Lockup Crash with Black Screen

[Jacobin]

<p><strong>Description of the Problem</strong>: During Gameplay in multiple zones and at completly random times I will get a full black screen, sound will go on for a few more minutes then it will start to skip and the computer completly locks up.  Only a reset button press will get me anywhere at that point. <p><strong>System Information</strong>: Both files seems to be too large. I will post the needed parts in the next post.</p><strong>Crash Log Information</strong>: No Crash Log files ever created with this issue.</p><p><strong>Steps taken to attempt to clear the problem.</strong></p><p>Reloaded Clean Video Drivers</p><p>Reloaded Clean Sound Drivers</p><p>Updated Bios on Video card and MB</p><p>Full Clean Boot. (no services/programs other then what was needed to get me on the internet and play the game)</p><p>Tried all settings in EQ2, All Quality modes, Windowed/Full Screen, Sound options.</p><p>I have attacked this issue as a driver and conflicting software issue, Then tried conflicting hardware issue. This issue is so random that some days I can play all day a never see it. Other days, I can go maybe 10 mins till it blacks out.</p><p>at first I thought it was only certian zones, now almost every zone has an issue.</p><p>Any more suggestions?</p>

[Jacobin]

<p>MS INFO</p><p>System Information report written at: 02/11/10 02:13:45System Name: MAINSYSTEM[System Summary]</p><p>Item Value OS Name Microsoft Windows XP Professional Version 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 Build 2600 OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation System Name MAINSYSTEM System Manufacturer INTEL_ System Model DG33TL__ System Type X86-based PC Processor x86 Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 11 GenuineIntel ~2393 Mhz BIOS Version/Date Intel Corp. DPP3510J.86A.0413.2008.0306.2218, 3/6/2008 SMBIOS Version 2.4 Windows Directory C:WINDOWS System Directory C:WINDOWSsystem32 Boot Device DeviceHarddiskVolume1 Locale United States Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "5.1.2600.5512 (xpsp.080413-2111)" User Name MAINSYSTEMScott Time Zone Eastern Standard Time Total Physical Memory 3,072.00 MB Available Physical Memory 1.50 GB Total Virtual Memory 2.00 GB Available Virtual Memory 1.95 GB Page File Space 5.80 GB Page File D:pagefile.sys </p><p>[Hardware Resources]</p><p>[Conflicts/Sharing]</p><p>Resource Device I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 PCI bus I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 Direct memory access controller   IRQ 20 Intel(R) 82566DC-2 Gigabit Network Connection IRQ 20 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 2 - 2942   I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT   I/O Port 0x00002000-0x00002FFF Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 2 - 2942 I/O Port 0x00002000-0x00002FFF PCI standard PCI-to-PCI bridge I/O Port 0x00002000-0x00002FFF ASUS Xonar DX Audio Device   IRQ 21 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2938 IRQ 21 Intel(R) ICH9R/DO/DH 4 port Serial ATA Storage Controller 1 - 2920 IRQ 21 Intel(R) ICH9 Family 2 port Serial ATA Storage Controller 2 - 2926   IRQ 23 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2934 IRQ 23 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 293A   I/O Port 0x00003000-0x00003FFF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 I/O Port 0x00003000-0x00003FFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT   IRQ 9 Microsoft ACPI-Compliant System IRQ 9 AEE81RFK IDE Controller   Memory Address 0xE0000-0xEFFFF PCI bus Memory Address 0xE0000-0xEFFFF Motherboard resources   IRQ 16 Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 IRQ 16 NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT IRQ 16 Intel(R) Management Engine Interface   IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2939 IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 293C IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 1 - 2940 IRQ 17 PCI standard PCI-to-PCI bridge IRQ 17 ASUS Xonar DX Audio Device IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 5 - 2948   Memory Address 0xD0000000-0xD2FFFFFF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 Memory Address 0xD0000000-0xD2FFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT   IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2937 IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 3 - 2944 IRQ 18 Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2936   IRQ 19 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 4 - 2946 IRQ 19 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2935 IRQ 19 OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller   Memory Address 0xC0000000-0xEFFFFFFF PCI bus Memory Address 0xC0000000-0xEFFFFFFF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 Memory Address 0xC0000000-0xEFFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT   Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF PCI bus Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT   Memory Address 0xD3100000-0xD31FFFFF Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 3 - 2944 Memory Address 0xD3100000-0xD31FFFFF Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller   I/O Port 0x00001000-0x00001FFF Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 3 - 2944 I/O Port 0x00001000-0x00001FFF Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller   