Game won't start. Video Card issue?

[Legacy_rogueknight333]

               Problems occuring on a computer with Intel Quad Core 2.4 Ghz processor, Nvidia 8600 GTS driver, and Vista.

I installed NWN Diamond on this machine c. 2 years ago, and it worked OK until yesterday. Then when I tried to start the game to play, it crashed just as the main menu (that is the second menu where you can select new game, load game, multiplayer etc., not the initial one where you select Play, Toolset, etc.) was appearing. I crashed back to desktop and saw an error message telling me that the video card had stopped working but had recovered. When I tried to start again, I guess it didn't recover because this time the whole monitor screen blanked out and stayed that way. I could not do anything and had to restart the computer.

After restarting I tried again and the game seemed to work fine, so I figured it was just some random fluke. No such luck. I exited the game after playing for a bit, and did some work in the toolset. Then I decided to test something I had done and went back to play. The unreliable video card, or whatever the source of the problem is, struck again. I went through multiple restarts and new attempts to start NWN, and each time approximately the same thing happened: Either just before or just as the starting menu was appearing either everything would freeze up completely, with even Alt+Ctrl+Delete not working, or the monitor would blank out, in either case requiring a restart.

I tried to start the game by using "Test Module" in the toolset. The module loaded up, but the graphics looked very grainy and blurry, and shortly afterwards everything froze up.

I updated my video drivers to the latest available. Same problem occured.

I uninstalled and reinstalled NWN. Same problem kept occuring.

So any ideas what's going on and what I can do about it?
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Rubies]

               Have you tried running the game in windowed mode? Might be a long shot, but still! '>
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_rogueknight333]

               Worth a shot, but it turns out the same problem occurs when trying to open in Windowed mode.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_HipMaestro]

               

rogueknight333 wrote...

Worth a shot, but it turns out the same problem occurs when trying to open in Windowed mode.

In this forum it's always faster to glean some useful advice if you post the full specs recommended in the Start Here sticky at the top of the forum.  Nonetheless, let's explore the benign before jumping to the conclusion that your vcard is suffering (i.e. heat and degradation)...

Have you updated to v1.69?

Which physical version of the game are you playing?

Do you have access to another disc drive other than than the one you are trying play now?  With v1.69 you can play without using the drive, hence the first question.

Have you installed any other utilities in your NWN directory other than what the stock installation provides? (eg. haks, overrides, etc.)

Have your read this topic?

How about this one?

I recommend reading all forementioned posts because often solutions are provided during the discussion that are not specifically related to the the topic heading, yet may address your particular problem.  Once you've ruled out all those possibilities it's time to swap out the vcard, at least for testing purposes.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par HipMaestro, 02 novembre 2010 - 02:03 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_rogueknight333]

               

HipMaestro wrote...

In this forum it's always faster to glean some useful advice if you post the full specs recommended in the Start Here sticky at the top of the forum...

Sorry, here are my specs laid out as the sticky recommends:

Game Version: NWN Diamond w/all expansions+ 3 premium mods
Game Language: English
Retail or Digital: Retail DVD
Processor Manufacturer: Intel
Processor Type: Quad Core
Processor Speed: 2.4 Ghz 
Operating System / Service Pack: Vista
System RAM: 2 GB
Video Card Manufacturer: Nvidia
Video Card Model: 8600 GTS
Video Card RAM: 256 MB
Video Card Driver Version: 8.17.12.6099 (currently, though the problem began with an earlier version in place)
Sound Card Manufacturer: Couldn't find Sound Card info in any obvious place. I can try harder to look this up if it seems likely to be important
Sound Card Model:
Sound Card Driver Version:
CD/ROM Type: DVD/ROM drive

Have you updated to v1.69?

Yes.

Which physical version of the game are you playing?

NWN Diamond, unless you mean something else by "physical version"?

Do you have access to another disc drive other than than the one you are trying play now?  With v1.69 you can play without using the drive, hence the first question.

Since I have 1.69, I'm not using the drive.

Have you installed any other utilities in your NWN directory other than what the stock installation provides? (eg. haks, overrides, etc.)

Post Re-installation, there was no non-bioware content of any kind in the NWN directory. Previous to reinstalling there was nothing in the override folder at least, other than the files Bioware put there with the 1.69 patch (I try to test my modules with a clean override), though there were numerous custom modules and haks in the relevant folders.

I also went through the standard Vista rigmarole of setting Compatibility Modes, files to be run as Administrator, etc.

Hope that helps. Thanks for your time and attention.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_HipMaestro]

               Have you tried disabling the sound in the nwn.ini?  I realize that may seem irrelevant but it has fixed some load problems and a benign test to perform.

If your drive is partitioned, have you tried installing into another one than the default?

Just out of curiosity, have you been using this machine regularly or has it sat idle for a lengthy period?  

You seem to indicating that the toolset opens and loads areas properly with no abnormal load time or flutter in the graphics.  Is that true?

Something else just occurred to me... have you updated your Vista service pack since it had been playing okay?
               
               

               

                     Modifié par HipMaestro, 03 novembre 2010 - 04:41 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_rogueknight333]

               Well, the good news is that NWN was working again when I tried it today. I exited and successfully restarted a number of times so it seems to be holding. The bad news is that happened without me doing anything, so I still have no idea what was going on or whether it might recur (especially since it apparently went away before only to come back again).

HipMaestro wrote...

Have you tried disabling the sound in the nwn.ini? I realize that may seem irrelevant but it has fixed some load problems and a benign test to perform.

If your drive is partitioned, have you tried installing into another one than the default?

Since at least at the moment it is working OK anyway, I don't suppose such tests would prove anything right now.
 

Just out of curiosity, have you been using this machine regularly or has it sat idle for a lengthy period?

I have been using it very regularly.

You seem to indicating that the toolset opens and loads areas properly with no abnormal load time or flutter in the graphics. Is that true?

Yes, the toolset appears to have been unaffected by whatever the issue is.

Something else just occurred to me... have you updated your Vista service pack since it had been playing okay?

According to the update history on the computer, some sort of windows update was downloaded on October 27 (somtimes other members of my family use this computer and do such things, so I'm not necessarily aware of them). That was fairly recently so it might have had something to do with the issue. On the other hand there were no problems until November 1, and I was doing some extensive playing over the previous weekend, so if that caused the problem it  did not do so immediately.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_rogueknight333]

               And today it is not working again. I tried disabling the sound. It did not help.



On one occasion I got the error message: "Nvidia Open GL driver lost connection with the display driver and is unable to continue," if that helps anyone figure out what is going on.