random lockups

[onetrueboo]

I recently acquired Osmos via steam. I think it's a lovely game - original. I love abstract stuff like this, and radial symmetry too. The sound track is atmospheric and compliments the game perfectly.

The game runs fine on my computer, at an acceptable frame rate. Unfortunately I'm getting these random lockups while playing. It completely freezes my computer, to the point where I have to power cycle it - even ctrl+alt+del (to bring up task manager) does not work. I have been able to complete a handful of levels, but the the freeze-ups are so annoying I've quit playing the game

I've a Win XP box (Athlon 64 '3200+' processor), and an older GeForce (nvidia) 6600 graphics card. I downloaded the latest drivers from nvidia today, and I'm still having the same problem. Any suggestions?

Thanks, Eric

[onetrueboo]

Well, I think I solved my own problem. I believe the graphics card I've got must have been overheating, as I rarely play video games but often do processor intensive tasks no problem.

I opened up the side of my desktop, vacuumed out all the dust and made certain the cheap PNY gfx card fan was working. I kept the side of the computer open and trained a small 4" fan at the GFX card/processor and the game ran fine without locking up.

Curious what sorts of computation the game is doing to cause the card to overheat, as I've played many 3D FPS w/out getting this problem.

Anyway, I can now trance out to this game, at least if I keep things cool..

[lordnikon]

I recently suffered a similar experience (although not with Osmos), where some (but not all) 3d games were causing random lock ups (eg GTA 4). At the same time, other (euqally intensive) 3d games were not (eg CoD:MW). I spent days, nay weeks, trying to locate the cause, reinstalling Windows & drivers, and eventually settled on what I thought was an overheat problem (the screen even displayed graphical artefacts, just as it would in an overheat situation), only to discover I was wrong...

It appears I had failed to install the "AMD Dual Core Optimizer" - after installing, all lock ups in all games were gone. If you still experience lock ups, it might be worth checking you have this. Afraid I cant find a direct link, and im at work atm so its not in my browser history here, but I believe the latest version was 1.4.1. This may be a red-herring, but someting to consider, although I would do some research if you're using a 64-bit OS as it may not be needed/may even cause more problems.

[jeffplum]

@lordnikon: this is interesting. When I had similar problems in GTA:SA I used to load the game, alt-tab to desktop, bring up task manager, right-click GTA:SA and "set affinity" to CPU 0 (by unticking CPU 1) and this solved the problem for me. Sounds as though what you're suggesting is a better fix that this!

[Meal Worms]

Yes, when you computer randomly locks up or BSOD, 9 times out of 10 it's an overheating issue. Glad to hear everything's sorted, onetrueboo!

Thanks for the praise, gang, and for your comments. Really glad to hear you're enjoying the game!

Happy Osmoting,
Dave