I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT</p><p>[IRQs]</p><p>Resource Device Status IRQ 9 Microsoft ACPI-Compliant System OK IRQ 9 AEE81RFK IDE Controller OK IRQ 16 Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 OK IRQ 16 NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT OK IRQ 16 Intel(R) Management Engine Interface OK IRQ 20 Intel(R) 82566DC-2 Gigabit Network Connection OK IRQ 20 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 2 - 2942 OK IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2937 OK IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 3 - 2944 OK IRQ 18 Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller OK IRQ 18 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2936 OK IRQ 21 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2938 OK IRQ 21 Intel(R) ICH9R/DO/DH 4 port Serial ATA Storage Controller 1 - 2920 OK IRQ 21 Intel(R) ICH9 Family 2 port Serial ATA Storage Controller 2 - 2926 OK IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2939 OK IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 293C OK IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 1 - 2940 OK IRQ 17 PCI standard PCI-to-PCI bridge OK IRQ 17 ASUS Xonar DX Audio Device OK IRQ 17 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 5 - 2948 OK IRQ 19 Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 4 - 2946 OK IRQ 19 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2935 OK IRQ 19 OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller OK IRQ 23 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB Universal Host Controller - 2934 OK IRQ 23 Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 293A OK IRQ 8 System CMOS/real time clock OK IRQ 13 Numeric data processor OK IRQ 0 System timer OK IRQ 10 Intel(R) ICH9 Family SMBus Controller - 2930 OK IRQ 3 Communications Port (COM2) OK </p><p>[Memory]</p><p>Resource Device Status 0xA0000-0xBFFFF PCI bus OK 0xA0000-0xBFFFF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 OK 0xA0000-0xBFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT OK 0xE0000-0xEFFFF PCI bus OK 0xE0000-0xEFFFF Motherboard resources OK 0xC0000000-0xEFFFFFFF PCI bus OK 0xC0000000-0xEFFFFFFF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 OK 0xC0000000-0xEFFFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT OK 0xF8000000-0xFEAFFFFF PCI bus OK 0xD0000000-0xD2FFFFFF Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1 OK 0xD0000000-0xD2FFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT OK 0xD2000000-0xD2FFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT OK 0xD3221900-0xD322190F Intel(R) Management Engine Interface OK 0xD3200000-0xD321FFFF Intel(R) 82566DC-2 Gigabit Network Connection OK 0xD3220000-0xD3220FFF Intel(R) 82566DC-2 Gigabit Network Connection OK 0xD3221400-0xD32217FF Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 293C OK 0xD3100000-0xD31FFFFF Intel(R) ICH9 Family PCI Express Root Port 3 - 2944 OK 0xD3100000-0xD31FFFFF Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller OK 0xD3221000-0xD32213FF Intel(R) ICH9 Family USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 293A OK 0xD3000000-0xD3000FFF OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller OK 0xD3221800-0xD32218FF Intel(R) ICH9 Family SMBus Controller - 2930 OK 0xF0000000-0xF7FFFFFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFEB00000-0xFEB03FFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFED13000-0xFED13FFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFED14000-0xFED17FFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFED18000-0xFED18FFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFED19000-0xFED19FFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFED1C000-0xFED1FFFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFED20000-0xFED3FFFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFED45000-0xFED99FFF Motherboard resources OK 0xC0000-0xDFFFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFFC00000-0xFFFFFFFF Motherboard resources OK 0xFEC00000-0xFEC000FF Advanced programmable interrupt controller OK </p>

[TSR-DanielH]

<p>Greetings,</p><p>Based on your description, it sounds like this may be a heat issue.  Do you have any kind of heat monitoring software on that computer?  If so, monitor the temperatures while you're playing and report back.  Cleaning your computer vents and making sure that the fans are spinning would also be a good idea either way.</p>

[Jacobin]

<p>Thank you for the prompt reply. I did some research on the possible heat issue. As I tested and researched, I found that my CPU does run close to the "too hot" range that I would like, so I've made some modifications to that situation and the heat is no longer an issue. I was about to post tonight as It seemed to be fixed when I got the black screen crash issue right after a cold boot and only thing i did was let it load up EQ2 and it right from char log in I get black screen crash.  Temps at the time GPU 50C and CPU 60C (still a little hot for MY tastes but still well within what the CPU can handle)</p><p>I'm getting a new Heatsink/Fan combo tomorrow via UPS, so that will lower temps overall.</p><p>I'm tempted to Overhaul the OS for performance issues anyways, but every other game i play never exibits any issues and some can really heat things up, but never a crash like that.</p>

