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Kinusu
Kinusu
Join Date 08/2008
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game hard freeze

hard freeze leading to eventual reboot - vista 64 -

August 10, 2008 5:47:01 AM from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Hi all,

Bought this game yesterday and still havent managed to play it for more than about 30 seconds - 2 minutes. The game hard freezes and then the sound stutters a few times, mouse locks, keyboard inactive, system eventually reboots itself. This happens in both windowed and full screen modes.

Machine Spec:

AMD Athlon 64 dual core processor 6000+ - up to date microsoft driver

nvidia geforce 8500 GT pci-e - driver - 7.15.11.7519 - no conflicts - up to date drivers

Creative SoundBlaster XFI Extreme Gamer - driver - 6.0.1.1361 - no conflicts - up to date drivers

RAM 2Gb set in dual channel mode 800mhz (tried it in single channel mode, no difference to outcome)

Vista 64 Home Premium - Service Pack 1 -

Antivirus - Avast! on access scanner -4.8 home edition

Game Spec:

Running game patched to 1.05

Running game in XP Service Pack 2 Compatibility  Mode

Running game in Windowed Mode

Running game as administrator

Solutions Tried:

Patching Game

Updating graphics and sound drivers

Running game as admin, window, low detail, no AA, compatibility, etc

Changing Ram configuration ie. dual and single channel

 

Someone please help me get this game work. It seems fun but I do not want to spend all my weekend trying to make something work, that frankly should do straight out of the box. If i cannot find a fast solution its back to the game store for me!

I welcome any sollutions!

Kind Regards

Paul

 

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Kinusu
Kinusu
Join Date 08/2008
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Reply #1 August 10, 2008 5:58:38 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
oh and im on a Dell 19" monitor running 1280*1024, attempting to run the game at the same resolution

also my cpu's are running at 3gig, forgot to mention that too.
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Kinusu
Kinusu
Join Date 08/2008
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Reply #2 August 10, 2008 6:04:59 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
oh and i forgot to mention my mobo....man im getting old...

mobo is

MSI K9AG NEO2 Digital
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Kinusu
the_Monk
Join Date 01/2008
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Reply #3 August 10, 2008 6:08:54 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Have you considered:

a weakened/dying PSU, faulty RAM, bad chip on the Mainboard, over-heating Hardware, a bad over-clock etc. ?

How about disabling the AV (and all other anti-malware software) while playing the game?

...just a few suggestions.
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Kinusu
Kinusu
Join Date 08/2008
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Reply #4 August 10, 2008 6:24:20 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
Hi Monk,

PSU, RAM, CPU and all components are new this year.

Ram is Corsair Twinx 2GB DDR2 6400 2.10v Ver2.1 800Mhz XMS2 6400
PSU is 500W
CPU's are not overclocked

Case is cooled via two 8cm intake fans and one 12cm exhaust fan
CPU has a V large heat sink/fan also. Basically the case is running cooler than fonzy.

Case is a jeantech AQUA gaming case, seems pretty well ventilated.

All my other games and pro software run fine. The only problem with this pc is 64 bit os, its an absolute bi*ch. I wish MS would actually finish things before they get published!

Very confused by this situation, its very annoying. I can only assume that the game is still buggy, that is unless someone can show me somethign im doing wrong. If anyone wants more PC info, or wants me to run some kind of diagnostic or report just shout, i REALLY want this game to run! seems v much like homeworld but with a twist, and i worshipped that game, so REALLY want to run this.

THanks again y'all!
Paul
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Kinusu
hydrocarbn
Join Date 09/2007
+45
Reply #5 August 10, 2008 6:54:32 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
also my cpu's are running at 3gig, forgot to mention that too.


Bingo. Hard freeze is almost always indicative of a unstable overclock. Your other games may not hit the CPU hard enough but Sins does a hell of a lot of unit logic.

Next time, run Prime95 longer.
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Kinusu
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Reply #6 August 10, 2008 7:01:37 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
but but but my cpu's arent overclocked!!!!!!! whimper....honest!

system tells me cpu's are running at 3004hz and thats the setting the bios put them at on auto...

have i been a plonka??
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hydrocarbn
Join Date 09/2007
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Reply #7 August 10, 2008 7:12:40 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
Blargh. I am stupid. The 6000 comes at 3ghz out of the box. Too used to Intels.

What model is the PSU exactly?
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Kinusu
Join Date 08/2008
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Reply #8 August 10, 2008 7:17:26 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
its a jeantech jn120f-500ap Active PFC

its matched to my case, no gaurantee i know but thought it should be ok.
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hydrocarbn
Join Date 09/2007
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Reply #9 August 10, 2008 9:12:45 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
Never trust a company with a website like this.

