My PC keeps 'freezing'

Bunford5 · Post by **Bunford5** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 4:49 am

Not that i would wish to cast any doubt upon the quality and reliability of this game, but my PC has been crashing alot lately and i need to restart it quite often because it freezes. Far be it from me to go around bad-mouthing your software but the problems i'm experiencing with my computer only occur while i'm playing The Universal. The problem is probably fairly common and easily fixed, i just don't know how. By 'freeze' i mean the screen stops refreshing and just stays on 1 image, the mouse doesn't work and i make a noise a bit like 'gaaaahrgh'.

Any advice anyone can offer would be appreciated.

Bunford5 - Proud owner and user of Directx 9

alner · Post by **alner** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 9:26 am

I'm not too sure, but maybe re-installing, and using non full screen mode might help. Maybe kill some recourse-using programs.

DirectX 9 works perfect with it, because I have it installed.

Post by **Mit** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 11:09 am

Not that i would wish to cast any doubt upon the quality and reliability of this game

s'ok..

The Universal is a lil part-time project and we dont have the time or resources of a proper game development group to make everything work alll the time.. specially on the range of different PC setups there are out there.
But most ppl who stick with it eventually seem to find a stable balance, and the code itself is of the finest quality i assure you :]. Especially considering how drunk devi & i were when we wrote it. :]

Running windowed is definitely a wise idea if you're having trouble with the client, as you're more likely to be able to recover (with ctrl, alt + del if necc).

The fact that its making a horrible noise when it dies suggests it might be something to do with the audio stuff. This is always a messy area as there are various differing levels of hardware drivers and libraries between the game and the hardware, some of which might not always function as i or directx expects em to. ( + a lot of the audio code was written while very very drunk :] ). Try turning the sound off in the options menu.

On one of the 3 machines i regularly run the game on i have found that the galradio causes occasional crashes for no apparent reason. (The debugger tells me nothing other than its crashed, and it was something to do with some internal windows thing doing some internal windowsy audio type-thing). The problem doesnt occur on the 2 other machines i run it on.
Soo.. ya might find that not using the galradio (if you do) might lessen the wonkiness.

If none of that helps.. try to see if you can find any sort of pattern - it might seem random but often theres something specific that triggers it. Is it usually in space or on a planet? Is there something you've done previously each time before it crashes, or do you see something weird beforehand? etc..

Post by **Magicfinger** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 11:21 am

Mit wrote:or do you see something weird beforehand?

excluding giant monkeys, exploding kricket balls, Mit, machine gun weilding sheep, cars the size of houses or any of the other weird things regularly seen

alner · Post by **alner** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 11:36 am

How about a guy with a moustache, hairy underarms, long blonde hair with pruple streaks, high voice, dressed as a girl?

Freaked me out when I saw it.

fhko · Post by **fhko** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 7:58 pm

You better be careful...you know gk doesn't like it when you talk about him behind his back

Bunford5 · Post by **Bunford5** » Sat Dec 17, 2005 2:35 am

I'll give the windowed thing a go and maybe try less draw distance or whatever. One contributing factor seems to be how long the computer has been on. It crashes if i run the game too soon after startup. If it helps, i'm using a nivida geforce3 graphics card with directx 9 installed.

btw, i have had other games behave in the same way before so my best uneducated guess would be that it's a problem with my graphics card or lack of RAM available for graphics. I have no idea how any of it works though.

paintballkev812 · Post by **paintballkev812** » Sat Dec 17, 2005 6:25 pm

whats your computer specs?

Bunford5 · Post by **Bunford5** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 3:16 am

They're quite unimpressive...

20gig hd
1.1gig cpu
384mb RAM
nivida geforce 3 64mb grafx card
sb audigy pro thingy soundcard
Increasingly dark yellow nicotine staining.

I've probably left out something.

theseer · Post by **theseer** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 4:18 am

iiirc, that should run the game fine.

Sonro · Post by **Sonro** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 8:57 am

I've been having similar probs since the 48.1 beta update - posted 48.1 bugs, but the post seems to have dissapeared.

thought initially I may be lacking in ram, as I was working & playing at same time. Upgraded to 1.5gb ram, no change. My pc specs not fantastic, but reasonable, shouldnt be any probs. only in this game

alner · Post by **alner** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 6:57 pm

gk doesn't like it when you talk about him behind his back

Sorry GK

Lol, yeh dude, it should run fine, if not, upgrade ur RAM to 512, or maybe remove a few things u dont use, like that old game which takes up quite a bit of space.

Or ur graphics card, the one I have cost me 200AUD, great little thing. Really fast too.

Bunford5 · Post by **Bunford5** » Wed Dec 21, 2005 4:29 am

I'm removing old stuff i don't need and it seems to be helping allthough it's still freezing occasionally, especially just after i run the game. Does anyone else have a nivida geforce3 gfx card and does it work fine for you?