[O]Possible GPU issue causing game to crash / blue screen

Bug Report Section Graphics
1

Started here: [http://forum.star-conflict.com/index.php?/topic/19414-rgame-keeps-crashing/](< base_url >/index.php?/topic/19414-rgame-keeps-crashing/)

Creating my own topic after filtering a few things i noticed.

 

Describe the bug in a few words/sentences.

If i turn the visual settings at high the game unavoidably crashes. I turned everything since 0.8 at low settings, but still getting the occasional game crash. Also happens while running Teamspeak 3, especially when i use whichever ‘push-to-talk’ key i use (currently LCtrl, before it was NUM0). Can also happen when alt-tabbing.

 

Why do you think this is a bug.

GPU / system / software partial incompatibility with game’s client / source.

 

How often does this bug occur.

Very often since 0.9.8, if i am actively speaking in TS it can happen every 30 minutes.

 

What was your last action/How to reproduce the bug.

Alt-tab OR teamspeak activation OR GPU overload in game by changing settings or… simply sitting idle, both in hangar or in battle. Had a crash today waiting for a battle and just staring at my ship without doing anything for a while.

 

Detailed explanation of the bug.(Only if you need to add more information to 1.)

TS crash: I already understood there are issues with TS / Mumble devs are aware of. Usually happens when i press the ‘push-to-talk’ key or if i have it set on ‘continuous transmission’ or ‘voice activation detection’ it can crash at complete random.

 

_Alt-Tab crash: _When i alt-tab to do whatever else (minor things like running the browser or looking through folders or looking at TS3 client, not running another game or something big) there are several things that have high chances of happening:

  1. GPU shutdown and restarting itself. I do what i do either in the alt-tab mode or after / when switching back to game and suddenly it happens - black screen, 2-3 second wait, GPU reboots and i get a taskbar error message saying my GPU crashed and needed to restart.

  2. Prior to the described above sometimes i see weird random speckles on the screen, multiple colors, resembling a 256 or whatever type color Windows mode in 8 bit? Forgot the details, those are old systems, but that’s what it resembles.

 

_Stuttering game crash: _This starts either out of nowhere or when doing something of the above. My screen turns black and the sound starts stuttering in a long ‘prrrrrrrrrr’. This has several outcomes: game CTD   or  alt-ctrl-delete followed by ‘end process’ from me, followed by a possible GPU auto-reboot with slow response time from my computer for a few seconds afterwards   or   it stops there with nothing else happening and i am forced to hit the ‘Reset’ button on the tower case.

 

Blue screen: Has chances to follow immediately after the ‘stuttering game crash’ part or happens directly. The message i’ve been able to read so far mentions something about memory, but it’s too short because my computer will almost instantly reboot. Trying to find out how to make it stop at the screen instead of auto-rebooting.

 

Your system specs + Operating system as DX Diag.

[DxDiag2.txt](< base_url >/applications/core/interface/file/attachment.php?id=7018)

 

Videos + Screenshots (Only if needed, but in most cases they are helpful)

Nothing available.

 

Log files + Exceptions

Game logs: [Game logs.zip](< base_url >/applications/core/interface/file/attachment.php?id=7019)

These are from today’s session where crashes happened (just before i contacted Error ingame). Are the chat and combat logs needed too?

 

Game exceptions: [Game exceptions.zip](< base_url >/applications/core/interface/file/attachment.php?id=7022)

These haven’t been created today, looked through them and they all seem to be older files, there aren’t any from today.

 

System DMP logs: [System DMP files.zip](< base_url >/applications/core/interface/file/attachment.php?id=7020)

These have all been created today.

 

 

Let me know what’s missing.

2

New crash record:

Game logs:

[2013.11.10 23.38.42.zip](< base_url >/applications/core/interface/file/attachment.php?id=7023)

Windows DMP file:

[111113-19172-01.zip](< base_url >/applications/core/interface/file/attachment.php?id=7024)

3

All right, thank you for a very good bug report!

It was very nice to work with. 

 

Unfortunately though, according to what we see in logs the problem is mainly connected with your software (blue screens may suggest that even with some hardware). We suggest you to try and re-install drivers of your videocard and update all of your software. Also, a good idea may be to try and run the game with partially different hardware in order to detect the malfunctioning part, if it is there. 

4

Thanks for the reply.

Fortunately i’m getting a new monster machine in a few weeks (hopefully max 2), so there’s no need to stress about it.

I hope the information can help for game compatibility tweaking if that’s on the ‘to do’ list.

5

Do you still experience these problems on your current machine?

