Winxp and ofp, the ultimate clash =(

[Insthink 0]

Ive been browsing through the forums, used search feature.  I could only find reports of problems similar to mine, but no fixes to those reports.

Here is my system specs firstly

AMD Tbird 1.33ghz 266fsb

EPoX 8k7a motherboard (yeah a VIA mobo)

Asus Gforce3 Deluxe

2 x 256 DDR Crucial

60g Maxtor HDD

SB Live! Value

Windows XP pro

Now, I used to not play a lot of OFP before because online just sucked, but after a few months of playing Day of Defeat, Ive went back to OFP for fun and well, wow, lagless gaming online! WOW I love it again =P

But a problem has been haunting me, ruining my pleasure, the crash to desktop problem, also the reboot one.

My first reaction to this was, format. My computer needed it, so I formated everything, installed the VIA 4in1 drivers for XP, installed all lastest drivers for sound card and video card

and well, still the same problem.

The only temp fix ive found was going back to the basic native windows drivers for my video card, technicly, the ones Windows XP installs by default for Gforce3 cards. The tips given on the official Trouble Shooting forum didnt work, like reducing my AGP rate to 1x/2x

The frame rate is less stable than nuclear jello, Direct 3D HW &TL or just Direct 3D.  I prefered the newer Nvidia drivers, but they crash randomly in every game.  The native drivers almost never crashes, but still do after a long period of time.

My system is flawless, its perfect to the very last wire, ok, I know Windows XP is quite the party crasher, but I need it.  All my other games running on Direct 3d or OpenGL run flawlessly at capped FPS with my demand of to the graphic card than you can imagine (Considering I run the lastest Nvidia Drivers, which I can't)

So here is my question to you fellow OFP Troubleshooting junkies =P  What is your suggested fix?

EDIT : While im at it, any fix for the poping screetching noise created by vehicles with SB live! other than going to 3rd person than back? The server I play on doesnt allow 3rd person view.

[Mister Frag 0]

Try downloading NVMax and the Detonator V23.11 drivers, and enabling the AMD-specific fixes in the System tab of NVMax.

[Hilandor 1]

not sure what u could do pal =[[ i have xp too and cant say ive had any problem what so ever with ofp on it (well one but i think its graphics card related not xp)

i did find tho with xp to stay well away from the critical updates etc there more hassle than their worth

[ALDEGA 0]

Ermm, I think it's better he dowloads the 28.32. These don't have the infinite loop problem. (and nvmax's fix isn't failsafe).

[joltan 0]

I'd recommend to install the latest updates for XP and OFP. The XP updates also contain a new driver for your NVidia card (besides the load of security updates that you really should install anyway). Never had any problems with the updates, all to the contrary. But then I don't have to use a slow modem connection to download them.

The game has obviously a high cpu load independently of the graphics adapter used. There's just so much more to ofp then the 3d graphics. Try stopping programs running in the background and use a tool like NVmax or other NVidia teak utilities (there are better ones than NVmax).

OFP runs very smoothly on my XP professional (Athlon XP1700+, GForce 2 Ti, Gigabyte VIA266A-motherboard, 1 GB ddr ram), usually playing in HW T&L mode, with antivirus software, personal firewall and internet connection running all the time in the background. I never had the system crash because of ofp, only a few crashes to the desktop when editing missions (give ofp a weaponname it doesn't know and it will crash faster than you can say "sh*t!").

[Satchel 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (ALDEGA @ April 08 2002,12:23)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Ermm, I think it's better he dowloads the 28.32. These don't have the infinite loop problem. (and nvmax's fix isn't failsafe).<span id='postcolor'>

I´ve just had a series of infinite loops with 28.32 when playing videos,

by checking the .wdl file(s) in WinXP´s Windows\Logfiles\Watchdog directory the bugger was quickly found.

A reinstall of the 28.32 cured this however, therefore i guess an application invalidated my Detonator installation, or files became corruptet, as it was the display driver ending in an IL.

Insthink,

the first thing you should do is to check the .wdl files in your Windows\Logfiles\Watchdog directory, this usually provides the fastest solution of the problem, as in the .wdl the cause for the crash is listed.

[Satchel 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Insthink @ April 08 2002,05:58)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">EDIT : While im at it, any fix for the poping screetching noise created by vehicles with SB live! other than going to 3rd person than back? The server I play on doesnt allow 3rd person view.<span id='postcolor'>

Simple answer: NO, there isn´t, and you´re not alone with this problem. It only occurs with an SBLive card and WinXP afaik.

If you want a good gaming system WinXP is certainly the worst choice, Win98SE and ME are both better suited for gaming purposes- without having such an assload of problems WinXP comes with, regarding gaming software.

[Insthink 0]

well Ive tried 23.11 and 28.32 drivers for the second time each and both failed to work properly, only the native windows drivers, and even them sometimes crash.

I think ill just install Win98 on my computer and run it instead of WinXP when I want to play.

Do you guys know how to make Win98 work as a second OS option along with WinXP? Like when I boot the computer, it asks me if I want 98 or XP? I only have one partition btw, so I dont know how 98 runs in NTSF HDD format

[ALDEGA 0]

Win9x can't run on an NTFS partition. You need two partitions. 1 FAT32 and 1 NTFS. You can use dualboot to have both win9x, xp on the same system.

[Insthink 0]

Well I formated my comp, went back to Fat32 partition, installed my old win98se. Installed via 4in1 drivers, installed 28.32 nvidia, installed lastest sound drivers, installed critical windows patches, installed OFP

I still crash, this time it just freezes, doesnt reboot not go back to desktop.. only crashes with sound in a loop!

WTF! IM PISSED! =(((((((((((( this never used to happen when I played 4 months ago on the same computer =(