System Crashes in Battlefield 2 and America's Army

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daines1

Junior Member
Jul 26, 2005
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Thanks all for even more info. I'm gonna try the Creative fix tonight if I can make time. Really want to enjoy the game to the fullest.

Good luck all,

daines1
 

Brillman

Junior Member
Aug 17, 2005
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I also did a fresh reinstall of my soundcard drivers to the BETA Audigy2 Drivers with OpenAL support. I'm still tinkering with the sound options ingame though... I'm currently running SOFTWARE, LOW, and EAX UNCHECKED
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
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I'm having a similar problem; I'll go to play Multiplayer in BF2, it'll load fine, I'll get in and within 5 seconds to 5min, my system will crash and reboot. After windows reboots I get a videocard driver error thing. The weird thing is that I can play single-player fine. I've tried adjusting the options in the game as suggested here (thought it might've been the creative card at first causing it) and it keeps happening. All of my other games work, except BF2. Any suggestions?
-Muerta
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
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Got it to work; ended up having to do a manual uninstall because something got tweaked in the registry when I updated the creative drivers. Thanks for the tip!
-Muerta
 

JayhaVVKU

Senior member
Apr 28, 2003
318
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I've done all that was posted above in the crative fix(uninstalled drivers and put on the beta drivers), replacing the .dll file, and turning settings to software, low, and no eax. While it has definately helped and it takes much longer to crash, the game will play about 10 minutes before biting the dust.

What the heck is the deal?

Athlon XP 3000+
Geforce 6800 (unlocked)
Audigy 2 Platinum
Epox NForce 2 MOBO
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
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Just out of curiousity, when you installed the drivers, were you running any background apps? Also, when it crashes do you get a fatal system error or do you get kicked to the desktop?
 

JayhaVVKU

Senior member
Apr 28, 2003
318
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I just get kicked directly to the desktop, do not pass go, do not collect $200. I've tried 2 or 3 different creative drivers with no success today.

I had basically everything closed. I'm running on a freshly formatted drive so there is a bare minimum of apps running.
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
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Hmm... I encountered the "fatal system error". This is what worked for me, but no guarantees; read through this first to decide if you want to do it or not.

I just did a manual uninstall.
To do that, go into the Task Manager and close all of the programs that are running under your user name except explorer.exe and taskmgr.exe. Then delete the Battlefield 2 folder from both the My Documents and EA Games folder within the Program Files folder (shift+del or into Recycle Bin, empty recycle bin). Then, go into the regestry (make a backup) and find and delete the following:

1. Click the plus sign next to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE.
2. Click the plus sign next to Software.
3. Click the plus sign next to DICE.
4. Right-click on the Battlefield 2 folder and choose Delete.
5. Click the plus sign next to Electronic Arts.
6. Right-click and choose Delete on any Battlefield 2 folders.
7. Click the plus sign next to Microsoft.
8. Click the plus sign next to Windows.
9. Click the plus sign next to CurrentVersion.
10. Click the plus sign next to Uninstall.
11. Right-click and choose Delete on the key named {04858915-9F49-4B2A-AED4-DC49A7DE6A7B}.
12. Close the Registry Editor.

Once you've done this, go to run and type temp; this should bring up the "Temporary Files" folder. Delete all of the contents contained within it (NOTE: If you have any saved passwords from Mozilla or IE or any other program that saves temp files, they will be removed!). Next, go to C:\Documents and Settings\"Insert login name here"\Local Settings\Temp and delete all of the files within that folder as well.

Then, just re-install bf2 and the patch and hopefully that will cure the problem.

Hope this works,
-Muerta
 

JayhaVVKU

Senior member
Apr 28, 2003
318
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Since this is a brand new install of BF2(tried it a couple times) on a fresh format drive, don't think this will help.

I even uninstalled my creative drivers and tried playing the game with no sound, and I still get booted after a few minutes of play. This doesn't happen on CS:Source, FEAR demo, Doom 3, etc. I can't imagine what the problem is other than shoddy programming.

If I get the energy I may open the system and start playing with different RAM configs, but I've run memcheck for a few hours with no problems so I'm about out of ideas.
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
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Yeah,
I agree with you totally. EA did a piss poor job of programming and they should've delayed the release (again) until they had it right. In regards to your fresh install, I just finished building my tower and had this problem, so you never know; works fine on the old one. Anyway, best of luck to you man.
-Muerta
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
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Turns out it was only a temporary fix. I still have the problem, but it's not as close together. I can play for about 10-30min now per crash. I really hate EA now. Guess it's back to more bf1942.
-Muerta
 

HomeyFoos

Senior member
Aug 22, 2005
211
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Ok guys, this is a long one so forgive me...first, system stats.

