Ah... Well, it took me a few hours, but I can *finally* change my graphics settings without hard-crashing.. lol.
Before my little saga begins, here are my system specs..
AMD Athlon (Classic) 800mhz
Asus K7M Mobo
384 megs RAM
Asus V6600 Deluxe (GeForce 1)
SBLive! Plat. 5.1
etc...
Running on Windows XP Pro, with the latest Detonators (28.32).
Problem #1...
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Ok, so I get the game, install it, and run it. No problems so far. Then I try to change my graphics settings in game. It drops to desktop for a second, goes back to a light-brownish colour with the mouse cursor (I'm fairly certain up until this point is normal), then freezes... No BSOD, no HDD activity, nothing. Both my KB and mouse are unresponsive.
I tried *everything* you could possibly think of, short of reformatting my system. Killed all taskbar items, killed all unecessary processes, etc. It turns out the problem was with my video card drivers... In desperation I reverted to the old 22.80 Dets, after which I'm back up and running.
However...
Problem #2...
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Now that I can actually run the game, it drops me to desktop completely randomly!! Even from the main menu! No error message, no BSOD, no lockup. Just back to my desktop, albeit in a REALLY bright state(probably residual effects from my brightness setting in-game).
I *think* I've fixed that problem by killing Zonealarm (I left all my taskbar/tray items after I fixed the 1st problem), but I need to run the game for a longer period of time...
Arrrrrgh... I've been looking forward to playing this game for such a long time!! It blows to have it ruined by these ghey problems... Ah... Any comments/suggestions about either of these issues? Am I the only one to experience these things?
That sounds like hardware to me...either overclocked or overheating, which go hand in hand...has it ever done this before? Also, you have an older Athlon mobo...just for kicks try running it a 2X AGP...
Overclocked? Lol.. Um.. My "800mhz" CPU is actually an Athlon **500** running @ 800... it's been that way for over 2 years. And no, I don't have any stability problems with anything at all, so I doubt that that is the culprit. Also, my video card isn't overclocked at all. I got rainbow coloured dots/splotches all over CounterStrike the last time I did that..
Hm... I don't think I ever got 2X AGP to work. I *believe* I'm running at 1X, or possibly even not at all? It's been so long since I've fiddled with those settings... Also most likely not the issue... Thanks, tho.
Well since your having the issue why dont your try to run the game unoverclocked and see what happens? It takes what 1 minute to do and will remove the possibility of that being the issue!
And to be quite honest with u 2 years at that speed your chip may be failing! It wasnt meant to run 300mhz higher and thats the chance u take when u overclock!
(btw my 1.33 is @ 1.5 so I also overclock!)
Also on via's website they have a new agp driver for xp! You might want to try that!