Planetside Software Forums

This new release freezes for me all the time after doing some test renderings =(

I split this post out to its own thread so we could talk about the freezing issue separately.

sjefen, can you give us your system specs? When it freezes, do you get a message from Windows, or does it just become unresponsive? How long have you waited for it to "wake up"? Does this occur with basic/default scene, or does it seem related to specific scenes or settings? Any other information you can add?

- Oshyan

Hi Oshyan,

My system specs:

Processor         Intel Xeon W3565
Memory            24 GB
System type     64-bit
Graphic card     GeForce GTX 460

I don't get any message from Windows. The software fades out (like the attached image) and becomes unresponsive. I haven't waited to long, I just closed the software and tried again a few times and it happens every time.

I'll try with different scenes and see if it still happens. I'll let you know later.


Regards,
Terje

---

I'm having similar issues with v2.4 on a Mac running OSX 10.7.3 with 32Gb RAM and ATI Radeon HD 5870. Terragen crashes on launch and I get a crash report. Does this consistently. Went back to v2.3 and everything works fine.

How many render threads are you using? When it freezes, does it actually say the program has crashed or just that it has "become unresponsive" offering you the choice to wait or close the program? If you have the choice to wait, what happens if you choose to wait, give it 10 minutes or so?

The issue with 2.4 on the Mac is almost certainly unrelated to this. It's something we've seen affecting a few users now and we're looking into it as a top priority. Rolling back to 2.3 is recommended in the meantime. But again this is specific to the Mac version, and only affects certain people (we're not quite sure yet what the commonality is).

- Oshyan

I haven't actually been watching how many threads it's been using when it crashes, but it is set to use all it can find and I suppose that would be 8. When it freezes it looks just like the image above. No message. It just kinda fades out a little bit and becomes unresponsive.

It happened again just now and there was actually a message telling me it has stopped working. It was just hidden under the rendering window.
I don't know if this helps but this is the information it gave me:

Problem signature:
  Problem Event Name:      APPCRASH
  Application Name:              tgd.exe
  Application Version:      2.4.31.1
  Application Timestamp:           4f433798
  Fault Module Name:           trlib.dll
  Fault Module Version:      2.4.31.1
  Fault Module Timestamp:   4f4335c2
  Exception Code:              c0000005
  Exception Offset:              0000000000003210
  OS Version:                 6.1.7601.2.1.0.256.48
  Locale ID:                 1044
  Additional Information 1:   0b9a
  Additional Information 2:   0b9a362801b0b85600eef38436f1bc36
  Additional Information 3:   099c
  Additional Information 4:   099c6c2e067e646a7b25247a412a996e

Hi, sorry for the delayed response. Does it always freeze *when rendering*, or does it do it in regular use too? Is it with any scene, or specific/more demanding ones? It seems possible it's graphics driver related as we've had a few reports of those kinds of issues with each new update (as we take greater and greater advantage of graphics cards for displaying the user interface and whatnot).

- Oshyan

Hi again.

Yes. It freezes all the time. I've tested with just the startup scene, did some crop renderings and after a few tests it crashes.

I can try to update my graphic drivers in case I'm not up to date and see what happens.

Please do try a graphics driver update and/or try turning down the Graphics Acceleration to zero, if possible.

- Oshyan

Sorry for the late reply.
My computer crashed a few weeks ago and just got up and running.
I will test now that I have updated my graphics drivers  ;)

Again very late reply. Where can I buy myself some more time?

I've updated my graphics drivers and also Terragen 2 itself, but it still crashes =(

Can you try limiting Max Threads to 2 for a while and see if it continues?

- Oshyan

I'll give it a try tomorrow  ;)

I've been doing some testing today and it still happens. I don't know if this is true, but it seems
to take a little bit longer for the crash to occur now that I have updated Terragen.

Very strange indeed. Have you tried a complete uninstall, reboot, reinstall? Have you tried rolling back to 2.3?

- Oshyan

Kind of a long shot, but do you run other cpu intense software?  Maybe it's a temperature thing.  I't amazing hot fast the cpu temperature can rise in just a few seconds.  A marginal power supply can cause similar problems.

Maybe try running a cpu intense program like prime95.  It's available free here: http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=103/

Or try running TG2 with 1 thread minimum and 1 thread maximum.

I always do complete uninstall and reinstall. I didn't reboot tho. I have not tried to go back to 2.3, but I will do if none of the stuff under is any helpful.

