Restart Problems (exclusive to GW)

Should be an option in control panel to uninstall drivers. Should help?

Any kmixer.sys is it?

Are you getting something like

DRIVER_IRQ_LESS_OR_NOT_EQUAL
?

I have that problem on my PC. All solutions are - Make sure you have the latest Bios for your mother board. Make sure you have the correct drivers. Or, and this is what I think is wrong with mine, the PCI slot that your sound/graphics/whatever card is in, is dodgey.

That's all the info i can despense.

What might be possible is that, because of the way the game is programmed or how data is rendered specific to this game, Guild Wars is especially prone to the adverse effects of heat. It does seem as though most people who have reported problems here run their computers pretty hot, but yet don't have any problems with other taxing games, including Guild Wars in its beta stages which was pretty much the same exact game.

Even though I don't have any problems otherwise, I've decided to buy a quality water cooling system for my PC and see how that works. It's not worth it just for Guild Wars, especially since its probably a coding problem on their end, but its a good idea in general to have a PC run cooler...so we'll see what happens. After I install it I'll post here the results.

On a side note, I've been in correspondence with ArenaNet's tech support service for a while concerning the problem, for which they've continually replied within a few hours each time. After going over basic troubleshooting they accused me of overclocking my system to cause the problems, even though everything was always at factory settings. Now that I've told them that wasn't true and that Guild Wars in beta worked just fine, they've gone silent for 36 hours and counting.


-Nall

This is exactly where I stand as well. They were very prompt in asking for my DxDiag and Everest results, but as soon as I sent them this thread and said that it worked fine in the beta, they haven't gotten back to me.

Well, I've run into two distinct problems - different systems.

The first one has been reported here. Game crashes and re-boots intermittently. It can be 5-50 minutes. Over the past few days, I've seen blue screens, re-boots, game has frozen and forced a physical restart. It has also frozen , but allowed a ctrl-alt-dlt, where I was able to see the ArenaNet error display which I forwarded to them a few times.

I also got one msgbox with a memory.cpp error. From what I could see of the error logs, it appears to be a memory related problem.

The times I was able to check the task manager the game was not responding and using 100% of the CPU and approximately 250mb of memory.

I am using the Sygate firewall and NAV. I had a few anit-spyware programs running which I un-installed...no difference.

System specs -
XP Pro SP2 -
Direct X 9c
Abit Kx7-R
AMd 2000
Radeon 9600 Pro 128mb
AGP set to 4x
Creative SBLive Value
1gb DDR
Dual 60 gb 7200 hdd
All hardware has latest drivers from the manufacturer's sites.

I thought I would try it out on my other machine, which I was planning on wiping anyways. After formatting the drive, re-installing XP Pro SP2 and installing the latest drivers, I installed the Sygate firewall, turned off the Microsoft firewall.
I ran a burn in test with Sisoft Sandra lite 2005. Ran another test with 3dMark03. System looks good.
Installed Guild Wars, logged in, appeared in the Abbey.
Game froze when I attempted to exit the Abbey. Status bar hit 100% and that was it....
I even ran nvidia tuning program for the nforce chipset..still no go.

System Specs
XP Pro SP2
Directx 9c
Abit NF7-S v2
AMD 3200
2 512 mb DDR400 dual channel
Radeon 9700Pro 128mb
AGP set to 8x
Sound - nforce2 chipset supports Soundstorm
120gb 7200 hdd

Very frustrating to say the least.

Mine is similar problem. For me the whole systems goes down like you killed the power after playing for 45 minutes. On re-start everything is normal until it does it again in 45 minutes. Very Wierd and no reply from tech support.

OK I am hoping i've cracked my problem Arena net have been pretty good I have to say. Last suggestion was to run a memory test (Memtest86). I ran this and one of my modules failed on test 5 - this test appears to be one Athlon memory configs fail a lot on.

I'm reasonably sure most here have Athlons?

I've played all afternoon with my memory modules I do have and found a combination that passes the test (768MB so lost 256MB) but if it solves the issue who cares.

I'll report back if it has indeed resolved the issue or not.

Sliceolife - that sounds like an overheating issue.

Tals

Numerous people here have the problem with Pentium processors as well. It's not limited to Athlon.



-Nall

OK - possibly different problems for each. And maybe i'm drawing conclusions before i'm sure my one is cracked. Then again what may be happening is the game is pushing the pcs and so any issues are coming to the fore. Certainly will be interesting if it was a memory issue. That memory test wasn't limited to Athlons - just Athlons are more likely to fail on those specific tests.

Tals

For me, its not a cooling issue, I have 9 fans in my computer, platinum heatspreaders on my Ram sticks, and a vantec tornado right on my CPU Heatsink...

