ARMA 2: OA beta build 81423

[Hanzu 10]

I just monitored the RAM usage of the game while playing warfare (MP) with the current beta build. As soon the game took more then 2GB ram, the FPS went down, LOD of some objects switched to low and 1 minute later the game crashed with out of memory. Maybe a hint into the right direction? > 2 gb ram usage

If i want to reproduce the problem somehow, the fastest way for me at the moment is to join a Warfare match in MP, set the view distance in the mission to maximum, play 10 minutes or so > out of memory crash.

Intel 2500k

4 GB

Radeon 6950

Intel SSD (OS and game running from it)

Win7 64b

So its not because of nVidia then since it happens with Radeons too.

It seems that soldiers wielding rocket launchers get stuck when they die:

Yes. Also said in replies #17 and #30 above.

I'll be having a few goes with the new beta over the next few days, just to see if I can produce a crash. Just played through the "Harvest Red" mission from the Arma2 campaign, no crashes so far.

Very peculiar indeed. Your specs are very close to mine with the exceptions of those Raptors and soundcard. Since me and "Ginger McAle" have crashes and both have SSD, could that be related?

MadDogX could you try with multiplayer and with visibility set to maximum of 10000? Also if you by any reason continue Harvest Red campaign, try Manhattan and Bitter Chill where I got most of the crashes.

[maddogx 13]

Very peculiar indeed. Your specs are very close to mine with the exceptions of those Raptors and soundcard. Since me and "Ginger McAle" have crashes and both have SSD, could that be related?

MadDogX could you try with multiplayer and with visibility set to maximum of 10000? Also if you by any reason continue Harvest Red campaign, try Manhattan and Bitter Chill where I got most of the crashes.

Okay, I'll give it a go this afternoon. Was planning to continue the Harvest Red campaign anyway. :)

Do you usually play with 10k view distance?

[Hanzu 10]

Do you usually play with 10k view distance?

Yes I do usually because I don't want to pay for high end hardware for nothing and with only 1680x1050 resolution it should not be too heavy for my specs.

To stop out of memory crashes I tried to lower it all the way to minimum of 500 too, but it does not seemed to help much and eventually out of memory crash will come.

I also do not use antialiasing, anisotropic, post processing or vsync, since they just cut detail or make headache but everything else is at maximum. Except Terrain Detail that seems to stay only High and can be set to Very High only if I lower Visibility to below 6000. Atoc is set to default too, since I don't like editing gamefiles unless there is real good reason.

[CarlGustaffa 4]

Uhm, antialiasing lets you see more detail. Detail that exist on a subpixel level. I.e. the cables on a powerline or girders on a crane will cease to "flicker". Anisotropic filtering helps on improving blurred textures. Typical example is to observe the road markings: The ones up close (that disappear into the distance) is much less horizontally blurred with increasing anisotropic filtering.

[Hanzu 10]

Uhm, antialiasing lets you see more detail. Detail that exist on a subpixel level. I.e. the cables on a powerline or girders on a crane will cease to "flicker". Anisotropic filtering helps on improving blurred textures. Typical example is to observe the road markings: The ones up close (that disappear into the distance) is much less horizontally blurred with increasing anisotropic filtering.

Thanks for clearing that up for me. Maybe worth starting to use them those. However with AA there seems to be some many values in Arma2 that its hard to decide which one to use. The highest(?) ones seem to add white "snow/frost" type artifacts to trees. Also some of the settings seemed to make trees very round like in Donald Duck type of cartoons, so I wasn't really fond of making Chernarus look like that.

[maddogx 13]

Thanks for clearing that up for me. Maybe worth starting to use them those. However with AA there seems to be some many values in Arma2 that its hard to decide which one to use. The highest(?) ones seem to add white "snow/frost" type artifacts to trees. Also some of the settings seemed to make trees very round like in Donald Duck type of cartoons, so I wasn't really fond of making Chernarus look like that.

When running at high resolutions, I find setting AA to "Low" is more than enough. Also, if you don't like the "round" trees, go to your Arma2OA.cfg and set AToC to zero.

[suma 8]

LOD of some objects switched to low and 1 minute later the game crashed with out of memory. Maybe a hint into the right direction? > 2 gb ram usage

Interesting find, thanks for sharing. How exactly you measure memory usage, though? Task manager? Which column?

[ginger mcale 11]

Yeah, i did it the easiest way, no special software used, i just alt-tabbed out of the game from time to time and took a look into the task manager, processes tab, arma2oa.exe, example:

Since it was in MP, the game continueed even when i tabbed out of it and i saw the RAM usage increase. It took a while until the game reached a usage of 2048 MB ram usage and then from one moment to another FPS from 30-60 to 3-5, low LOD on some objects (player & vehicle for example), and then out of memory crash.