[Jacobin]

<p>Just Thought I'd post an update, New Heatsink/Fan combo in place, System is running alot cooler (a good 10-15C cooler) BUT I just got a black screen of Death in Loping plains.  </p><p>Any Further Suggestions?</p>

[TSR-DanielH]

<p>If you haven't already, I would advise running a driver cleaner program to make sure that you don't have some old driver files hanging about. </p><p>Beyond that, do you have that computer overclocked in any way?</p>

[Fedoruk]

<p>I'm having the same issues. This is not an overheating issue since my computer does not shut down w/ any other program. I also run it for hours and it is fine. It only happens when in game.</p>

[Jacobin]

<p>Well I thought I had it when i installed the new heatsink, as the problem went away for a while. but with this most recent patch it started right back up again...</p><p>No overclocking, just did a clean driver install.</p><p>My next step is install Win 7 if i cant get a fix within XP, but i wasn't planning on that for another couple months.</p><p>any more advice would be great.</p>

[Tes Mar'a]

<p>I have the same problem and if you look at the forum you will notic that a few others have posted similar problems.</p><p>And personly I can say that my tempereture if no where critecal, and I have run memtest, and hardware strees test and tride a few other more demanding games, and only EQ have this problem.</p><p>So you are not alone. But I have no idea how to fix it.</p>

[MagicWand]

<p>I am having the exact same problem as you.  I have no idea how to fix it either.  It's getting so frustrating that if it continues I will be forced to just cancel the game.  No point in paying for something that can't be played.</p><p>It's happend only when the battle ground fix on last patch occured.   Also this only happens with EQ 2.  No other games do this.</p><p>As I said this problem only started after that battlegrounds fix (not this patch that happened today) but the one before it.</p>

[Wingrider01]

<p>there are reports from MS and others on the net that the Black screen of death is caused by the interaction of various malware/rootkit and a couple of security patches that where loaded by MS recently. You might want to do a deep scan on the systems using various malware applications, including ones that are online access only</p><p>malwarebytes</p><p>trend micro house call, ther also have available hijakthis and a pretty decent rootkit scanner</p><p>Norton</p><p>avast</p><p>are a few that are pretty decent, the issue primarily shows up on boot, but it can happen in the middle of application processing. These issues are reported to affect xp, vista and 7</p>

[MagicWand]

<p><cite>Wingrider01 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>there are reports from MS and others on the net that the Black screen of death is caused by the interaction of various malware/rootkit and a couple of security patches that where loaded by MS recently. You might want to do a deep scan on the systems using various malware applications, including ones that are online access only</p><p>malwarebytes</p><p>trend micro house call, ther also have available hijakthis and a pretty decent rootkit scanner</p><p>Norton</p><p>avast</p><p>are a few that are pretty decent, the issue primarily shows up on boot, but it can happen in the middle of application processing. These issues are reported to affect xp, vista and 7</p></blockquote><p>Did this and I still have the same problem.  And to see if this happened to other MMOs I play, and it only happens to EQ2.   Hopefully this gets fixed soon.</p>

[Juice]

<p>I am having the same issue, I thought it might be a graphic card thing since others with my graphics card had the same issue, but you have a different one then me so that might rule that our unless it is with a couple Nvidia series cards.</p><p>So far I have only encountered it in DLWs and am crossing my fingers that it stays there.</p>

[TSR-DanielH]

<p>If you're using an ATI card, make sure to turn off 'catalyst AI' in the control panel since that has been known to cause strange issues like this.</p><p>Also, as a test, I'd like to see if this is related to the sound system at all.  If you're comfortable doing so, try disabling your sound hardware in the device manager temporarily.  Then try to reproduce the crash again and let us know if you're able to do so.  I wouldn't suggest this as a permanent solution, just as a way to eliminate the sound hardware as a possible cause.</p>

[mekibilis]

<p>Oh come now.  </p><p>This is a common software bug that is easy to reproduce.. at least one person in group has trouble when we go through the Ascent.</p><p>It may by Microsoft's or ATI's bug but it's a bug</p>

[TSR-JoshuaM]

<p><cite>mekibilis wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Oh come now.  </p><p>This is a common software bug that is easy to reproduce.. at least one person in group has trouble when we go through the Ascent.</p><p>It may by Microsoft's or ATI's bug but it's a bug</p></blockquote><p>Not sure exactly what bug you are referring to but I am sure that a year ago, when this thread was made and the person before you last posted, things may not have been as clear as they are now.</p>