Memory is corsair, and i have yet to have an issue with it. During the game my CPU temp doesnt' go over 42*c (full load).

My x850xtpe is 2 slot design, i can't imagine that badgirl (very beautiful piece of equipment) overheating...

DEFINETLY some kind of game issue...it doesnt like modern hardware or somethng.

Your system is unstable and GW is stressing it in a way the other games didn't. Your CPU is probably unstable. Only the mobile Athlon XP's are really good above 2.1 GHz or so, without lots of extra voltage. Your RAM may also be above spec with CAS2. Run Prime95 and Memtest86+, or better yet try it unoverclocked.

I'd still try the memory test - even if its to get that one marked off. I have never ever had an issue with any other game. However my memory still failed when tested. Maybe when I next crash i'll change my tune - proper session later tonight should determine for sure.

Tals

Blue Screens and random reboots are caused by CPU or RAM instability caused by overclocking, defects, or an insufficient power supply. If you are overclocked and see these problems the FIRST thing you should do is return to default speeds and RAM latencies. Don't start by throwing bug complaints.

I have no reboot problems, or any stability problems, with GW at all on both of my systems.

Oh, so the problem must not exist.....? Blue screens and random reboots are also caused by defective software.

Prime95 (Blend torture test) is completely stable overnight at my regular overclocks (around 8 hours). I haven't had the patience to do the same with Memtest86+ yet but it's stable for at least 3 runs straight.

I don't see how that would work though. There's no way Guild Wars needs more processing power than Doom 3, or WoW when there's a giant clash going on in Hillsbrad.

And even if what you say is true, then it's just bad coding.
If I never crash in any other games, and I haven't had any problems up until now, I severely doubt it's my CPU being moody.

Do you honestly think that out of like the 2000 views this topic and many others have had, that everyone has a faulty CPU/RAM?

I mean some of you people in this topic seem to have the mindframe that, "I'm not getting the problem so you must be doing something wrong". Bugs do exist you know, just because your system isn't affected doesn't mean that other people won't have problems. Everyone in this topic is running on different RAM, different CPUs, and different video/sound cards, (none of which I am overclocking by the way), and yet we're all having the same problem that comes up in this game and this game only.

Yes, CPU overheating does cause reboots, much like a videocard will if the GPU is clocked too high, but the fact that it only occurs when running one specific game, and then added to the fact that hundreds of other people are having the same problem, tells me that it's a problem on their end not mine.

Why is their game causing my CPU to overheat exactly? It's running at a cool 36 degrees celcius, it's fairly new, and it's never had any major errors, there's no reason why it should ever be overheating.

I'm not going out of my way to place blame or anything here, I think arenanet's a great developer, and Guild Wars is a great game, but I just want to get my bloody game working. Most of us have tried everything but the kitchen sink and are now just waiting for some kind of fix. Some people even replaced components in their PC and still get the problem for christ's sake.

I run more than one monitor, so I had a system diagnosis prog for my mobo running to monitor temps. My CPU temp goes up less than when playing Doom 3 or HL2. I have tried about 40 combinations of video settings, drivers, sound off, sound on, underclocking, etc, etc. I still get random crashes. I have several test systems I'm going to run it on today to see if it continues as I would like to move past a level 4 character.

I did not have any problems whatsoever running this game until the patch yesterday afternoon- around 330-400cst. Now the game freezes my comp and a hard boot is needed. I have read everyones problem in this thread and a lot of peoples issues may be drivers, OC, or whatever. But a lot of people are only having problems recently. This is obviously a problem with the GW client and not with the end user.

Exactly the same problem as me, but Im running a Athlon XP3200+, Asus A7N8X-E mother board, 1gig of Corsair Value Select RAM with a 9800pro graphics card. Using onboard sound.

Not many people are OCing their CPU so i dont understand why people are making an over exagguration about it.

Next, HL2 pushes my CPU towards the 45*c mark (i run it at 1600x1200 4xAA 16xAF) and no problems, even when I DO OC my comp (for bencharking)...

Running GW stock, i get problems, and i dont want to imagine it running it oced...and the temps for it are at most 42*c for GW.

Definetly a bug, but the company is still denying it.

Yeah, I don't know where this "Using your CPU in a certain way" stuff is coming from.
I run many much more graphically intensive games than this.
Guild Wars is pretty, but it's certainly not cutting edge.

here's my system.......

A64 3200+ NewCastle Core @ 2.2ghz
Asus K8V SE Deluxe
eVGA 6800 Ultra
Kingston Hyper X PC-3500-2\512 sticks
Western Digital 80gig HD
No Sound Card-Useing OnBoard Sound
500watt Ultra X-Connect PSU

i unoverclocked my system and ran Memtest 86 on my ramm for over 10 hours and Memtest 86 didnt find any errors on my ramm. i swapped out harddrives and replaced all my ribbon cables going to my devices.......nothing....and i do mean nothing a have tried has fixed my problem. GW still locks up within 5 minutes of playing. im not buying another computer just to play a $50 video game. guys....i think we all made a big mistake buying this game. every other game i have runs perfectly, no crashes, no lockups. GW is the only game i have that doesnt want to work.

