Intermittent Lock-ups in BF2

[Sgt_Sl@ughter]

Hey guys,

I was wondering if anyone out there has experienced the same problems that I have lately? (see below)

After playing BF2 for about an hour (sometimes less and sometimes longer) the game will start to have intermittent pauses, at first they are usually very brief and seem like lag. The pauses progressively become longer and longer and then are accompanied by a black screen. Eventually the game will kick me out to the desktop.

The problem will only be corrected by rebooting the PC. If I go back into BF2 without restarting the problem will persist.

I haven't been able to really locate any similar problems on the internet. The fact that it is corrected by rbooting leads me to think it is not a heat problem because the system is not off long enough to cool down. (Plus I have checked temperature on the video card and it is normal). Could this be memory (video or system RAM)? I am not running the highest grade or expensive equipment but this problem has just started recently (last couple of months) and is unique to BF2. It does not happen in Need for Speed Most Wanted nor Nascar Sim Racing (only played the latter two in Single player not on-line)

Any input you guys might have would be greatly appreciated.

I am running the following:

Athalon XP 3000+
1 Gig of 333 MHz RAM
GeForce 6600 OC Video Card (Latest drivers)
Sound Blaster Audigy2 Sound Card (Latest drivers)

Thanks

[PiLL-Doc]

Hopefully one of our computer guys can help you out on this one, does it happen on all servers?

[Sgt_Sl@ughter]

Hopefully one of our computer guys can help you out on this one, does it happen on all servers?

TO be honest Pill I can't remember if it happens on the OSS server or not. I played for several hours last night on the OSS server without a hitch. It is going to be extremely hard to figure out due to the intermittency of the problem. That is why is has got me stumped :(

I did read a post on the web that indicated there may be problems with the GeForce 6600 series if you turn anti-aliasing off but that is not the case here. Plus you would think if it was a problem such as that it would happen every time....not just once and a while.

I will keep the PC gurus posted....perhaps if I am lucky there will be one on line when it happens

[Tombstone]

I will give you my very first impression, which could be way off, but hopefully some of our other geeks can post what they think.

It sounds to me as if your system could be slowing down from having to use the swap file (virtual memory) on the hard drive to load textures for BF2. Almost as if your RAM is not flushing the unused textures and when full your system reverts to using the slower swap file, thereby creating the pausing. When you swap file becomes saturated from use by BF2 windows chokes resulting in the black screen. A reboot flushes the sysytem of anything loaded in RAM or the swap file and allows you to start up BF2 again.

I think one of our guys talked about slowdowns coming as a result of fubared texture rendering stored in your My Documents/BF2/ folder. It was recommended to delete the texture cache held there and let BF2 re-render all the graphics the next time you load a map. It takes longer to get into games again as it goes thru this process but it sometimes fixes slowdown problems.

I hope someone else can give feedback if I have something wrong in the above the evaluation and solution.

']['

[Tortelvis]

First off I dont profess to know a whole lot. So take this for what its worth. It might be the video driver you are using, though new, might not be the best for that card/game combo.

I am using altered video drivers from http://www.tweaksrus.com/index.php?option=com_docman&Itemid=41 and have good luck so far. This guy tweaks them for BF2. They also have forums for the site and the admin might have a clue whats doing with your system.

Just my worthless 2 cents.

[EnsignPulver]

I will give you my very first impression, which could be way off, but hopefully some of our other geeks can post what they think.

It sounds to me as if your system could be slowing down from having to use the swap file (virtual memory) on the hard drive to load textures for BF2. Almost as if your RAM is not flushing the unused textures and when full your system reverts to using the slower swap file, thereby creating the pausing. When you swap file becomes saturated from use by BF2 windows chokes resulting in the black screen. A reboot flushes the sysytem of anything loaded in RAM or the swap file and allows you to start up BF2 again.

I think one of our guys talked about slowdowns coming as a result of fubared texture rendering stored in your My Documents/BF2/ folder. It was recommended to delete the texture cache held there and let BF2 re-render all the graphics the next time you load a map. It takes longer to get into games again as it goes thru this process but it sometimes fixes slowdown problems.

I hope someone else can give feedback if I have something wrong in the above the evaluation and solution.

']['

Tomb,
there are many subdirectories there. Can you specifiy which sub-directory because the file names within them do not give me a clue.

[Heenalu]

Tomb,
there are many subdirectories there. Can you specifiy which sub-directory because the file names within them do not give me a clue.

C:\Documents and Settings\Mark\My Documents\Battlefield 2\mods\bf2\cache

[EnsignPulver]

Thank you Heenalu for that directory name. It worked. I deleted it, BF2 reloaded it, and that cured my "BF2 kickout" or proram termination problem. Slaughter, you should try Heenalu's fix.

How many rockets does your damned helo carry? It seems like a never ending supply.