I've thought about the CPU temperature thing so I tried with only running TG2. I've watched the temperature rise from about 38 degrees to 64 max. May this be a problem?

I should also mention that lately my computer just crashes for no reason. I get this blue screen where it says it's dumping physical memory or something. This has only been a problem these last days and it is not the same as what happens with TG, but I think one or more of my memory chips are defect. Could this cause the problems I'm seeing in TG?

Hi sjefen,

If you're having strange problems with TG2 that we're not hearing about with other computers and you're having problems with your computer then I think the first thing you need to do is make sure your computer is working properly. TG2 is quite an intensive application and it's possible this was making problems with your computer become apparent before they would in normal usage.

If you can make sure your computer is all working properly and then you still have problems with TG2 then we can spend more time trying to figure out what's wrong.

There have been a few occasions IIRC where people were having unusual problems with TG2 and it turned out to be a fault with their computer.

Regards,

Jo

Quote from: sjefen on June 25, 2012, 06:02:02 PM
I should also mention that lately my computer just crashes for no reason. I get this blue screen where it says it's dumping physical memory or something. This has only been a problem these last days and it is not the same as what happens with TG, but I think one or more of my memory chips are defect. Could this cause the problems I'm seeing in TG?

Yes, a faulty memory module could definitely cause the problem.  And heat can cause memory problems too.

I had just cleaned my older computer (specs in signature) and ran prime95 all night.  It started at 31 degrees and was up to 55 in a few minutes (it doesn't take long.)  Still 55 the next morning. 

Do you have 3 8gb memory sticks?  If so, maybe remove one and try tg2 with 16gb.  You may have to rotate each module to narrow down  the problem (sometimes re-seating the module(s) fixes it.)

Try Memtest86+ to test your memory.

- Oshyan

I will try to fix my computer and come back to this topic if there still is a problem with TG2.
Thanks for the advices so far guys =)

Have problems when i try to render a scene with big populations.
Stuck at "preparing to render", and the cpu is almost not doing anything.
Even left it like this overnight.

Happens especially when I've already rendered one picture.
Can fix the problem by restarting TG, but then i use like 15-20 min to populate all the grass again.

Might be my windows needs a reinstall.

Pc:
Amd Phenom II X4 3 GHz
6 Gig ram
2x Nvidia 9600GT
Win7 64Bit

Hi microwar,

I'm not quite sure what your problem might be but I don't think reinstalling Windows will help it. It will be something to do with TG2.

I take it you're having this problem when trying to render an image from the same project as you've just rendered?

Regards,

Jo

Yea, happens when when i change somthing, and try to re render the image.

But reinstalling windows is a thing that i got to do anyway.
Been planing to do that for about 6 months now, but cant seem to get my finger out.
Got 2 pc's waiting a reinstall + a factory reset on my phone, but i always end up doing somthing else.
Might be that a windows reinstall takes over half a day for me.

So here I'm back again. This has been very frustrating as my computer have been unstable for a very long time.
It kept getting worse and worse and it was really impossible to figure out what was wrong. I've tried everything.

I ran a windows memory test thing which told me my computer was just fine so it was natural for me to believe
the problem was hiding somewhere else, but to figure out where was no easy task.
Finally a friend of mine installed Linux on one of my hard drives and tried running that Memtest86 to see if it could
find something and sure enough the errors where popping up like trolls in boxes. After some more testing he was
able to figure out that two of my memory chips where defect.

I have now returned the broken chips and waiting for the new ones. Without those chips my computer seems
to work properly and I can finally start using Terragen again =) =) =)

Glad to here you figured out the problem.  I'm surprised mem86 didn't find a problem though.  Did you run it from a boot cd?

In the 1970's I wrote memory diagnostics for PDP-11 computers.  They would load into lower memory and test the memory above and then relocate above the lower memory and test it (lower memory.)  Some of those old mini-computers had three different types of memory -- core, bypolar, and MOS, and each had different timings and types of failures.  Core memory could actually fail if a program ran in a tight loop -- there was a core heating test.  Ah, the good old days.  ;D

Hi jaf,

There was someone helping me with all of this so I'm not really sure. All I know is that Windows always told me my computer was just
fine with it's memory testing stuff, but Linux found the problems right away.

I'm just really happy the problem is fixed. I've lived with this for way too long and had almost given up all hope for this computer.
Now I can finally start using it to something more than just surfing the web again =)