Video Game (Cars 2) Black Screen Crashing (AMD 6670)

[FitzGerald]

All,
Help me diagnose this problem I am having with "Cars 2: The Video Game" on PC.

Configuration:
CPU: AMD Athlon II X2 250 (3.0 Ghz)
Motherboard: Asus M4A78LT-M (760G with integrated HD 3200)
Video Card: Gigabyte 6670 (1 GB, DDR3)
Video Card Drivers: Latest AMD Drivers, Catalyst 12.6
RAM: 4 GB (G.Skill Ripjaws)
OS: Windows XP SP3

One thing I'll mention is that I had an old Socket 939 nForce4+Nvidia 7300GT; when the motherboard stopped working I migrated Windows to the above configuration with a Repair Installation. I believe all the drivers were cleaned out (and I used more driver cleaners trying to troubleshoot).

This game has been problematic the whole time I've had it. Here is the current status:
Basically the game is not crashing in game, at some point after completing a race with Lightning McQueen and his friends, the game will save and screen changes from in-game into some puts up some type of splash-like graphic on black background and then enters into the next level. It is only crashing at this point. Even when it goes through it seems like there's a tic between switching into this part.

This is not predictable; my son and I can play through 5 or 6 levels and then it crashes; or we can get through 1 level and it crashes. We are playing full screen at 1280x720 resolution (actually changing resolutions doesn't seem to help).

If I use one of the tools that will look at the minidumps I get something like this:
Stop 0x0000008E: KERNEL MODE EXCEPTION NOT HANDLED (not including the arguments in the crash).

Memtest86+: 6 passes overnight, no problem
Furmark: After 7 minutes GPU temperature gets up to 58 degrees C and levels off, ran it for 15 minutes (my FPS was horrible, something like 11 FPS but I think that's expected for 1280x720 and a 6670)
CPU Temperature: It was taking off, but after a good cleaning it's not problematic anymore (maybe 60 C, prior to dust removal it was worse).

I previously was having in-game crashes:
it was throwing up a STOP 0x8E pointing at ati3duag.dll. I discovered that I hadn't completely turned off the Integrated Graphics; once turning them off in the BIOS I was able to only get crashes at the point I mentioned. It's not pointing to ati3duag.dll.

Planning on jumping on the $40 upgrade to Windows 8 and was going to do a clean install prior to that. Maybe I can live with crashes until we upgrade to Windows 8.

 

[jolancer]

couple things to try perhaps...

If your playing the game in a Non-Administrative account...
Log into an administrative account
If one is not created, just... Log out.. hold (ctrl+alt) and hit (del) twice, type "Administrator" and name and leave password blank and enter.
go to...
/control panel/folder options/view/scroll to bottom/disable "use simple file sharing"
find the directory the game usess to Save, and also usually configure...
There usually in the root /Program files/game name or production co,
saves maybe there or /my documents
to avoid complication just use the Home path of the game and save folder and right click(repeat on both if they differ) and go to...
/properties/security/advanced/add
type the User name of the limited user account... or alternativly INTERACTIVE(wildcard4allusers) in the field then hit "check names" then hit OK
then select "Full Control" on the permission box that just poped up, and hit OK
I guess is the Save States are located within that Users Documents folder you wouldnt need to change the security settings there since its allready under there full control.

I'm not familiar with that generation of ATI, if thats not one of the latest gens and if there driver releases affect them similar to Nvidias drivers... then always download and use the driver from that generation of card... example dont use a 2012 driver for a 2005 graphics card, use a driver generation from the prime age of the generation of card you using. Heres the registry setting for Hidden devices that were previously active in devicemanager( start/run: devmgmt.msc)
Regedit= start/run: regedit
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\Session Manager\Environment]
"devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices"="1"
(note: thats a new "string value")
after you input that, you can go to devicemanager and go to
/view/hidden devices
once thats on you can manually right click and uninstall all the /Display adapters, and install the proper one.

If that doesn't fix it, my bust guess is the fact you transfered your windows installation over to a different motherboard without doing a clean format/install... i'm sorry but thats pritty much like a transgender computer now LoL

 

[FitzGerald]

jolancer,
Thanks for the response.

My son and I were playing last weekend and we actually had an in-game crash; so much for the theory I had gotten around it.

The error that showed up was: PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA.

Given that my memory passed Memtest86+ overnight (not sure if I need to diagnose each RAM separately); I am suspecting a dying, or fragmented hard drive. Its about 6 years old.

