I have been experiencing a very strange problem running a few games under
Win2k that everyone else seems to be doing ok with. Ever since beta 1, when
I would use the hacked NT 3dfx drivers and run unreal, after anywhere from
30 seconds to 15 minutes in the flyby, the entire system freezes and the
sound loops for about 2 to 15 seconds, then resumes running. This problem
has persisted to the final release 2195, which I did a clean install of, and
the official 3dfx hacked drivers released a week ago. The *really* strange
thing, is now I have d3d running on my viper 770, and the same lockup
happens when running unreal in d3d mode on the viper. Also, everquest has
the same problem under glide on the voodoo2's and d3d on the viper, although
it can take hours of EQ to make it hangup. Often the hangups only happen
once then go away, but othertimes keep happening sequentially. I hooked the
voodoo2's to a second monitor so I could see what was going on when the
hangs occur, and the entire system grinds to a halt, the system monitor
froze, then resumed when the hangup finished. Network protocols, keyboard
input, everything is totally unresponsive for the duration of the hang.
Unreal using the same drivers under NT4 runs with no problem, and both EQ
and Unreal run flawlessly under windows 98. My system is otherwise 100
percent stable and I experience no other unusual behavior running ordinary
desktop apps, only the games I listed cause trouble. My system is as
follows:
 
Tyan 1836DLUAN mainboard
2xCeleron 366's running at 550 on MSI6905 slockets (I have run the system at
366 and single cpu,
and still have the hangups, in fact the hangups date back to when I had dual
p2-266's)
2xVoodoo2's (stb blackmagic 12mb's in SLI)
Viper 770
SBLive
SB Vibra 16 (onboard)
onboard UW dual channel adaptec scsi, seagate barracuda 9gig, 2gig jaz, and
creative dvd-ram drive
2 3.2 gig EIDE drives in a striped config on the built in EIDE controller
Yamaha SW60XG on the lone ISA slot
built in Intel 100BaseT Ethernet
 
I have disabled both sound cards, moved all my cards around,
stopped any and all extraneous services, tried all the drivers for all the
devices in this machine [censored] back to Beta 1 of NT5.0 and nothing seems to
fix this problem.
 
Nothing is reporting errors in the event log, and the machine runs these
games flawlessly in win 98.
If its and interrupt problem I can't tell, since my MB is using the APIC
high interrupts.
 
I tried underclocking the voodoo2's to as low as 60mhz and the lockup still
occurs
 
the following games cause the hangups:
Everquest running on both the viper in d3d and the voodoo2's in glide
Unreal (original not tournament) running in both d3d (viper) and glide
(voodoo2) mode
 
the following games seem to run fine (both on the viper 770 using 3.78
nvidia ref. drivers)
Asheron's Call
NBA Live 2000
Baldurs Gate
 
If anyone has been having similar problems or can shed any light on this
problem I would greatly appreciate it. This problem has been driving me
nuts for about 6 months and is the only reason I
still have Win98 on my computer at all.
 
Ning