing its job well. 75C is way too high and I think it\'s not a matter of case fans but more of a matter of the contact between the CPU and HSF.

AMD chips would actually stop functioning (properly) around 75C so I\'d recommend that you do a more thorough check to see if there\'s something really wrong somewhere.

[Skain]

About the system lock-ups are you getting what im nicknaming as \'the lines\'? just curiousity because something like that is happening to me, I was on today, i only got one chance to call you bunny before it did it


I think u may be right bout the overheating though, this heatwave in UK could be adding to it.