If i want to reproduce it i have to play a while. It seems it took me yesterday to reproduce it three times about 20-30 minutes each playing Warfare on a half-full server, Chernarus.

I hope you will be able to reproduce it too.

[maddogx 13]

Well, playing Manhattan with 10k view distance right now and noticed two things:

#1: In the beginning, after talking to Shaftoe, a missile came out of nowhere and destroyed the LAV standing outside the base. :eek:

That was a real WTF moment.

#2: Watching Arma2s memory usage in the task manager, it's generally between 1.3 and 1.4GB, but when the mission autosaves it creeps up to 1.5GB+, before dropping down to the old values when the save is completed.

EDIT: Yup, I can confirm the games memory usage briefly increases by ~200MB while saving on Manhattan. Could this cause problems in certain situations?

Edited June 8, 2011 by MadDogX

[Hanzu 10]

Well, playing Manhattan with 10k view distance right now and noticed two things:

#1: In the beginning, after talking to Shaftoe, a missile came out of nowhere and destroyed the LAV standing outside the base. :eek:

That was a real WTF moment.

#2: Watching Arma2s memory usage in the task manager, it's generally between 1.3 and 1.4GB, but when the mission autosaves it creeps up to 1.5GB+, before dropping down to the old values when the save is completed.

EDIT: Yup, I can confirm the games memory usage briefly increases by ~200MB while saving on Manhattan. Could this cause problems in certain situations?

#1

Intresting you probably mean LAV-25 codename Boomerang that stands there until you attack enemy main base where it comes to assist you. I can only find 2 reasons what hit it. Shot down UAV hovering around FOB Manhattan hill crashed into it or enemy patrol came from west and found out it is a sitting duck target.

If it is the latter one it makes me wonder what has happened with enemy AI movement in recent betas since they seem to become much more active and aggressive. Yesterday I played Bitter Chill with 79600 and enemy patrol or helicopter had killed NAPA Scout and all soldiers usually located in yard of NAPA safehouse making it impossible to talk to that Scout to make mission end in that NAPA safehouse.

BTW. MadDogX when you get to Bitter Chill singleplayer let me know if it works for you since in 81423 multiplayer it will not work at all and you will be stuck forever inside start scene. Also try in Manhattan mission to not to report NAPA weapons in Gorka and verify that in Bitter Chill NAPA fighters always say you reported them.

#2

Yes savegaming consumes amazing amount memory that I have learned from CIT comments by Suma. In this case I think it crashes similarily even before if I do the first multiplayer save. So I think its more of a memory leak created something that was added in last two builds. Since yesterday I played with 79600 build multiple hours without a single crash.

For further tests when you are in multiplayer and game seems to show signs of crash by slowing down or press ESC-Suspend then continue to load savegame that is automatically created because of Suspend and somehow that flushes memory and it runs fast again.

I'm going to put that task manager memory usage open on my second display next time I play. So I don't need to ALT+TAB to get that info. Also I think reading at least four first columns in article called Windows 7 memory usage: What's the best way to measure? might help us on this.

Edited June 8, 2011 by Hanzu

[suma 8]

The public beta is getting ready to deploy now, which should hopefully fix the issue. While I was not able to reproduce the crash, I have identified and fixed a serious memory leak caused by the new technology introduced in the latest patches, and I think it is very likely having fixed this the Out of memory issue should go away.

[fruity_rudy 16]

sounds good hurry up :eek:

just kidding..can't wait to test

[ginger mcale 11]

Sounds promisingly. Thanks for the fast fix! :)

Cant wait to play this beta with fixed FPS drop in scopes.

[kremator 1065]

Thanks Suma and team. You guys are great !

Will test the beta and get back to you with the success story :)

[NeMeSiS 11]

The public beta is getting ready to deploy now, which should hopefully fix the issue. While I was not able to reproduce the crash, I have identified and fixed a serious memory leak caused by the new technology introduced in the latest patches, and I think it is very likely having fixed this the Out of memory issue should go away.

Hurray!

[Hanzu 10]

Thank you for working hard on that vicious issue only some of us suffered from. Good job Suma & Co!

[suma 8]

I suggest delaying your praise until the patch is released and you confirm the fix.

[Hanzu 10]

That's ok - we like to praise and it's nice to be in high expectations. :)

By praising maybe we hybbyists can little bit turbo charge you for whom this is a profession.

Personally even with not having a fix yet, I'm foolisly happy for just hearing the cause was like I said earlier "So I think its more of a memory leak created something that was added in last two builds."

That something beeing "the new technology introduced in the latest patches". Most of us do not know about such things, since they have no entries in patch readme, but obviously, should have known, since so many visual bugs do not come without some technology changes.

Edited June 9, 2011 by Hanzu

[maddogx 13]

fixed a serious memory leak caused by the new technology introduced in the latest patches

Question: what new technology? :D