AH-64D Constant CTD/DCS Crash Dialog

[Flyindy]

I can't seem to get through any AH-64D mission - quick start, regular or training without crashing, either direct CTD, a blue screen with reboot or with the DCS crash dialog. When the DCS crash dialog happens, I've been sending the auto-report, but I'm wondering if there's a better way to report this (posting logs here perhaps?).

This must be something in my setup, as there would be a lot more posting about this. I can fly for 15-25 minutes and then either CTD, BSOD or DCS crash dialog happens. I've tried disabling TacView, I've installed the latest NVidia driver, I run the sim with no other apps open. I have no user mods installed (other than TacView which I've tried disabling). I've run memory scans and shuffled DIMMs on the MB.

It's constant and repeatable so should be no problem gathering logs, I've yet to complete a mission, even a training mission, without a crash. Other modules seem fine, F/A-18, A10C-II, AV-8B - I'll get a crash very occasionally, but with the AH-64D it's every flight. I do fly normally in VR with Quest 2, but I tried going back to flat screen and TrackIR (with which I found it MUCH harder to fly the Apache!) and that crashed, so I'm thinking it's probably not VR related. If it could be Windows 11 related I'm willing to wipe my whole computer and install 10 if that's what it takes. This rig was purchased with Win11 preinstalled so I can't just do a simple downgrade, so I'm hesitant to go through that just as a guess as to what's happening.

i7-11700F@2.6 GHz, 32GB RAM, Windows 11, GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, driver 522.25, Warthog throttle & stick, DCS World OpenBeta

Thanks,

Gerry

[Dallas88B]

Short of any response from others on this forum, I expect logging a support ticket including the logs etc as described here would be the go. https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/support/faq/support_ticket/

[MAXsenna]

2 hours ago, Flyindy said:

I've been sending the auto-report, but I'm wondering if there's a better way to report this (posting logs here perhaps?).

Yes, just drag and drop your DCS Log here. 

Have you over clocked your GPU? And what's you're swap file settings? 

[shagrat]

As you already did the usual RAM checks/swaps, another helpful thing to look at, is the Windows eventlog, first thing after a BSOD/Reboot. If you look at the timestamps there should be an error pointing to the "abnormal shutdown". Look at events, especially errors shortly before the crash. I once had a weird erratic crash problem and an error code/message and a bit of web search pointed to the PSU (power supply) either being faulty or at its limits. For me it was the old PSUs voltage constantly falling enough to starve the CPU.

Another thing (unlikely, as other modules seem to run just fine) could actually be heat issues... Though the crash would reliably happen under load. Anyway, if nothing else pops up it doesn't hurt to check the heat management.

Airflow not obstructed,suck-cool and push-warm, as in fans should suck in cool air from one side usually the sides or front, or the (unobstructed!!!) bottom and other fans pushing the hot air out to the back or top. Air flow over individual components e.g. CPU fan not sucking in the hot air exhaust, from the GPU. CPU cooler not blowing hot air on the back of the GPU.

Finally omit placing the PC inside a desk or similar, that obstructs the airflow leaving the system. Don't place the back with all the cables too close to a wall or other surface.

...and yes, there are things out there, you cannot imagine. I've seen PCs in a closed (!) cupboard, cables in cable management cover that blocked 80% of the fans in the back (because the cables look so ugly), a PSU fan dying a gruesome death as it had sunken into a fluffy long haired flokati rug...

Edited October 26, 2022 by shagrat

[Flyindy]

Here's a log file from the latest crash, this was a BSOD, so I'm not sure the log recorded the last part of the mission. Looking through this I noticed a couple of things - even though I disabled the TacView module within DCS, the DLL is still driving some events, so to rule this out I'm going to uninstall it completely. I also noticed a mod I had forgotten about, called Scratchpad which allows you to take notes in a window in-game. It's not in the Mods folder which is why I missed it, so I'll figure out how to uninstall that as well.

I'll try some more flights and see if I can get it to crash to the DCS crash dialog where it allows you to send files back to home base, that should have more complete information, and possibly DMP files and might help track this down.

I had tinkered with my swap file, but when that didn't help I put it back to System Managed. But looking at it now, it appears to have auto-allocated 9.278MB. That seems low, I think the idea was the swap file should be larger than that, although I've also read with 32GB of RAM the page file size isn't too critical. But I'll fiddle with this some more and see if I can get any better behavior.

This is the farthest I've gotten in this mission, this is the Reservoir Fight mission - I think it got far enough that the FARP (Paris?) should have come alive (even though I got no radio call about it, think I've read this is a known issue), but as I was going back to look is when it crashed.

And appreciate the thoughts about cooling, but this is a large case gaming PC with plenty of fans, lots of ventilation, and in a cool basement with plenty of airflow around all sides. I don't think it's a heat issue, I've been running a great campaign for the F/A-18, Operation Black Knight, and have no issues with crashes with that module. I also recently completed the Baltic Dragon free campaign for the Harrier (name escapes me now), and again no problems with Harrier missions. It's just the Apache that's causing me grief. On the plus side, I'm getting to know this Reservoir Fight mission like the back of my hand. I'll try some different missions and see if I can get a "better" crash. This mission for whatever reason usually results in the BSOD, but others will either just quit to the desktop or give me the DCS crash/send dialog. It'll crash on any mission, I've just been trying to finish this one lately. The consistent crashes are frustrating, but the Apache is so fun to fly it's almost worth it...even getting better with rockets now.

dcs.log

Forgot to mention, I haven't overclocked CPU or GPU. I'll go over those configs though, I installed the stock 3060ti with no tweaking, so I never really verified what the default settings were. You never know, it could have been overclocked at the factory or something.

[Flyindy]

Here's the latest crash, this was an Instant Action - Battle for Saipan, Hitchhiker. I got about 15 minutes in, then it just quit the program to the desktop without warning, but wasn't blue screen like last one, so it looks like it created the crash and dmp files. 

 

dcs.20221027-224934.crash dcs.20221027-224934.dmp dcs.log