Patch 3 crash

[Yakface]

Hi

Just updated with the new patch and I'm getting a problem with crashes now. The replay works fine, but after about 10 minutes of putting in orders (during which time again everything seems OK) the window in whcih I am running the game goes white (except for the blue window border).

The trigger seems to be opening or closing one of the in game 'windows' (something like the air group view or planes database or anything similar). Once gone it never comes back. If I leave the PC or try to do other things it becomes progreesively slower and then stops (and CAPSLOCK button stops working).

I am not running in widescreen mode. I've tried it with and without the intel dual core switches that are suggested. Same for two different installs (I have one for my Japanese game and a separate one for Allies). I can imagine it's hard to diagnose on such flimsy info, but any suggestions as to how to get things working?

Thanks

[michaelm75au]

If it is repeatable, can you supply a save with the steps to make it go boom.

[Yakface]

Hi Michael

I can certainly post a save when I get home. However I fear that the problem is not so much with the save, more the interraction between whatever has changed by the patch and my PC and so I'm guessing i will not perform its shenanigans for you as it is for me.

There's not just one single thing that triggers it. It's more a case that after about 10 or 15 minutes of doing normal order issuing things, I will click a button and AE will die on me - never the same task twice where it has died.

I assume you don't have to run the patched program in widescreen mode or with a particular screen resolution if you don't want to?

[antonius45]

Hi

I have got exactly the same problem as Yakface : after some time playing (either 10 minutes or one hour), my window goes white right after I click on some button and the game crashes.

At first I thought that the new resolution I was using (great improvement !) was the problem so I went back to 1024x768 but it didn't help.

Until the latest patch AE would never crash on me, now it has become nearly impossible to play

[michaelm75au]

Attach a save and I'll firstly see if anything is obvious.

[dorjun driver]

I had the same problem with the beta that Yakface is experiencing. Never resolved.  Haven't bothered to try the latest patch.

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2385462

[antonius45]

Yesterday I tried running the game in Win98 compatible mode.

That disabled the new resolution feature (-px1600 -py900 and other resolutions supported by my screen didn't work anymore) but the good news is that I could play the whole evenning without any crash.

Of course maybe I was only lucky and need to play many more hours (yeepee !) before I can safely conclude that really fixed the problem.

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: Yakface

Hi

Just updated with the new patch and I'm getting a problem with crashes now. The replay works fine, but after about 10 minutes of putting in orders (during which time again everything seems OK) the window in whcih I am running the game goes white (except for the blue window border).

The trigger seems to be opening or closing one of the in game 'windows' (something like the air group view or planes database or anything similar). Once gone it never comes back. If I leave the PC or try to do other things it becomes progreesively slower and then stops (and CAPSLOCK button stops working).

I am not running in widescreen mode. I've tried it with and without the intel dual core switches that are suggested. Same for two different installs (I have one for my Japanese game and a separate one for Allies). I can imagine it's hard to diagnose on such flimsy info, but any suggestions as to how to get things working?

Thanks

have been experiencing the same instability since installing the patch. Before the patch (in 6 months game time) I had perhaps three crashes, since the patch (2 weeks game time) I had something like halve a dozen crashes. Can´t repeat it though, it happens now and then when putting in orders. It just freezes and then crashes.

[jwilkerson]

ORIGINAL: Yakface
I assume you don't have to run the patched program in widescreen mode or with a particular screen resolution if you don't want to?

Absolutely not!

Just remove those pesky like command line switches ...

-px

-py

and things will get back to normal!

[jwilkerson]

ORIGINAL: castor troy
have been experiencing the same instability since installing the patch.

Are you running with the -px -py command line switches?

For me, I've been running since August release with zero (the integer less than one) crashes.

But I do see some "pausing" and involuntary screen changes when running in widescreen mode. Like if I click on the air base indicator or the port indicator, some times the screen pauses and I wind up seeing the base screen instead of the air list or the ship list. Because of this, when playing in widescreen mode, I have changed my habits to click on the base first then the air list or ship list. This at least stops the "pausing" and "involuntary screen changes". But for me, none of these items causes a crash. I have not seen a crash on my box since game release

[castor troy]

ORIGINAL: jwilkerson

ORIGINAL: castor troy
have been experiencing the same instability since installing the patch.

Are you running with the -px -py command line switches?

For me, I've been running since August release with zero (the integer less than one) crashes.

But I do see some "pausing" and involuntary screen changes when running in widescreen mode. Like if I click on the air base indicator or the port indicator, some times the screen pauses and I wind up seeing the base screen instead of the air list or the ship list. Because of this, when playing in widescreen mode, I have changed my habits to click on the base first then the air list or ship list. This at least stops the "pausing" and "involuntary screen changes". But for me, none of these items causes a crash. I have not seen a crash on my box since game release

yup, running widescreen. I´ve got the feeling that it´s related to windowed mode. Am now running full screen 1920x1080 and full screen prevents the game from going into this "pause mode" during giving orders. It seems that in windowed mode sometimes it happens that this pause causes the game to crash. Am now alt-tabbing between tracker and the game...

[BigJ62]

I used to see this a lot long before wide screen and for some reason it just stopped happening, mind you I started with xp32 then to vista 64 and now to win 7 64. When I enabled IIS and all it's modules the problem went away on vista and have not seen it since, maybe IIS is just a coincidence.

I would also experiment with command line switches to see if this helps.

[michaelm75au]

Try turning Music down to '0'.
In testing, I do a lot of screen switching when debugging the code. Every so often, I get a crash in the Sound code section of the Engine. IIRC, it seems to be in the same place each  time. [I'll pay more attention where in future to see if there is a distinct pattern.]

That place is when switching sound files from what I can see; the old sound is finished and it wants to start a new one, but the code is no longer pointing at a valid 'sound player' anymore. Presumely the old 'sound player' has finished and been released, but the new sound does not know this.

Turning off the music seems to help with this, although I don't know if the other sounds can be a source of problems too. But these generally are quick 'in and out' sounds, not like the long playing music.

[Yakface]

I have resolved my problem.

I was not playing with the widescreen switches, just the same old '-w' switch with the extra ones for intel dual core.

The problem disappeared when I went for full screen mode with the appropriate -px -py values (still with the dual core switches). It does seem that my issue was with the 'windowed' switch as I tried a windowed, widescreen mode and was still crashing. I hope this helps anyone with the same problem.

[castor troy]

IMO it´s related to windowed mode, therefore I´ve switched back to full screen mode. In full screen mode I´ve never got those pauses and therefore no freeze/crash. Have to alt tab between tracker and the game though, but this is by far not as annoying as losing twice your orders of a turn due to a crash three minutes before ending the turn.

[michaelm75au]

Question:
when playing window mode with wide screen, does the animations bounce up and down?

[jwilkerson]

ORIGINAL: michaelm

Question:
when playing window mode with wide screen, does the animations bounce up and down?

Not for me.

[USSAmerica]

ORIGINAL: jwilkerson

ORIGINAL: michaelm

Question:
when playing window mode with wide screen, does the animations bounce up and down?

Not for me.

I saw some of that on the ship details screen with the beta patch, when mousing over "clickable" links, but don't see it with the official patch 3.

I have seen occasional "pauses" when in widescreen windowed mode with Patch 3. It's similar to what I used to see on AE and WitP in windowed mode, until the CPU affinity switches were introduced. Very minor in my case, so far.

[BigJ62]

In xp32 I still see the pausing but not in win7x64.

[Nikel]

bouncing happens here with ships animations when you maximize the window and disappears when you restore down, is reproducible