BF2 suddenly crashing - have this problem?

[TheNiceGuy]

As of today, I am able to get on a server for about 30 seconds and then it crashes. Any idea what's happening?
PS- never had this problem in the 5 years Ive been playing.

 

[GullyFoyle]

Punkbuster update?
Disk errors?
Virus?
Bad video driver update?

Got any more info? I suppose this is a crash to desktop? Any messages in your system logs? When was the last time you played successfully (did you just reinstall or anything)?

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Thanks Gully
I played 2 days ago no problem. Play it often.
I have not updated anything, or seen anything update, on my PC, for weeks maybe.
It crashes to desktop fast. I get no messages, etc. I can fiddle around on the account server menues no problem, but soon after connecting to a game it will crash. I tried 3 different servers many times.
System logs? What do you mean?

 

[GullyFoyle]

I think this is how you view the Windows system logs in Vista: Left click Start Button (Windows Logo) ---> Left click Control Panel ---> Double left click Administrative Tools ---> Double left click Event Viewer ---> Left click Windows Logs in the left-side window pane --->

Check out the different event log categories and see if there are any events about the time BF2 crashed.

I was wondering if Punkbuster released an update and that's why it suddenly started. Can you try updating Punkbuster manually, with PBSetup (Google it, if necessary)?

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Thanks Gully
I just checked Anandtec now.
Two days ago I did a disk scan for errors in Vista. Not sure the results, as when I came back it was finished and in desktop again. I tried the game again yesterday - no problems.
So not sure why it was crashing.

As a side, on some servers I can join and play a whole game, but get kicked when the next map loads, with a "different version" error, despite having the same version.
Also, occasionaly my chat text will come out as gibberish on the screen. And then after a few hours it may return to normal. Is this a language error? I have both English and Japanese installed for Vista.

Thank you for your help! And I will try that log check the next time I get an issue!

 

[GullyFoyle]

I'm glad you have things working again.

I know it is common to get a "modified content" error when switching maps in BF2 if your PC is faster than the server at switching maps. Maybe this is the cause of your "different version" error too? It sounds similar...

I have several languages installed on my machine at work. The key combination ALT-Shift cycles the keyboard through the different languages. This could definately cause issues with BF2, where key combinations like Alt-Shift could be common occurance.

 

[minmaster]

maybe your installation got corrupt?

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Thanks again Gully, I think you solved my 2 issues!
I thought the language issue may be from hotkeys, when I stopped to think about it this week. Nice to know the solution!