Abit IS7-V Motherboard w/ onboard sound/Abit VT-7 w/ onboard sound (tried both)
Intel P4 3.0 ghz Prescott 1gig L2 Cache, 800mhz FSB
512 megs of PC 3200 ram (eventually upgraded to 1 gig during this process)
NVidia GeForce FX 5700LE w/ 256megs (tried 4 different cards)
Linksys Wireless G USB Adapter 2.4ghz (although when I was playing BFV, it was a Netgear PCI wireless B adapter)
Iomega External CDR/DVD Rom USB (tried using an old internal CDRW - same result)

Now, on to my odessy...

I Purchased Battlefield 2 the day before it came out in retail outlets. Due to some shipping error, Walmart released it on the 21st of June instead of the 22nd. Atleast that's what the guy at the store said. Anyway, I've had this game since day one.

The game ran fine for about a month. No problems. I went through 1.01 without incident. Got to 1.02 and things seemed fine. However, a few days passed and I started having troubles. I could launch the game, log in, find a server, join a server, and actually start playing. 10 seconds into the game, however, and my screen would freeze up for a sec and then my entire computer would reboot. The funny thing is, this is the EXACT same problem I had with Battlefield: Vietnam. However, I was able to play that game for months before this started happening.

Here is what I have done to troubleshoot this issue...

Round 1:

Performed F-Disk on the hard drive and reinstalled windows
Reinstalled the game atleast 3 times to test out all 3 versions of the it (release, patch 1.01 and 1.02)
Tested 3 versions of video drivers (the driver from the CD, the driver from NVIDIA, and the upcoming driver for NVIDIA 77.77)
Tested 2 versions of Audio Drivers
Swapped out the power supply, the ram, the video card (exact same model), the sound card
Reduced the internal temperature of the computer by some 60 degrees by adding a copper core heat-sink, thermal paste, and exhaust fans
Updated the Bios
Cleaned the registry (even though windows had JUST been installed)
cleaned up temp files in C:\

After doing this, I contacted EA 'Support'. They suggested that I uncheck the 'Automatically Restart' in System Failure. Did that. Instead of a pure reboot, it would blue-screen and give me a hex-address of where the problem was (if anyone wants to see it, I have it saved). They then told me to close all user apps in Taks Manager. Did that. Same deal. Then, turn down my sound accelleration. Did that. Nothing. Delete my BF2 folder from 'My documents'. Did that. More nothing. After that, I was told to do what Muerta de Poly suggested at the end of page 3. Removing the game manually. Reinstalled, no dice. Then, they wanted me to try it in windowed mode. Same old story. When that didn't work, they tried to send me to the NVIDIA site for new drivers. Having done this a million times, I got pissed and told them to go screw themselves. That was August 11th.

Since then, I have put an Antec 500w power supply in, another 512 of PC3200 ram, and changed the motherboard and processor. I thought surely the mobo/processor would fix it. Nope. I have decided, there is NOTHING wrong with my system. It is this game. I have tried EVERYTHING I know to do, and some stuff I had to learn about. I have tweaked the bios settings (AGP aperature, 8x/4x, disabled fast writes, etc.) Re-Reinstalled windows (4 times now), messed with the sound settings in-game (softwre, low, no eax), tried 4 different graphic cards (NVIDIA FX5700LE, ATI 9200 (PCI and AGP), ATI 9250 (AGP), and a 9600 Pro), and nothing has worked.

I implore anyone reading this. DO NOT spend any money on new parts. This is not a hardware issue. There is something wrong with the coding of this game. Some combinations of parts work, some don't. I have spent some $300 upgrading my system in hopes of making this game work (new mobo, nice psu, more ram, sweet heatsink, fans) and I am still SOL. And worst of all, EA is ABSOLUTELY USELESS!!! It reminds me of when I played SWG and those damn monkeys would not lift a finger to fix all the problems with that game.

I hate to preach doom and gloom, but I have had no luck in getting this game to run for more than 5 mins in the last month. I'm hoping 1.03 will fix this but I am not holding my breath.

I would be open to any suggestions, but I feel I have done about everything.





