PS Unable to load, crashes/lag

[Trevelar]

Hello everyone! I have been reading through the posts here trying to find a solution to my problem and was unable to find a similar circumstance so here goes.

The Problem: Planetside crashes between the launcher and the server select screen. After clicking the play button in the launcher the game begins to initialize and my desktop appears, then a black screen. You can hear the game music playing in the background. Sometimes instead of a completely black screen I get the first frame or two of the Sony logo animation. The mouse cursor is available and super lagged. Sometimes the system crashes at this point and at other times I can use the window key to exit and then reboot.

The Stats: Windows XP Home Edition SP 1 (all updates installed), Intel Pentium 4 CPU 1.8 ghz, 512MB RAM, DirectX 9.0b (4.09.0000.0902), Dual displays on an ATI Radeon 9000 pro (128 MB) with Omega drivers (version 2.5.30). All planetside files are intact and updated, connecting via Cable with no firewall and no connection sharing.

What I Have Tried: Multiple uninstall/reinstall of planetside, multiple uninstall reinstall of Direct X & Sony's suggested ATI drivers, changing monitor refresh rates, disabling secondary display. Complete reinstalation of windows (thought maybee some of my tweaks could have caused the problem), the current Omega driver and a few older ATI drivers. Ran spyware/adware remover.

Occasionaly (3 times), the game will start and I can play with no problems. This happened first when I installed Sony's suggested drivers. But when I logged off and tried to log back on it pulled the standard black screen crash. It also loaded sucesfully after changing the refresh rate of my primary monitor. Again worked fine for one session then back to crashing. And the 3rd successful load was after the windows reinstall, but again only worked for one session of play. Since reinstalling windows everytome I want to play is not an option you guys have any suggestions?? Any help would be greatly appreciated

[Phaelon]

First, please get a firewall, or enable the firewall in XP for something, being open like that on a broadband connection is sooo bad. It is so easy for someone to hack you that way.

It looks like you tried a good deal of stuff, did you try after installing XP to use the Generic XP drivers it assigns your ATI card? They won't be optimized but it might help.

Do you have a copy of windows 2000 Professional you could load up and try?

Try doing a XP Professional install generic, with no Windows Updates, then just loading the ATI recommended drivers and playing?

Maybe try some video driver rollbacks and see if that helps. I would also search www.deja.com for "ATI Radeon 9000 issues"
Deja is google newsgroups, and comes back with hundreds of newsgroups that discuss this stuff.

Good Luck

[hazzer2007]

Press "ctrl alt delete" and see if any programs are running that are not ment to or if any programs are "not responding". If not, the game itself could be broken. You might need another planetside CD.

[Trevelar]

Yeah, I know I need to get off my lazy butt and get a firewall, and soon at that. As far as background programs. I shut down all programs except PS and teamspeak, and I have tried without running teamspeak. Still the permanent screen crash. I also have tried disabling my sound adapter (avance 97) again no work. I will definately check into the deja.com groups. I will also try using the generic windows drivers. At this point im willing to try anything. I need to borrow someone elses CDs and install, it would be great if I just had bad disc/s. Unfortunately it's almost never that easy. Thanks for all the advice, ill get back to you.

[Rbstr]

Well if its worked sometimes its probably not bad files. It may be a driver problem or perhaps a bug in that acctual card, but it would be odd that it only would glitch in PS. And that part of the game isn't even rendering stuff.

You have done full scans Ect right? that may catch bad files

[Trevelar]

yes, I have performed multiple full scans, and repaired the instalation with the discs twice. So it's probably not the files. Someone else suggested that I open and clean the interior/reseat the graphics cards and ram chips. im going to try that next. Oh yeah, it worked today for the now infamous single session. Didnt change anything, just turned on comp and hit the play button. But of course after logging off and trying to log back on I got the Blank Screen. Im still tying to sort through the info in the log files as soon as i get it I will post it here.

[Electrofreak]

Heh. That sort of inconsistency means that its most likely some kind of hardware or software conflict... does it usually work after running a program? Not running a program?

edit: have u run a Direct X diagnostic? (run "dxdiag") Have it check your DX files, run all the tests etc, maybe something will turn up...?

[Trevelar]

HMMMM, Im beggining to think it is a hardware problem. For giggles I turned my PC off and let its sit for about an hour (cool down). Turned it on and wham was playin. logged on succesfully this way 2 more times. Complete power off and cool down. However when I tried it today it worked and then did not. But its the first pattern I have noticed. You know it seems to me that I just need to use this as an excuse to buy a new desktop ;)

Thanks for all the help guys, Ill check back here every few days or so. If you think of something post away.

[Ait'al]

What compatability does PS have with multiple moniter setups? And have you tried turning off teamspeak while you open it. It could just be your computer overfilling with info on startup and not being able to get past that screen. How much ram does the PS startup take. he said hes has 512. Maybe hes using it all. And its more likely the vid card than the hardrive. Are your HDD lights flashing like nuts or does it go solid while this is happening? What happens in general that you notice? And how do other programs work on your computer? Do you have other things that dont run as well? How much virtual ram do you have. If your lights are flickering it could be thats filling up to and its backing up that bad. Its posible something is using up that much during startup. Are you running a teamspeak server or in a room with alot of people while your starting the game?

When you changed the refresh rate did you try setting it to adapter default instead of optimal or a specific frequency?

[Rbstr]

PS actualy supports some multi monitor settings, atleast it was suposed to.

The powerdown and cool off seems to point to cooling problems or more likelythe PSU(power supply unit) as those acctalulay account for more crashes than alot of people think i jsut got a new 500w PSU(not an incredibly nice one but decent) and my crashes have droped to a slightly lower amount.

See if you can borrow a more powerfull PSU form someone and see if it more stable

[Trevelar]

PROBLEM SOLVED, Boo-Yah

Ok guys if you are still looking at this and trying to give me a hand then my infinite thanks/appreciation. But it looks like I finally have solved the problem.

The Culprit: Bad AGP slot driver.

After trying every thing I and everyone else could think of, including another full install of windows (this time XP pro), I got the wild notion to update my Bios. While at my Motherboard's homepage I noticed updated drivers for the AGP slot and onboard sound chip. Downloaded and installed them. Then installed the original drivers that came with the ATI 9000 pro and DID NOT UPGRADE THEM. Planetside has survived 10+ loads now with no problems.

Thanks again for all the help, hope to see you on the field.

[Electrofreak]

Awesome! :)