BAH!

[Arakasi]

WTF, I can't play more than 30min without crashing to desktop. It makes no sense, my computer is brand spankin new, like 2 weeks old, though it runs fine on my buddy's Falcon. Is anyone else having similar problems? Any suggested fixes besides the idiotic nonsense that they post up on the "support" site?

[coyoteblack]

need more info. what is you memory/vid card? did you install direct x after you vid drivers if so re install vid/sound drivers? also check for virus/trojon/adaware on pc.

[Slyy Daugg]

I'm running EQ 2 on a 1.6mhz pentium3, 512 RAM, ATI 9800 pro, and in low population areas I can actually crank up the res. In high-pop zones, with everything turned down, it's still a little painful, but totally playable.

In the last few weeks of playing, I have had not a single crash to desktop, linkdead, nothing. Stability and consistency in performance has been the most I could ask for given the system I'm running this monster on.

:blink

SD

[Bayler]

The game seems to suffer from a memory leak or memory fragmentation. It gets worse mostly around lots of player models. Performace basicly degrades the longer you play. Symptoms include "hitching" when moving near a lot of players - particularly when rotating; and longer than normal zone times - particularly in city zones.

If this sounds like the problem you're having, you might try getting more RAM for your system. (I have 1MB and have to reboot every few hours.) And the basics: make sure nothing else non-essential is running, etc. And if you find your performance is degrading too much, tell your group you need a break to reboot - odds are some of them need to do it too.

[Arakasi]

Operating System: Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition with Service Pack 2
Power Supply: Alienware® 480 Watt Power Supply
Processor: AMD Athlon™ 64 3500+ Processor with HyperTransport Technology
Motherboard: ABIT AV8 - VIA K8T800 Pro Motherboard
Memory: 1GB Extreme Dual Channel DDR PC-3200 SDRAM at 400MHz - 2 x 512MB
Video Card: NVIDIA® GeForce™ 6800 Ultra 256MB DDR3 w/Digital and S-Video Out
Video Cooling: AlienIce™ Video Cooling System - Astral Blue
System Drive: Extreme Performance - Serial ATA RAID 0 - 160GB (80GB x 2) Seagate® Barracuda 7,200 RPM w/16MB Cache
Sound Card: Creative Sound Blaster® Audigy® 2 ZS High Definition 7.1 Surround Firewire (IEEE® 1394)
Network Connection: High Speed Gigabit Ethernet

Here's the pertinent information. Like I said, it's a brand new Alienware. I also run 2 spyware programs, a registry mechanic, Norton Internet Security (includes firewall, virus scan, etc.) and have run them all last night as well as defragged the system. Sony has mentioned that they've been having some problems with the GeForce 6800 GT/Ultra cards, and I'm guessing that that may be what it is. Also, I installed directx 9.0c before my video drivers, but then I reinstalled the drivers that SOE supported after uninstalling the previous driver. I've gone down every route that they've suggested, my drivers are not only up to date, but are the one's they said they support (and yes, I tried the more recent one's as well), it's definately not my video card overheating like they suggested, I doubt it's an overclocking problem as I haven't overclocked it myself and I don't think Alienware does that when manufacturing, I can't think of anything else to try.

And no, I'm not really having any "hitching" problems, I just can't play the game for longer than 30min max without the game crashing to the desktop. Other than that performance is fine (though I've noticed some graphical anomalies that have occurred, particularly with the bloom lighting effect, though I'm not sure if it's related to the game itself or the video card or the support of the former to the latter), except for the usual performance issues with the highly populated areas that everyone seems to be having.

[Farvel]

Up until today, I've had rocksteady performance from EQ2 for hours at a time. I started to have the same problems when I logged on today---15-30 minutes of gameplay, then a sudden crash to the desktop without any warning. I'm using a Radeon 9800 here, 1GB of ram, and no non-essential tasks running in the background. Maybe the last patch has a bug in it.

[Arakasi]

It's quite possible, some people were saying that they were experiencing this problem after a certain patch, however my buddy's Falcon seems to run perfectly fine, no crashes yet and he's current with the patches. He's using an Intel based system, not AMD, and I believe a GeForce 6800 GT instead of the Ultra, (can't remember what vid card actually, but I know it's not a Radeon) and he's running fine. I don't think it's the Intel base, though as people with Intel based systems were also experiencing similar problems, plus he has like 3 firewalls and 4 spyware programs running at the same time as well. No clue what the actual problem is. I can't figure it out for the life of me.

The only thing I can think of is that possibly he's running Direct X 9.0b instead of 9.0c, but even that is doubtful, can't recall what version of directx he has.

[Peebs]

Do you have some sort of temperature monitor you can run on your processor while playing? I've had periodic CTDs but since I've turned my CPU fan's RPMs up I haven't crashed. This could all just be coincidence though, or they may have discreetly fixed my problem in a recent patch.

[coyoteblack]

off the top of my head I would say your vid card. ultras have issues. also trygoing into options and vireo performance and going the more performance friendly options. if it still fails could be all those spyware/filrwalls going and when the game access your system you are failing. can you "allow" eq2 and the launchpad exe's through?

[Dionaea]

I think Coyote is right with the Nvidia Ultra video cards having some minor issues.

I had the same problem with my game locking up frequently in late beta and early release.

I'm also running an Nvidia video card, 5600 Ultra, and upgrading to the new beta video drivers from the Nvidia site fixed my problem.. haven't had a single game lockup since installing those drivers.

hope that helps :)