Bad Crashes, Please Help!

**phi**

I'm having a look but it sounds like either your RAM or GFX card is toast, or your HDD is getting errors.

**phi**

On closer inspection it looks like a possible heat problem (given the number of morpheus crashes this month)

Your first step should be to do a full system check of course, incase it's just corrupt game texture files: Running Full System Check

(By the way, Windows XP Media Centre edition is just Xp with a media center application and a couple of extra drivers. That's why it says XP.)

Open the side of your case and check that all the fans are working, then carefully, without touching anything, blow the dust off all the fans and heatsinks. in particular the CPU and GFX card.

If that doesn't fix it, leave the case open and point a big ol' fan in there.

If still no result, I'd take it to your local PC shop for repair. Tell them that you think the GFX card or RAM seems damaged (best to get them to check rather than forking out for a new GFX card only to find that doesn't fix it).

Do this as soon as possible. Heat damage is cumulative and the longer you leave it the worse it gets.

**Wendigo**

Thank for the tips, I'll try that stuff as soon as I get back from work.

The really odd thing is that I just finished playing Star Trek: Legacy for about 2 hours, and had no problems at all. I don't know if you are familiar with that game, but it is very demanding on system resources, very 3D, and it ran like a dream at highest detail.

I'm going to do the Full System Check thing first, because it seems that this problem is really only MxO.

**phi**

It's also a lot easier on the RAM and advanced GFX features. MxO is the DirextX equivalent of Quake4's OpenGL stress test.

**Wendigo**

So after cleaning out my PC case, my problem has been largely fixed. Seems it was just a heat issue, but one problem remains. I'm a PvPer, and my machine has developed a Mara allergy!

I swear, I can play anywhere else I want, but as soon as I set foot in Mara C (within 10 minutes, often much less) everything comes to a grinding halt. What's that about?

**ShiXinFeng**

Wen, I am having almost the exact same problems: crashing during missions, crashing while at Mara C, etc.

I know it's not a heat issue, because I usually run oc'd and monitor my thermals regularly.

It just started out of nowhere after the Feb 23rd restart.

One question tho, who is your isp?

**phi**

Current crashing and other issues around places like Mara C are to do with NoRepro's (and the other devs) current major project which is fixing the downtown lag. They're changing the way the servers allocate resources to areas and where the districts split their loads across servers. The result is if you don't have the craziest of super-fast computers, some areas near hardlines are lagging some people out all of a sudden.

Glad the clean-out fixed the heat problem Wendigo.

Can I suggest that we try and take the PvP to Camon Central or Tabor East for a bit to ease the load Tabor has an elevated road, low roofs and fences like Mara to keep things tactical. Camon has loads of space and low roofs.

OR we could take it to international if you want to fight in more impressive surroundings. Heck even Westview has heaps of crumbling buildings that make it fun sniper teritory.

Downtown of course has the lag problems and overly keen NPCs (edgewater might work as another good location).

TSRBradG

Hello phi ,

Thanks for the assist as always.

Wendigo as he is someone I go to for questions I can't add anything to what phi has suggested.

**Wendigo**

Hmm...well. How to say this? I'm back to full on crashing again. 3 times in the last hour. Wits' end is steadily approaching.

**phi**

Sounds like some of your RAM has developed a fault. (possibly as a result of the earlier overheating)The way to fix it is to turn off your PC, take out 1 of the sticks of RAM and start up again. If all is well, there's the bad RAM (hang on to it though). If not, replace the RAM and take out another stick. If that doesn't work then both could be bad but you may have a more involved hardware problem.Note: RAM is VERY sensitive to static-electricity damage, so make sure you have grounded yourself (touch the casing of your PC before touching the RAM ... every time) and when in doubt take the PC to the local repair shop. As numerous people on this forum have said in the past: If you do something wrong all you can do is get angry and pay for the damage, if the PC repair shop does damage they have to fix it for you.

TSRBradG

Hello Wendigo ,

In addition to removing the ram as phi sugggests, just on a hunch, uninstall AVG for a test and let me know is anything changes.

**Wendigo**

Uninstalled AVG. Didn't help.

I downloaded a memory test utility and ran it overnight to test my RAM. No errors came up. I'm trying the thing with pulling the DIMMs now, but assuming that the test was accurate and my RAM isn't bad, what else could it be?

The errors I get nowadays are quite odd. The game will run fine for 30 minutes, or even an hour, but eventually, either while I'm just randomly running around or if I try to use a hardline to teleport or am forced to reconstruct I get a tasty blue screen of death. It says it's caused by my video card driver attempting to write to read-only memory. Dubya Tee Eff?

**Wendigo**

Update: I've tried the DIMM swapping thing with dubious results.

The first time, I crashed the same way I have been, this time attempting to access a construct.

On the second pass, I locked up jacking in from the Hardline. No BSOD, the game just became totally unresponsive.

I'm very confused and I'm starting to go through MxO withdrawal. Could BOTH sticks really be bad even though they pass every test I can find to run them through?

**TheEx** · 03/10/2007 09:15:58

You know, amidst the hardware talent that runs rampant in these forums, I feel almost silly trying to help out, but here I go anyways. Its a long shot, but there is an old shool trick you can try if the problem is indeed to do with your RAM. Though this will probably not yeild you much of a result at all, you may be having a contact problem, if the RAM itself seemes intact (no burn marks or scoring) then the contacts may be gummed up, the best way I know of to clean them up is to run a pencil eraser over the contact strips (the little brass/copper keys that fit into the RAM slots). Not that I expect that to actually help you out, but I didn't see it mentioned so I thought I'd throw it out there. Sometimes all a machine needs is a thorough cleaning (though likely that is no the source of your issue).

On a much more likely note, I have in the past worked on machines that have had the same shady results from RAM tests. Though I've only seen it in laptops, one or more of the RAM sticks may be bad, even if they pass the tests, unfortunately the tests themselves sometimes (depending on the tests and the situations) check for different things to test the RAM's functional operation. Best bet, is if you have a spare machine lying around with enough RAM in it to play MxO you might try swapping it out and testing the game then. There is also a possible, however highly unlikely, chance that the RAM sockets on your mother board have a problem...but that is pretty unlikely I would think.

**NOTE**

Before ever attempting to even touch anything inside your machine remember to discharge any static electricity you might have on you, a simple way to do this is to simply keep in contact with the metal frame of your machine though that can be tricky if you have to use both hands or maneuver yourself oddly to get at the machine.

**NOTE**

**jeffers**

Could possibly be the case, RAM testing I haven't gone into to much so will have to pass on giving a definitive answer.

One other random thing to try, although I very much doubt it will make any difference, but will be interesting to see in any case but I suspect Phi/BradG are going down the right route. If you load dxdiag up and click on the sound tab and try lowering the hardware acceleration to none and load the game and test that. If you can play without crashes, try increasing it to low an test that and repeat to see if it makes any difference. If of course it makes no difference at all, then just put it back up to full and hopefully wait for the next response from BradG/Phi.

Jeffers