Stability Issues! Dead Space & Left 4 Dead

Heatsinked · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:11

Hello to everyone not playing in the snow...!

After a lot of troubleshooting, I just wanted to ask for some advice...

System info:

Windows XP SP3
Intel Core 2 Duo E6850
MSI P6N Diamond
4GB Corsair Memory
GeForce GTX 260 (216 Core) Black Edition (180.48 drivers)
Hiper Type-R 580 Watt Power Supply

My system is running at stock speeds but the GTX Black Edition is overclocked by default, as you no doubt know...

Fallout 3 crashes to desktop occasionaly, but I put that down to the game not my hardware. Other, somewhat older games, have had no apparent problems. However, I finally got round to trying Dead Space and Left 4 Dead recently and I have had recurring crashes of a particular type.

Left 4 Dead: Black screen / Sound Loop (needs restart)

Researched this a fair bit and I have tried everything that has been suggested. The console commands, disabling dual-core support etc... although the stuttering / lag has been solves, it still crashes to black screen and sound loops until reboot... randomly.

Dead Space: Pink corrupt screen / Sound Loop & corruption (needs restart)

Everything I have read seems to point towards dodgy graphics card or dodgy drivers / OS builds. I have tried the latest drivers but they didn't change anything, so rolled-back.

I have wiped my hard drive and started from scratch. Fresh Windows XP SP2 install, with and without SP3... latest drivers... tried and tested drivers (ones that have always seemed to work for me before)... same issues as before. CPU / GPU temperatues are well within acceptable limits. I have re-seated every component just be sure. It doesn't seem to happen that often but it's something that I really want to try and fix if it is something to do with my hardware.

Let me see... what else? I have disconnected all non-essential devices and monitored my PSU readings, all of which are normal. 3DMark06 has been allowed to run for hours and has not crashed. Memtest also reports no errors and my CPU is 24 hours stable (had to cancel the test so I could do something!)...

So then... are the games to blame? Drivers? Or should I try swapping my graphics card and / or PSU? I would have done that already but I have no spares and it's going to be a pain to do! But i'll do it if it's not likely to be a dodgy graphics card.

Sorry about the long post and thanks for reading. Look forward to getting some advice! Cheers.

Delvis · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:15

I had random hanging and sound loops in L4D, and that was because the game needed to be run in borderless windowed mode (it's in the video options...)...Although I'm not too sure how much that will help your issue.

I played deadspace on my old XP install fine, but that was SP2...So I'm gona have to re-install it and try it again on my SP3 system in order to tell you if that still works or not though

Is your system new then? Or have you had it a while sort of thing?

Heatsinked · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:24

The graphics card is the newest component, got it back in November last year. All the other components I've had for about a year, possibly longer...

I have tried the games on SP2 and SP3 but it didn't make any difference... so I've left SP3 installed for my latest build (I have re-installed a lot over the last few weeks trying to sort this out!!!)... hmmm. I must admit that I haven't tried Vista, 32bit or 64bit, as I don't have it...

I will try "borderless windowed mode" and see if that makes a difference in Left 4 Dead at least... I do remember reading about that on the Steam forums, I'm willing to try anything and everything at this point.

Thanks for the reply

I shall persevere...

Delvis · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:31

Indeed you shall.

Vista, meh, I'm sticking with my XP untill I have to upgrade as moneys tight and I can't be bothered with the hassle tbh

It could be the card, but as you said you've tried various drivers? Presumably you wipe them correctly? Driver cleaner + CCleaner or something? Not that it makes THAT much of a difference in all honesty, especially on a new install.

You could rule out RAM by leaving Memtest on them over night or something, see if it bugs out.

Otherwise, you 'could' try RMA'ing you Gcard? Or if your lucky enough to have a spare / older one, try that....Or a mates Nvidia card or something.

Rroff · 2 Feb 2009 at 19:48

Turning the GPU fan upto 100%

will deffinatly* fix the left 4 dead problem - the default fan profile isn't agressive enough to handle certain extremes causing the VRMs to get too warm it seems theres a few threads on this.

Same probably applies for dead space but I don't have that to test.

Using 180.60 CUDA beta drivers or 181.2x seems to help too but 181.2x seem to cause stuttering in left 4 dead

* Depending on your cooling you might have to reset the clocks to under 600MHz on the core

Heatsinked · 3 Feb 2009 at 11:08

Delvis said:
Indeed you shall.

Vista, meh, I'm sticking with my XP untill I have to upgrade as moneys tight and I can't be bothered with the hassle tbh

It could be the card, but as you said you've tried various drivers? Presumably you wipe them correctly? Driver cleaner + CCleaner or something? Not that it makes THAT much of a difference in all honesty, especially on a new install.

You could rule out RAM by leaving Memtest on them over night or something, see if it bugs out.

Otherwise, you 'could' try RMA'ing you Gcard? Or if your lucky enough to have a spare / older one, try that....Or a mates Nvidia card or something.