Just so i can compare my CPU and make sure the temp is not to blame which i am almost certain it is not, what do other peoples Athlons run at? mine is around 98 102 C while playing guildwars what is everyone elses?

my A64 3200+ runs at 96 to 100 degree's when playing GW. my mobo temp under full load runs at 77 degree's. my 12, 5 , and 3volt rails are all reading dead on. hardly any fluctuation on voltage when playing a game.

just tried playing again, played for about 10 minutes this time before it locked up on me. im almost getting to the point to where i dont care if this game ever works. i didnt want to play WoW becuz of monthly fee's but now im thinking i should have bought it instead of GW. atleast WoW has 24 hour tech support and doesnt get screwed up every time a new patch is released.

needless to say.....i am very dissapointed with this game.

I want to help out because I was having same problem. Now, I am having blast. When i got this game the installation was fine. When I go to create a character it will automatically restart my computer. WTF. it happened 10times. I was using onboard graphic card. yes, I am fool for running game using onboard graphic card(intel mother board with built in 128meg graphic card). My friend told me it was too much to handle. He suggested buying a graphic card. So, I got a BFG nvidia 6600GT pci express. Start the game and NO problem. I haven't update any drivers other than what it came with. I been playing since release. It's fun game. it's breath of fresh air from MMORPG. This is fun for casual gamer like me. I had terrible time with DAOC and Anarchy online. It's too hardcore for me. GW is easy to get into. There are lot of people playing the game so, it's a good launch for GW.

gateway (3.2gig with 1k ram)
Netgear 614 version1 router
DSL modem with bellsouth.

Most of us aren't using on-board video though.

this new patch has yet to fix my problems...

Same.

Same, there was a slight change though.
Don't know if it's coincedence or not, but instead of rebooting my computer this time, the game simply froze and wouldn't let me shut it down so I had to restart manually.
Not much better really, but meh.

thats the problem i have now. GW plays for about 5 minutes then completely freezes up forceing me to manually reboot. i dont get any error or any kind of window that pops up allowing me report a bug with the game. i played for 12 hours the first day i bought GW. i wake up the next day and load up GW and i get nothing but lock ups after 5 minutes of playing.

This is what I've been getting since the last BWE, and now in retail.

In other news, downloaded Motherboard Monitor and ran temp gauges as I played this and City of Heroes.

Idle temp is 37C
CoH Hamidon Raid temp is 44-45C (Hami raids constitute 75-200 Heroes killing one giant monster... it's a huge strain on the system)
Guild Wars average temperature is 42-44C.

I've never once had an issue with CoH and I've been playing that on this computer for a year. I've been to so many Hami raids that I can't count them all (our server does them once a night) and I'm always right in the thick of things, as my character is a healer.

Sooooooooooooo yeah. It's a problem with the client, and not a heat issue, for me at least.

All I can do is draw from my own experiences with this one. I have a number of games on my PC HL2, WOW, Soldiers, Trackmania, Call of Duty etc. None of these have caused the PC to crash. GW was and big time, hard resets, controlled exits and uncontrolled to desktop. I was pretty 100% sure this was a GW issue and really did not feel like testing the memory, however has to be said my memory failed test 5 and so its a duffer - maybe the other apps arn't doing some of the stuff that GW does - who knows.

Anyway no crashes since, now your issue may actually be a GW one However it would be useful if those experiencing the problem make it clear that they have tested their memory and the cpu heat has been checked. I would recommend reporting it to Arena net if you haven't already - they are pretty sound and at least the issue does get properly recorded. Load of other stuff which can be done as well - my post earlier pretty much covered the initial recommendations and my own from Arena net.

Tals

Yet another Athalon chipset user with crashing problems adding to the list.
Not technical enough to add anything usefull, but hell I paid for the game like everyone else, my PC runs DOOM 3 fine & others of similar demands.
Lets hope the developers get a fix underway quickly.
I notice the daily update on the website for Mon 2nd May mentions "miscellaneous fixes for rare crashing bugs"
Keen to know what their definition of "rare" is, in my GW experience thus fare "rare" is approx 5 mins.

Probably not helping, but it's good to vent !!!

well my memory is fine passed all tests this game is more bugged than the beta

Did everyone tried to play other games after GW started to crash?
(and i mean, at least an hour in a row)

I have a similar problem, GW at random times freezes and then either has a graphical freak out (random colors all over the place, inverted screen..) or it starts to flash like a strobe light.

