Unexplained DAoC Crash to Desktop w/o Error Msg - Help!

[TheBinarySurfer]

Wondering if anyone can shed some light on this - already tried Support and General webpages and the VN's. We all know how fantastic GoA technical support and mythic technical support is...(great if youre totally IT illiterate, otherwise worthless since theyre unable to suggest anything beyond the simplest fixes it seems).

The Problem
Playing camelot occasionally on classic at the moment (pretty rare as i work long hours) but when i do (playing with DR/Cata clients) im getting chain crashes to the desktop (henceforth referred to as CTD) with no error messages at entirely random times - not on zoning, not on casting, not on typing etc etc - seems to be entirely random in all zones both pvp and pve with mobs/players in frame and off frame.

Time of normal running before Crash varys between almost instantly (took less than 10 secs once) to several hours but typically takes around 15-30 mins it seems.

It effectively insta-dumps me - no error messages nothing. Anyone has any suggestions aside from graphics driver update, reinstall the clients (tried it) and run registry repair (done it several times with every program under the sun) i'd love to hear them.

PS Also its not overheating as the temperature and voltage never spike according to my logs and ive got the side off currently so NP there. As i say it never is a fatal crash that needs a reset just a CTD with no error.
PPS Also tried dropping all graphics settings to their absolute lowest - makes no difference whatsoever

System spec: Gf6800 Ultra, Processor Pentium 3.45Ghz, 4GB RAM, 2*200Gb HDD, 600W+psu. Windows XP with SP2 installed, Norton Firewall/AV fully up to date, Graphics / Sound drivers fully up to date. Disabled everything under the sun in the start menu and my direct X is the latest there is (9c i think?).

If anyone solves this for me ill have their babies

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

Update: Just reinstalled all drivers and all 3 DAOC clients (ToA, Cata, Si). Going to leave it running into a wall for an hour or so see what happens with each on diff accs...

Any help/suggestions appreciated...

 

[confused]

Sounds like one of two things, you say that temp isn't rising, but try running speed fan as it is more accurate, either than or you've got a memory problem, try running memtest... Ultimately could be a windows stability problem

 

[Naffets]

CTD is mostly memory in my experience, run memtest.

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

Mem test threw up an error in the same memory location twice - tried swapping out the sticks - seems to be errors on both of them since i get errors no matter which one is in.

Thats one problem identified - just nicked the RAM out of my housemates pc to test it, and still getting the error with his RAM in mine so must be something else in addition to that...

Thanks for the help thus far - further ideas/suggestions welcome

 

[Ingafgrinn Macabre]

Mem test threw up an error in the same memory location twice - tried swapping out the sticks - seems to be errors on both of them since i get errors no matter which one is in.

Thats one problem identified - just nicked the RAM out of my housemates pc to test it, and still getting the error with his RAM in mine so must be something else in addition to that...

Thanks for the help thus far - further ideas/suggestions welcome

then it's most likely a problem in either the memorybank or the memorycontroller on the northbridge.
Take one memorychip and try it in the first slot, second slot, third slot and fourth slot. and again with another memorycard. (the more cards tested, the better)
If it gives thesame error in thesame place every time it's a problem with the controller. If it gives thesame error in thesame place everytime in a certain slot, it's a most likely a problem in the slot, but _could_ also be a problem in the controller.
If it gives the error only with a certain type card (other brand works fine) it's probably an incompatibility between memory cards and the rest of the PC.

What you also might wanna see is if the powersupply is up to par with the system. Too little juice and the PC can do some weird stuff aswell...

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

then it's most likely a problem in either the memorybank or the memorycontroller on the northbridge.
Take one memorychip and try it in the first slot, second slot, third slot and fourth slot. and again with another memorycard. (the more cards tested, the better)
If it gives thesame error in thesame place every time it's a problem with the controller. If it gives thesame error in thesame place everytime in a certain slot, it's a most likely a problem in the slot, but _could_ also be a problem in the controller.
If it gives the error only with a certain type card (other brand works fine) it's probably an incompatibility between memory cards and the rest of the PC.

What you also might wanna see is if the powersupply is up to par with the system. Too little juice and the PC can do some weird stuff aswell...

Got a top quality 150 quid PSU installed so don't think thats the issue. Also although im not certain of the values they should be recieving they don't fluctuate at all - consistent bar 0.5%-1% flux or so which is normal im told?

However good idea about the diff slots - bearing in mind im not a techie by any stretch of the imagination how would i fix a problem on the memory bank/controller?

Going to flip the chips around etc now and get back to you - good responses so far guys - much appreciated - keep em coming - will say immediately if it gets fixed

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

Update: Forgot to say i deliberately locked the RAM speed to a lower level (100 i think it is now) and it seems to have made the crashes consistent in timing - around 30 mins.

Thinking perhaps DAoC memory leaking? Didnt they fix that ages ago though?

<Potters off to crack open the casing again>

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

Additional Update: Sat here watching the available physical memory drop slowly as the mem useage on game.dll creeps up at comparable values - reckon this could be it - at the rate these numbers are changing the RAM spare will reach 0 in 20-40 mins (hard to estimate) so it fits the time frame...

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

Additional Update Mk2: Crashes before the memory leakage can reach a sufficient level to affect the computer on anything other than a piffling levelso it aint that. Again fairly consistent crash time - 35 mins this time.

 

[confused]

Thinking perhaps DAoC memory leaking? Didnt they fix that ages ago though?
>

Yes they did, but if it's a hardware problem then it's nothing to do with mythic..

You mention having 4gig of ram, well xp can only cope with 2 gig. What brand of memory is it and what brand mobo.... should have asked before

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

Didnt realise that a memory leak could be due to hardware - thought it was always a software based issue?

 

[confused]

Not saying it could a hardware memory leak, as i've never heard of them existing... but xp can't handle more than 2 gig of ram

What I meant before is that it might not be a memory leak at all, but infact a hardware problem that is looking like a memory leak or somthing like that...

 

[Ingafgrinn Macabre]

Not saying it could a hardware memory leak, as i've never heard of them existing... but xp can't handle more than 2 gig of ram

What I meant before is that it might not be a memory leak at all, but infact a hardware problem that is looking like a memory leak or somthing like that...

I don't know about Windows XP Home Edition, but Professional supports 4GB memory...

 

[TheBinarySurfer]

XP pro does indeed utilise 4gb memory happily - whatever the problem was it just seems to have stopped randomly though - i've had one crash in around 12 hours now...Odd! Cheers for the help though guys Rep all around!

 

[Rhana]

Just saw this thread and first thing first, I dont know jack about thise sort of things. But I do remember when a friend of my, when still playing daoc had problems with strange crashes. It turned out to be the incomming power to his house.. The amount wasnt stabel but whent down now and then. Didnt whent down to zero, just sort of fluxed, enough to make his comp have a hickup.

The company suplying his power denied this, to the point, (as he is working in the telecom buisness, working with the stations) he put up some equipment at his home and mesured the input...

The power company, when they saw the outprint of the more then 12h test run, just had to go in and start looking after what was wrong and in the end fixed it.

Maybe an idea, maybe no.. but it might explane it and why it disapeared for more then 12h (maybe your power suplyer did some changes in some power central or something)

 

[Entran]

iv just started geting this exact same problem. Only started today

2nd comp is fine. just this one.

1gb DDR400, Athlon 64 3400+, GeForce 6800GT