Computer is freezing during games. (New OP)

Lardalish

Ok, I had a problem with episode one and I lowered my settings and that fixed it. I played through that whole game without any other issues. I started Episode two and went ahead and lowered my settings just as a preventative measure. Well, the game played fine up until

I had retrieved the larval extract and got back to Alyx and the vorgons. The movie started and apparently the G-Man is supposed to be talking to me but he never starts. It shows his face eventually and his lips arent moving so I didn't suspect anything, but then it freezes.

In the middle of the movie it just stops and I cant do anything but ctrl+alt+del and closing the game.

Well, I tried lowering my settings, but they were already lowered.

I tried updating my sound and video drivers, but they were already updated.

A friend found a thread on the steam boards and someone had my problem and they put somethin, I cant find the length of code, but it changed the "heap size" to half my memory or something like that.

And I clicked some stuff in my video card settings, made a few things application controlled.


Well, after all that I tried to play it again and it was worse than before. It was choppy, constantly, like "the game is just loading for a second" choppy but all the time. It was unplayable. The menus were sluggish and the sound was all messed up. So I went back I reset all those things to the way they were before and that didnt change anything. So I reinstalled the game, that didnt work.

All the other games in the Orange Box work just fine, so Im kinda confused. I meet the minimum requirements for the Orange Box, just not the reccomended ones.

Heres the system specs that the System Requirements Lab website gave me,

Intell Pentium 4 CPU 1.99ghz
767 MB RAM
Windows 2000 Service pack 4 build 2195
NVidia GeForce FX 5500
256MB RAM
3D Acceleration
HW Rasterization
Pixel Shader Ver. 2.0
Video Card Driver Version (DirectX) Your driver version number is: 6.14.11.6218
DirectX 9.0c
Creative SB Live! Basic (WDM)
Your driver version number is: 5.0.2184.1
7.6 GB Free Space
SONY DVD RW DRU-810A (but I downloaded off steam, so I don't think the CD drive matters)




So, I seem to have managed to not fix the original problem, but infact made it worse. What do I need to do?

Lardalish

No ones got any ideas? Thats depressing.

zhen_rogue

I'd sugest overheating as the issue, but apparently it only happens during FMV sequences?
Or can the shutdown occur at any other point in the game?

Otherwise i'd say it was a chipset issue, specifically relating to pixel shaders.
I've never played HL2, but on the options screen or in an .ini file is there a way to disable all shader effects?
Give that a try.

Lardalish

Just giving a bump because of the new OP.

Lynx

I'm having a similar issue, except every Orange Box game freezes and then crashes my whole computer after only a few minutes in each game. It only happens with Orange Box games, though.

I've updated my video and sound drivers, and I should have plenty of cooling for my system (Liquid cooling and three fans), so I have no idea.

System Specs

AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 4000+ 2.41 GHz
2.0GB RAM
Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT
256MB
3D Acceleration
HW Transform & Lighting
Vertex Shader Ver. 3.0
Pixel Shader Ver. 3.0
Video Card Driver Ver. 6.14.11.6371
Audio Codecs ver. 5.1.2535.0
Free Disc Space 72.2 GB

Lardalish

Maybe there is a better place to ask this? I made a thread in G&T, I sent an email to the support in steam, I went through their little automated thing, I joined the forums but they're approving me or some bullshit so I cant do anything. I'm pretty much at a loss for what to do. This is the only game thats messing up and I have no idea what I did wrong.