Sometimes upon rebooting the system afterwards GW detects the crash and it says its due to overheating, overclocking.. which I do notice my comps temp rises to 45, but only when I run GW. Opening my side door and cranking my fans seems to help it.

I run al types of games on this system with no issues.. Silent Hunter III, EQ2, HL2, Empire Earth 2.. only does GW cause this overheating issue.

AMD FX-53, 2 gigs Corsair Plat ram, 10k RPM SATA HD, and an old 9700PRO radeon. I updated all the drivers and no change, I then said my 9700PRO finally hit the wall, but it seems that now not only me experiences this issue and it seems like it is the software that is somehow causing this.

I have run EQ2 and another game on this system at same time many times, I can do it with GW too (when it doesnt want to reboot)

las, I too have the hard lockup issue listed here. I have defragged. I have lowered all the graphic details to minimum (looks freakin' ugly mind you). I have test my memory for 12 hours. My door on my computer is open. My computer case has 7 fans in it and I have a Zalman "Rose" fan on my processor. My power supply has two fans in it as well. Guild Wars locks up anywhere from 5-50 minutes into playing. A majority of the lockups occur in the catacombs. The most recent being whilst fighting my 5th Cave spider. The lockup I get is strange but yet forces me to reboot my computer hard by pushing the power button to turn it off. The screen turns into, what looks like, a static filled TV display with the outline of all the objects that were on screen, including character, monsters, walls and anything else. This happens without fail everytime it crashes and like I stated earlier it happens a majority of the time in the catacombs, but it has happened elsewhere.

AMD 2.6
Asus A7N8 Deluxe (not sure of the exact order of those numbers... at work now)
1 gig of Ram
280 Gig of HD space
Windows XP Pro
Audigy 2 Sound Card.
BFG 6800 GT OC.
Thermaltake Case

All drivers are current. Not using any beta drivers.

I have tested the HD and memory and both have passed successfully. I have tried playing the game with all graphic settings set to minimum and no sound. I have the side door to my PC off and I have never overclocked my pc. All provide no solution to the problem. I have removed all extraneous programs from memory and in fact removed as much as possible from startup using msconfig. Still crashes hard.

It is my opinion that the only marginally suspect piece of equipment I may have is my Antec 350W True Blue power supply. There is a slight possiblity of the game not having enough power, but I doubt that, due to the fact that Doom 3, Half-Life 2, Silent Hunter 3, City of Heroes and many other games run at 1600X1200 with all settings set to highest possible with no issues whatsoever. I will probably end up buying a new Power Supply Unit in the near future (when I have some more money) but I can't afford one right now.

All that being said, I am quite disappointed that this game insists on crashing. I really wanted to enjoy this game. I've played several of the betas with no problems and was really looking forward to this game. Too bad I can't play it for longer than about an hour before I have to do a hard reboot. Heck I would even be willing to accept just a crash to desktop. At least that way I wouldn't have to wait for the computer to reboot.

I'll be quiet now.. I've written a book as it is........



Mr. Grimm

I've found the Guildwars support team to be very responsive and helpful.

If you haven't reported you're problems read this reply:

Thank you for contacting technical support. I would like to get more information about your system than is available on the dxdiag.

There is a program called Everest Home Edition that is freeware that can give us a ton of information about your system.

The download is here:

http://www.lavalys.com/index.php?pag...ew=1&subpage=5

Once you download and install the program, open it up and click "report."

Go through the wizard and choose Hardware-related pages. Choose the plain text report format. The diag will run. When it is finished, choose "save to file" and save the file to your desktop. Then send the text file to us as an attachment to this email.

Regards,
The Guild Wars Support Team

As a heads up, you can attach the report when you make your initial bug report. I had a reply in less than 24 hours.

Another quick note, I did not experience any crashes last night. The only difference was that I was moved on from Pre-Searing to Post-Searing. No crashes in Old Ascalon and I even managed to go on a few team quests. Did I ever get beat up bad in Post-Searing.

It was fun to play for a few hours straight. I don't think I have ever exited the game normally until now.

why dont we just wait till they patch it....

>I did not experience any crashes last night. The only difference was that I was moved on from Pre-Searing to Post-Searing.

...and there've been several patches since the game opened, any one of which may have fixed whatever your specific issue was.

I had one crash last night (a client crash to desktop, not hard reboot), which was certainly better than four shutdowns an hour when the game originally opened. Actually played for several consecutive hours, it was a welcome relief.

Pulled one simm, which tested fine but since pulling it the game's been running (relatively) error free. I may pop it back in tonight and see if the software updates were responsible for the improved situation, or yanking the simm was. I suspect the simm's perfectly ok.