Possible Fix for HL2 Sound Loop Crash

By 12Iceman
in PC Gaming

 Share

Recommended Posts

Mentor

12Iceman

Posted
Posted (edited)

I decided to take a break from CS:S and loaded up HL2 and every time i tried to play after about 5-15 minutes the game would freeze and the last sound played would loop over and over. I had to CTRL-ALT-DEL and end the hl2.exe process in order to get back to desktop.

I searched google (didn't find anything that was usefull) and consulted the valve support article My games crash with sound looping over and over, usually no error messages which recommended I update all the drivers on my system (pretty much the we don't have a clue so try this approach). So I did what the article recommended, I upgraded my motherboard drivers (to nForce UDP 5.10), audio drivers (nForce Audio Driver 4.62) and video drives (Catalyst 5.10). I also fiddled with a bunch of cvars I found on google that were supposed to help (like -heapsize xxx), but no luck. The game still crashed.

Finally, I thought about why the game worked on my laptop (mobile 9700) and not my desktop (9600XT) and thought maybe since i was using the omega drivers on my laptop and the ati ones on my desktop that maybe the omega drivers somehow fixed the problem.

I remembered that I saw that the Omega Drivers defaulted to fast writes off and the ati ones defaulted to fast writes on, so I gave it a shot and turned off fast writes, and sure enough now my game works.

So to fix the problem, right click on desktop, go to properties, settings, advanced, SMARTGART, and set Fast Writes to off. Reboot, and now instead of the game freezing, the game will just slow down every once in a while for a few seconds and then speed back up again.

I can now play at 1280x1024 at max settings (but with AA and AF off) and get around 60 FPS average. This may not work for everyone, but so far it has seemed to fix my problem.

Edited by 12Iceman
Mentor

12Iceman

Posted
  • Author
Posted (edited)

The game would freeze and the sound would just continue loop over and over again. I usually ended the process after waiting a couple minutes for the game to come back, but the one time i let it just sit there, it eventually crashed to desktop with a "Memory cannot be read" error.

Edit: The setting might be in a different spot if you are using the Catalyst Control Center, I was using the Control Panel. Just poke around the CCC and hopefully there will be a FASTGART option in their somewhere. It might also be possible to disable fast writes in your motherboard's bios.

Edited by 12Iceman
Grand Master

ozgeek

Posted
Posted

I have been having this problem which is why I am replacing my ****ty ATI Radoen X300 with a nVidia 7800GT.

With the X300, I would be playing ANY game, yes ANY game, and it would at random freeze and the sound loops and then my screen would change to blank and then scrambled and then back to the game, but the pc is frozen forcing me to restart the computer.

I know why: atimag.dll has ended up in an infinite loop and wants me to install new drivers which I have many times after un-installing the old drivers well enough. I went back to the drivers that came with the card. Still the same.

I can't disable Fast Writes because this card is PCI-E based. Fast Writes is for AGP cards. I searched all over the internet and the fixes always point to AGP cards and not PCI-E card which I have.

  • 4 weeks later...
  • 1 year later...
This topic is now closed to further replies.
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

  • Posts

    • This hidden Windows 11 setting makes the system feel a lot faster

      By Raa · Posted

      Windows 2000, actually.
    • End of an era? Kubuntu is removing default support for X11 in new installs

      By Good Bot, Bad Bot · Posted

      So is Ubuntu and Fedora (with GNOME). It's a welcome move and those that need X11 can easily install as pointed out in the article it but that won't stop a loud minority from whining of course. Funny but It will actually be easier to install X11 on Ubuntu then enable Flatpak support/Flathub and use them.
    • End of an era? Kubuntu is removing default support for X11 in new installs

      By David Uzondu · Posted

      End of an era? Kubuntu is removing default support for X11 in new installs by David Uzondu X11, the old window system whose days have long felt numbered, just saw another one of its major supporters head for the exit. Kubuntu has decided to follow its parent distro's lead, making its next release, version 25.10, a Wayland-only affair for fresh installs. It seems many Linux developers see Wayland as the future. Just recently, Linux Mint started working to improve support for the protocol in Cinnamon, tackling lingering issues with keyboard layouts and input methods. You can even see the progress in KDE's development, where an upgrade to Wayland PiP is planned for KDE Plasma 6.5. So what's the logic behind dropping a session that, for the most part, still works? According to Kubuntu's Rik Mills, the team wants to "rip off this sticking plaster" now, in an interim release, rather than ###### off a lot of people by doing it in the next Long-Term Support version, 26.04. The developers feel that maintaining code for the aging X11 system holds back progress on security and new features that Wayland can enable more easily. Plus, supporting two separate display servers is a massive undertaking. Of course, this change might have some people worried, but relax; all is not lost if you still need the old session. If you're running hardware that acts up, like some older NVIDIA cards, or who relies on an ancient application that doesn't play nicely with the XWayland compatibility layer, you can still get your familiar session back. Just enter the following command in your terminal: sudo apt install plasma-session-x11 Once that command finishes, the X11 session will appear as an option on the login screen, so you can carry on as before. As OMGUbuntu notes, not everyone in the Ubuntu family is following its lead just yet. Other official flavors like Xubuntu, Ubuntu Budgie, and Ubuntu Cinnamon are expected to keep offering an X11 session on their default installs for this cycle.
    • Steam overlay's FPS counter gets major upgrade to show CPU and VRAM usage, temps, and more

      By MikeK13 · Posted

      Mangohud hasn't been built into "Steam Deck", it has been built into SteamOS. I understand that your goal is to try and praise MS for a simple feature that everyone else has, but we are comparing OS vs OS. Hardware does not have anything "built-in". Software does. Like it or not, SteamOS has it "built-in". And it is far superior to XBOX game bar's information.
    • Apple releases massive slide deck to help children convince their parents to buy them a Mac

      By Good Bot, Bad Bot · Posted

      Please don't inject yourself into a discussion you did not read or understand what was said. No where did I say Windows was hard to use. I knew when seen two notifications with your handle the replies they were going to be a waste of time to read.

  • Recent Achievements

    • First Post
      Johnny Mrkvička earned a badge
      First Post
    • Week One Done
      viraltui earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      serfegyed earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Dedicated
      firey earned a badge
      Dedicated
    • Dedicated
      fettermanj earned a badge
      Dedicated

  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      643
    2. 2
      Michael Scrip
      221
    3. 3
      ATLien_0
      218
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      143
    5. 5
      Xenon
      142
    Show More

  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!