6

Returning to this with a little discovery that slipped my radar before and to answer the question.

 

As stated, i bought a new PC with a damn powerful GPU (nVidia GTX 780 Ti, 3GB) (you can see the rest of the config in the dxdiag file, but it’s the GPU i want to talk about because this is / was the real issue). This allowed me more room for fiddling with the game’s settings. As most powerful GPU cards do, this one makes coil noises when stressed. After a little bit of research i came upon someone mentioning fps count that directly impacts the coil noise. I ran immediately to SCon’s graphical settings and noticed i missed the ingame fps slider, i only payed attention to the out-of-game one before which was set at 30,2. Some of you may have already known this, some of us discover this very lately like i did after enduring tons of crashes. I was amazed that when i slided that one instead of 120 fps before the ‘unlimited’ threshold it showed me 250 fps option which obviously my old card cannot take. Well, it can take it in Minecraft, but dies there too pretty soon. Changing back and forth between 250 and unlimited, the noise was getting so different that i think my card was going like 500 fps (just a guess).

 

So, what happens: the default fps limit ingame is set to unlimited, which creates a very massive impact on the GPUs, even on my new one which goes sky-high in heating. The problem is that the game tries to go over the edge with ‘unlimited’ instead of auto-calculating optimal fps to deliver, it is not adaptive. After reducing the fps count manually to 60-120 the new card stops heating like crazy. This is why i think, Antibus, you guys discovered the issue to be my GPU, which it was indeed. I will test it soon on the old machine to confirm if the other card still dies at a lower fps count. Alt-tabbing is indeed a plus to the crash issue since it force-switches from 30 frames out of game to 250+ when going back ingame.

 

So:

Do you still experience these problems on your current machine?

Yes and no. As you read above, the crashes and issues that were irritating me are gone, but the card stressing is still there.

 

So i really highly suggest that in a (very) close future patch you change the ‘unlimited’ fps default to lets say 60 fps which is more than enough for a start and older GPUs. Currently i set my game @90 fps, might actually use 120. The monitor renders only at 60MHz/s so even 120 fps is over-board, but the motion smooth enough.

 

Also, when devs get some time, try to implement an adaptive fps calculator for the GPUs. Also low settings should automatically reduce fps count on the slider. It maybe already does that, i haven’t been uninstalling and reinstalling the game to see any changes there to know for sure.

 

Are there any logs that would be relevant in this case?

 

New DxDiag:

[DxDiag.txt](< base_url >/applications/core/interface/file/attachment.php?id=7155)

7

The crashes you had were probably a result of driver or hardware issues. Maybe moving on or some card in another slot may help (if you have an IRQ issue). Otherwise removing old drivers and installing new drivers for everything and doing a BIOS update should have helped.

 

I noticed on my system the video card’s fan going very fast too. it is strange that i don’t have that in other games, details are set to medium on my system. I’ll check my fps setting, Thanks.

8

The crashes you had were probably a result of driver or hardware issues. > hardware issue, GPU more precisely

 

Maybe moving on or some card in another slot may help (if you have an IRQ issue). Otherwise removing old drivers and installing new drivers for everything and doing a BIOS update should have helped. > already done that a long time ago with no changes

 

I noticed on my system the video card’s fan going very fast too. it is strange that i don’t have that in other games, details are set to medium on my system. I’ll check my fps setting, Thanks. > it’s not the fan(s) in this case, it’s the coils, and that is a whole different story

The problem with the old nVidia GeForce 9800 GT was simply the fact it tried to squeeze the maximum out of it (fps in this case since the other settings were all on low) while the game’s possible visual quality and performance exceeded the GPU’s capabilities. After all, that card came out when, 7-8 years ago? And nVidia stopped supporting them. They promised some years back when DX11 was released that they would create drivers compatible with that and the GPUs. But either technical issues or something else canceled that project. After doing lots of other things i have to agree that GPU wouldn’t be capable of pushing itself on DX11 anyways.

In the current setup the new GPU’s capabilities exceed the game’s max possible performance output, so it runs to it’s near maximum without a problem. However there is no reason at all to go at such fps (unless Takamina says 250 fps vs 120 fps is a massive difference that you can actually feel ^^ ). I checked the fans, they are alright, it’s the coils buzzing when i go over the limits with this card.

9

Takamina says 250 fps

my fps in game 300+ ^_^ before the patch he was about 500

b19f3c0cf719.jpg

10

my fps in game 300+ ^_^ before the patch he was about 500

b19f3c0cf719.jpg

:what:  wow

Time to kill my GPU then xD