HomeyFoo
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
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Yeah,
I've come to the same conclusion. Just out of curiousity, on your "blue screen of death" did you get STOP CODE 0x0000008E? This is the STOP CODE that I get.
-Muerta
 

HomeyFoos

Senior member
Aug 22, 2005
211
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You know it...here is the message...I transcribed it on another computer while the bluescreen was up...



a problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent damage to you computer.

If this is the first time you've seen this stop error screen, restart your computer. if this screen appears again, follow these steps:

Check to be sure you have adequate disk space. if a driver is identified in the stop message, disable the driver or check with the manufacturer for driver updates. Trhy changing video adapters.

Check with you hardware vendor for any BIOS updates. Disable BIOS memory options such as caching or shadowing. If you need to use safe mode to remove or disable components, restart your computer, press F8 to select advanced startup options, and then select safe mode.

Technical information:

*** Stop:0x0000008e (0xc0000005, 0xb283001a, 0xb26ae5e8, 0x00000000)
*** vm67kr9p - address b283001a base at b282e000, datestamp 42e15f8b

Beginning dump of physical memory
physical memory dump complete.
contact your system administrator or technical support group for further assistance.



This is the windows error that was generated when the machine rebooted from the bluescreen. It seems to be the same error message that pops up each time this occurs. Just so you know, I have used a different Video Card of the exact same make and model and had the same result.

BCCode : 1000008e BCP1 : C0000005 BCP2 : B283001A BCP3 : B26AE5E8
BCP4 : 00000000 OSVer : 5_1_2600 SP : 2_0 Product : 256_1

C:\DOCUME~1\homey\LOCALS~1\Temp\WERc8e9.dir00\Mini080905-01.dmp
C:\DOCUME~1\homey\LOCALS~1\Temp\WERc8e9.dir00\sysdata.xml


You have no idea how liberating it is to hear that someone else is having the same problem. For a month, I thought it was my hardware. Heat, failing parts, video card, drivers, etc. It is VERY disappointing to reach this conclusion, but at the same time I feel like I've been vindicated somehow...I can't explain it...

Today I am going to exchange my new ABIT Mobo (VT-7 - there is a factory defect incase anyone was wondering, the IDE 1 Channel has an issue with the way the pins are set. The cable will not plug into the socket because the last 2 pins are a space-and-a-half apart instead of space) for an ASUS P4s800DX. I witnessed the game running on that mobo for a period of time and since I'm going to take this board back anyway, I thought I'd give it a try...

Good luck to everyone and I will keep checking with this thread to see if there are any developments...





HomeyFoos
 

JayhaVVKU

Senior member
Apr 28, 2003
318
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You know, I think I am in almost the same boat. I don't think I'm having the exact same issue but I know when I first got the game(1.0) it worked fine. However I decided to upgrade to a 6800 since my old 9800 was running the game slowly. I got patch 1.02 and it worked fine with my card for maybe a week or two, then crashes started happening and now I can barely even run the game without it crashing back to the desktop.

I feel like I've wasted $50(but it's an EA game, so it's always a waste of $50) and put way more time in diagnosing this problem than it's worth. I was about to buy some new ram but after reading Homey's post I think that will be put on the backburner.

Let's keep this thread updated, I can't believe we are the only people having problems with this.
 

laerz

Member
Aug 5, 2005
42
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You're not alone Jayha and Homey. I was playing BF2 since day 1 perfectly until I swapped my mobo and video card w/ the one that evga.com was offering (nForce4 SLI + 7800GTX). Well now I can't even play 5 minutes without the damn program freezing on me. I really liked the game when it was working, but this is ridiculous. EA or DICE needs to fix this.
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
0
0
Yeah,
I know. I was reading through the Windows Support database and this seems to be a problem with some other games and windows updates (link). I have the same issue that you all described. I was able to play fine with v1.0, but when I updated to 1.02 that's when my problems started as well. It's frustrating that EA would put such a shoddy piece of code out. It's ironic too, since they've bundled BF2 with a number of nVidea cards. I'm tired of companies releasing software before it should be; if it doesn't work right and there are issues, don't release it. It's as simple as that. Anyway, off of the soap box,
-Muerta
 

HomeyFoos

Senior member
Aug 22, 2005
211
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Well, I think I have fixed my problem. Temporarily, anyway.