Really, I'm not sure this is hardware related, but hard freeze is not something software does often. It's gotta be a really, really messy crash to cause this sort of thing rather than just not responding. What other games is it *not* locking up in?

The 8500GT does not grab a lot of amperage but really you should have been told never to use a PSU that comes with a case!
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Kinusu
Join Date 08/2008
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Reply #10 August 10, 2008 9:54:28 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
well the case was bought seperately from the psu, with the psu costing more than the case. they purely happen to be made by the same company.

Build quality is good or i wouldnt have picked it up. my mobo requires 350w so ive got room to spare on that.

since we last exchanged messages i have done the following:

removed and re installed sound and gfx drivers. all fine.
checked bios revision, chipset drivers, all up to date and fine.

repaired sins installation.

deactivated aero and gone to windows classic theming, just incase desktop manager was bieng a pain.

tried running game without AV, tried running game with AV set to ignore sins path with regard on demand scanning.

no joy as of yet. game locks up very quickly once i start a game.


other games played recently with no problems.

bioshock - maxed out options except AA
gears of war - maxed out options except AA
guildwars - maxed out options except AA
GTA SA - ok not high demand this one
EVE - cant remember settings
Homeworld - again not exactly taxing to run
WoW - maxed out except AA

"proper" software without problems

Adobe CReative suite
Capture one 4
itunes 1.71.11 (1.7 was an absolute nightmare though on V64)

Im fairly confident this is a Vista 64 issue. Any other issue I have had in the past has not been present on a vista 32 OS.

Will try this now on my laptop just for a comparison.

BRB

Paul

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Kitkun
Join Date 06/2008
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Reply #11 August 10, 2008 11:15:08 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
If the laptop works, try running it with as much other software closed as you can get.

If not, you may have a damaged disk. Try getting a replacement.
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Kinusu
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Reply #12 August 10, 2008 11:16:51 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
runs on my dell xps 1330 laptop like an absolute dream! but on my power pc...nope. my laptop has lower specs but here is the big diff, runs vista 32 and my power pc is on vista 64....perhaps im wrong but i think thats the prob
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Kaltes
Join Date 05/2008
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Reply #13 August 10, 2008 11:58:45 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
There should be a warning lable on microsoft products.
"cautoin this product could be absolute crap"
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vincenoir
Join Date 08/2008
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Reply #14 August 10, 2008 12:12:39 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
I'm running this game (patched to 1.09) on Windows Server 2008 (x64) and it's working fine as long as I have graphic settings below "highest", so the OS can't be the problem.

If it's a hard freeze the problem usually is hardware related.

BTW, if I set the graphic settings to "highest" the game crashes and the system seemingly freezes while the crash dump is created. Have you tried reducing the graphic settings?
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the_Monk
Join Date 01/2008
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Reply #15 August 10, 2008 1:56:26 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Kinusu,

Someone else stated you're probably under-powering your rig with only a 500W psu, I'd like to say that I agree with that statement. However, more important that the total wattage of one's psu is the reliable power it can deliver to each independant component. Many case-included-psu's are terrible at doing that. All it takes is a slight "dip" in the power provided and "hard-freeze, re-boot, etc."

Just something to look at.

the Monk
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Kinusu
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Reply #16 August 10, 2008 3:24:24 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
hmmm ok i accept the advice, im skeptical that its power issues though.

i may be misguided in this but im going to unplug all my extra drives, fans, dvds etc and see if it makes any difference. reducing the overhead on the psu to that degree should show if thats it in my opinion. if im wrong though please give me a prod.

dont mean to be a stick in the mud but a bigger psu is quite a lot of cash and if i dont have to spend it i would rather not.
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the_Monk
Join Date 01/2008
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Reply #17 August 10, 2008 4:14:52 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
dont mean to be a stick in the mud but a bigger psu is quite a lot of cash and if i dont have to spend it i would rather not.



Understandable    I think all of us are on a budget these days! Although my car doesn't seem to care how much it's costing me in fuel these days....lol

Either way, we'll be here with more suggestions as your "troubleshooting" progresses.

the Monk
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single_dot
Join Date 07/2008
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Reply #18 August 12, 2008 5:17:33 AM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums
I had the same issue with a N'vidia card and only with Soase (my other games worked fine).
Then I simply uninstalled the N'vidia drivers in safe mode and re-installed them (it was up to date drivers too).
No crashes anymore.
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