I turned off the Page File in Windows XP. I was able to play the game for about an hour last night without problem. I'll have my son try to play it today while I'm at work and see if he can induce crashes.

I've already backed up all the data from this hard-drive... and at some point plan on replacing it.

 

[FitzGerald]

Nearly year plus update. We've continued to have problems with this game crashing. I upgraded to Windows 8 ~ 2 weeks ago and the problems have continued. The error log has a message about unable to access a specific location. Even "running as administrator" doesn't help.

I've also had problems with the game and my controller. The right analog stick is not working properly for one axis. I've installed X360ce but this game doesn't support it out of the box and may require further time to configure.

 

[Ketchup]

PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA can refer to a lot of things, but maybe we can narrow it down. Do you get this error at any other time? Do you play any games on this computer where you do not see this error?

Here is what Microsoft says about the error:

This Stop message occurs when requested data is not found in memory. The system generates a fault, which normally indicates that the system looks for data in the paging file. In this circumstance, however, the missing data is identified as being located within an area of memory that cannot be paged out to disk. The system faults, but cannot find, the data and is unable to recover. Faulty hardware, a buggy system service, antivirus software, and a corrupted NTFS volume can all generate this type of error.

 

[denis280]

One thing I'll mention is that I had an old Socket 939 nForce4+Nvidia 7300GT; when the motherboard stopped working I migrated Windows to the above configuration with a Repair Installation. I believe all the drivers were cleaned out (and I used more driver cleaners trying to troubleshoot).

you should have done a fresh install.

 

[FitzGerald]

I'm convinced its a defective port for Windows. This was a clean Windows 8 install from Windows XP as well. It crashes in the same manner, it appears the game is saving between levels and then *crash* (although not every time).

There are 2 faults in the event log:

Faulting application name: Game-Cars.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x00000000
Faulting module name: Game-Cars.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x00000000
Exception code: 0xc000001d
Fault offset: 0x01556dfd
Faulting process id: 0xbf0
Faulting application start time: 0x01ce866aa0f45dbd
Faulting application path: D:\INSTALL\WINDOWS8\CARS2\Game-Cars.exe
Faulting module path: D:\INSTALL\WINDOWS8\CARS2\Game-Cars.exe
Report Id: dfb76a3e-f25d-11e2-be6d-f46d0439b074

and then:

Windows cannot access the file for one of the following reasons: there is a problem with the network connection, the disk that the file is stored on, or the storage drivers installed on this computer; or the disk is missing. Windows closed the program Game Application because of this error.

Program: Game Application
File:

The error value is listed in the Additional Data section.
User Action
1. Open the file again. This situation might be a temporary problem that corrects itself when the program runs again.
2. If the file still cannot be accessed and
- It is on the network, your network administrator should verify that there is not a problem with the network and that the server can be contacted.
- It is on a removable disk, for example, a floppy disk or CD-ROM, verify that the disk is fully inserted into the computer.
3. Check and repair the file system by running CHKDSK. To run CHKDSK, click Start, click Run, type CMD, and then click OK. At the command prompt, type CHKDSK /F, and then press ENTER.

 

[Ketchup]

Yeah, I was thinking of a game bug as well. Does the game come with anything like a "check for updates"?

To be sure, you aren't disabling your page file, are you?

 

[Carlos Murphy]

best way to play is running it with administrative rights right click mouse on game exe and run as administrator play next on missions and if black screen press CTRL+ALT+DELETE sign out and it will reset sign in and play with the same intructions above it sucks to replay over and over but it works and you can continue your save game just press next on each mission

 

[Carlos Murphy]

I found a way to stop crash go to game properties check run as admin check compability on windows xp(service pack 3) and last but important go to windows firewall and add cars 2 game exe both checkmarks on private and public restart with all this settings and play game without crashes

 

[LTC8K6]

I think after 5 years, they are good to go...

 

[Daremig]

Hi,
I ran into the same problem on windows 7/10 but the cure is not really the one described above. I troubleshoot briefly the game after crash and in fact it has a threading issue.

The fix is simply to force the affinity of the game executable to CPU 0 only. Could set by the task monitor or through command line but in this case double check you have admin rights or it won’t work at all.
I was able to play 4 hours in a row without any black screen. On 2 different machine where the issues was...
katchawwww....

 

[Fanatical Meat]

WTF do that many people play cars 2 on super dated hardware?