Today I exchanged my ABIT VT-7 for an ASUS P4S800D-X. It runs an SiS chipset and I've heard on some other threads that the VIA chipset was problematic. I also heard that the problem was being caused by a cookie. So, what it instructed me to do was run daemon tools and go to gamecopyworld and download the MDS file. Mount the file and run from there instead of using the CD. The guys who did the mds file say the mounting somehow helped. The catch, however, is that you are supposed to get a new product code and start a new account for the game. I did both of these things and I was able to play for an hour today (I stopped playing the game didn't reboot my machine). I haven't gotten more than 5 mins in the last month. I reinstalled windows and used the new product key and everything seemed normal.

What I did to get a new product code was take my game back to where I bought it (Walmart) and exchanged it for a new one.

I don't know if this will work for long or for everyone. But for now, i'm playing. I'll post back in the next day or so to update my 'progress'




HomeyFoos
 

Brillman

Junior Member
Aug 17, 2005
10
0
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In case this might help shed some light as to hardware conclusions, my final post regarding my freezing problem... the "Creative Audigy 2" fix that I posted about earlier worked for me with this config:

AMD64 3000 (socket 754)
Abit K8V Pro (VIA chipset)
1GB Corsair PC3200 CMX (2x512)
Sapphire ATi X800 Pro (currently using Catalyst 5.8 drivers)
Audigy2 OEM (non-value series) (currently running the OpenAL BETA Drivers released 5-19-05)
470W PC Power and Cooling PSU
DLink DL-520 802.11b Wireless PCI
Windows XP SP2

Hopefully this helps someone somewhere. :)
 

JayhaVVKU

Senior member
Apr 28, 2003
318
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Originally posted by: HomeyFoos
Well, I think I have fixed my problem. Temporarily, anyway.

Today I exchanged my ABIT VT-7 for an ASUS P4S800D-X. It runs an SiS chipset and I've heard on some other threads that the VIA chipset was problematic. I also heard that the problem was being caused by a cookie. So, what it instructed me to do was run daemon tools and go to gamecopyworld and download the MDS file. Mount the file and run from there instead of using the CD. The guys who did the mds file say the mounting somehow helped. The catch, however, is that you are supposed to get a new product code and start a new account for the game. I did both of these things and I was able to play for an hour today (I stopped playing the game didn't reboot my machine). I haven't gotten more than 5 mins in the last month. I reinstalled windows and used the new product key and everything seemed normal.

What I did to get a new product code was take my game back to where I bought it (Walmart) and exchanged it for a new one.

I don't know if this will work for long or for everyone. But for now, i'm playing. I'll post back in the next day or so to update my 'progress'




HomeyFoos

Very weird, keep us up to date on the progress. I'm running an NForce2 mobo though, so the VIA problem isn't applicable.
 

Brillman

Junior Member
Aug 17, 2005
10
0
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Well... I thought my prob was fixed, but apparently not. I was able to play longer for some reason, but in the end it still eventually locked up on me. Sorry to get anyone's hopes up. I bought the new Creative X-Fi Platinum card today for two reasons: to cure my lock-ups and this card will rock. If it locks up with this card, I'll know it's not my soundcard because BF2 was made in such a way to take advantage of this card. Here's to no lock ups!!
 

laerz

Member
Aug 5, 2005
42
0
0
I finally gave up trying to fix the problem by updating the drivers, so instead I reinstalled Windows. However, since I had a copy of Win x64 lying around I decided to give it a shot. Aside from not being able to print anything (since Canon doesn't have drivers for Win x64 yet) it appears that the new version has cured my freezing problem. It's been 2 days since I've installed x64 and there's been no freezes. I know most of you guys won't install Win x64 because of the lack of driver support, but it might worth a try if you REALLY want to play BF2 that bad.
 

Muerta de Poly

Junior Member
Feb 26, 2005
24
0
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Just as an FYI, I did a total reinstall of Windows (32bit) and didn't update the creative or videocard drivers from the ones that came with the cards and BF2 has worked fine so far; I haven't had any critical system errors as of yet and I've been playing for about an hour and a half; gotta hit the hay for work though. I'll try again tomorrow evening and see what happens and post back. I'll just wait to update the drivers after a few patches are released by EA. No biggie anyway as none of the new drivers updated or fixed anything of great necessity (for my config; if you have SLI, this might not work well). Anyway, just thought I'd throw this out as well so you don't have to shell out for WinXP64 just yet. Hope this helps and hope you all get this to work,
-Muerta
 

Brillman

Junior Member
Aug 17, 2005
10
0
0
I played for 2 hours last night with my new sound card (Creative X-Fi Platinum) without any freezes... hopefully this means it's fixed.