Well, according to memtest, my memory is fine (after many hours of testing)... As for the graphics card... well, I don't want to send it back if I'm not 100% certain it's faulty, otherwise I'll be charged by XFX for the inconvenience if they can't find a problem with it. As I mentioned before, I have run 3DMark 06, both the main tests and demo, for hours and it hasn’t crashed once. I guess it is likely that it may be a combination of faulty card and random crashing due to the game / system configuration.

As for the drivers, yeah, I have been installing them and removing them cleanly.

Rroff said:
Turning the GPU fan upto 100% will deffinatly* fix the left 4 dead problem - the default fan profile isn't agressive enough to handle certain extremes causing the VRMs to get too warm it seems theres a few threads on this.

Same probably applies for dead space but I don't have that to test.

Using 180.60 CUDA beta drivers or 181.2x seems to help too but 181.2x seem to cause stuttering in left 4 dead

* Depending on your cooling you might have to reset the clocks to under 600MHz on the core

Now there’s a thought… I could run the card at default stock speeds and see if it makes a difference. As I said before, I haven’t overclocked the card but it does come overclocked by default. I will try running the fan at 100% but I’m pretty sure my card isn’t overheating, my old card used to run as high as 80degc no problems. This one peaks at about 72, lower in some games.

Thanks for your input all, at least I have something else to try

Rroff · 3 Feb 2009 at 14:44

No the core isn't overheating - but it seems that the card design doesn't cool some component* enough which is eventual causing a lockup - turning the fan upto 100% seems to force the air through enough to keep whatever component below critical - theres a couple of threads in the graphics card forum below about this.

*VRMs looking the most likely as they carry on rising on my graphs even when the core has topped off.

Columbo · 3 Feb 2009 at 15:23

L4D still crashes for me randomly no matter what I do.

I've tried just about everything and nothing works, I still haven't seen the end section of Dead Air due to it crashing. It would be nice if an error message was given but the game just exits back to the desktop.

I feel like demanding my money back from Steam....

Delvis · 3 Feb 2009 at 15:27

ManCuBuS said:
L4D still crashes for me randomly no matter what I do.

I've tried just about everything and nothing works, I still haven't seen the end section of Dead Air due to it crashing. It would be nice if an error message was given but the game just exits back to the desktop.

I feel like demanding my money back from Steam....

Is there nothing in event viewer saying why the application terminated?

Heatsinked · 3 Feb 2009 at 15:54

My System and Application event logs show nothing out of the ordinary when the crashes occur…

I’m going to have a Left 4 Dead session this evening. First I'll try borderless window mode and if it still crashes I'll try using default non-overclocked settings. It usually crashes at least once after an hour so it’ll be interesting to see what happens. I’ll also give Dead Space a try too. Failing all that, I'll try 100% fan speed. I didn't consider the possibility that other components may be overheating, not just the GPU / memory....eeeugh

I ran 3DMark again for 3 hours… not a single crash. I'm going to leave it looping all morning & afternoon tomorrow while I’m at work just to be sure.

Delvis · 3 Feb 2009 at 15:55

I presume everything on your board is cooled properly as well? Chipset? The VRM type modules around the cpu etc.

Heatsinked · 3 Feb 2009 at 16:09

Delvis said:
I presume everything on your board is cooled properly as well? Chipset? The VRM type modules around the cpu etc.

I'm not sure if you are familiar with the motherboard I have but it has an onboard Creative X-Fi chipset that is cooled by a heatsink and fan. The chipset is cooled passively by a heatsink / heatpipe design that connects through the X-Fi heatsink through to a heatsink located at the back of the motherboard near the I/O backplate. I have two fans sucking air in through the front of the case which cool the hard drives and RAM. The side of my case has a single 80mm fan sucking air in and onto the graphics card / lower portion of the motherboard. Finally, the CPU fan sucks air through the heatsink and out through two exhaust fans mounted on the back of the case, just above the I/O backplate. The VRMs do appear to be passively cooled.

I have always thought the cooling inside my case has been quite effective but maybe it's time to re-evaluate, due to having hotter and more powerful components inside my computer than before. The case in an old Antec File Server case, five case fans in total, basically sucking air from the front and out of the back. Still, I'd have thought five fans should be enough!!! As I said, the temperatures aren't anything out of the ordinary... :confused:

If the PSU was struggling to power the graphics card, I would assume that the PSU readings would be erratic and fluctuate, therefore producing readings that drop below or exceed specified tolerances?

smogsy · 3 Feb 2009 at 18:00

turn of multi core rendering in L4D fixes CRashes

or use Console mat_quene 0

Heatsinked · 3 Feb 2009 at 18:07

smogsy said:
turn of multi core rendering in L4D fixes CRashes

or use Console mat_quene 0

No offence, but I think you may have skimmed my original post?!

Turning of multi-core rendering stopped the stuttering (mostly) I was experiencing so that definitely has helped. I have already tried the console command you mentioned too, no effect… I still have the crashing to black screen / sound loop problem.

Thanks for the input though

Rroff · 3 Feb 2009 at 18:36

I found turning off multi-core rendering actually made L4D worse - it didn't crash so often (probably because GPU was being pushed less) - a lot less frequently but still did sometimes, but performance was almost 1/3rd compared to having it on and it would get very stuttery in heavy action.