Help With Crashes

[aaronwhite]

Good morning!

There's a long list of crash logs in my F-4 thread, as initially, I was thinking the crashes were just unique to the F-4 from Heatblur, however through testing, I've discovered that they aren't and are happening through DCS as a whole, and also happening with the model viewer at times.

My system specs are as follows: 
Processor: Intel® Core™ i9-14900KS Processor (8X 3.20GHz + 16X 2.40GHz/36MB L3 Cache)
Motherboard: ASUS PRIME Z790-V WiFi - WiFi 5, ARGB Header (3), USB 3.2 Ports (1 Type-C, 3 Type-A), M.2 Slot (3)
Memory: 64 GB [32 GB X2] DDR5-6000MHz Memory Module - Certified Major Brand Gaming Memory
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER - 16GB GDDR6X (DLSS 3.5 – AI-Powered Performance) PNY VERTO OC
Power Supply: 1000 Watt - CORSAIR RM1000e - 80 PLUS Gold PCIe GEN 5, Fully Modular
Primary Storage: 1TB WD Blue SN580 M.2 PCIe GEN 4 NVMe SSD

I've tried a variety of solutions so far. I have re-installed a clean DCS copy about 6 times now. I initially started with DCS on my primary SSD, but moved it over to my spare SSD to see if maybe the SSD itself was causing issues. I've tried rolling back my GPU drivers, lowering graphics settings to the lowest possible, and just trying to run a few small missions to see, all without any luck so far. The crashes still happen, and I still see a few odd messages in the error logs. This morning I wanted to see if the SSD move helped, so I fired up a little mission I threw together with the Apache and still crashed about 10 minutes into startup. With the F-4 I had been testing previously the most, I was trying out training missions and custom made missions, and the crashes also happened randomly then as well. Yesterday's crash was a hard crash that required me to completely hard-reset the computer, while the one this morning just crashed it to the desktop. 

Here's the link to my previous thread with a handful of crash logs in it.

I'm going to run a test on my RAM just to eliminate that option, but the computer is brand new and only seems to be running into problems with DCS, which is a bit of a bummer, as it's the game I was most looking forward to flying on the new computer. Anyhow, interested to see if anyone has any ideas about a potential cause. 

Just to recap my fix attempts: No mods installed, full repair multiple times, full clean install multiple times in different locations, attempted to run MT and standard DCS, rolled back and updated GPU drivers. I think that's everything I can think of. 

Thanks!

dcs.log

[aaronwhite]

Alright, hopeful update. Disabled XMP in the BIOS and started up my previously-crashed Apache mission on the Caucasus map. There's not much going on, just a few AI flights and then some client slots I can jump into for helicopters. 

Anyhow, I had created a FARP and had some AI AH-1W's take off from there, so I just left the camera there while logging into work, and after about 5 minutes, they took off and flew off. Noticing there hadn't been a crash yet, I jumped into the Apache slot and started the startup process and got through startup as best as I could (I didn't have my TrackIR going or my HOTAS on my desk, so it was all just mouse clicking) and it didn't crash at that point either.

I'm cautiously optimistic the XMP may have solved it, but I'll give it the ultimate test on my lunch break by testing out the F-4 training mission to see what happens.

[AdrianL]

Your log is showing IC failures of some files. 

So re-run the repair now that you have disabled XMP 

[aaronwhite]

2 minutes ago, AdrianL said:

Your log is showing IC failures of some files. 

So re-run the repair now that you have disabled XMP 

Not a bad idea! I'll give that a shot, since I've got meetings until I can test it until lunch. I've noticed that one popped up a few times, which is odd, since this install is clean from last night and hadn't been run until this morning. I'm going to block the directory from Defender just to be safe, even though I haven't noticed any indicators that Defender has been quarantining files.

[aaronwhite]

Well, mixed bag now. Did the full repair and then launched it with XMP turned off, and the game was running fine, with a few little stutters of a half second or less, where you could hear the fans kick up a bit then it would go back to the training mission. Made it through the F-4 first training mission just fine, loaded up the 2nd one to see, and managed to get through a few minutes of that one, but then there was a stutter and eventual freeze before the computer rebooted. 

I ran this log through the Discord log checker, and it just recommended turning down some settings, and wasn't flagging the IC failure, so I'm not entirely sure what caused that. I do still see a bunch of random ERROR messages, like "ERROR   ED_SOUND (Main): invalid source_params(F4E_PILOT_COCKPIT:aircrafts/f-4e/cockpit/f4e_ecs_int_fl): gain" in the log pre-crash, and after the handoff of controls, but I'm not sure if that's related. This is all post a full rebuild, which is still all running on a full clean install from just last night with nothing else installed into the game. I've got Saved Games and my DCS folder excluded from Defender, and no signs of any files being quarantined or anything like that. 

I'll spin it up again and see if I can fly around in the Apache mission I created. 

dcs.log

[aaronwhite]

Another mixed bag. This mission did last way longer. I was able to take off and fly around in the Apache for a bit. It's not too much going on, just overcast and some artillery and a few other AI units scattered around. I think I flew for maybe 20 minutes or so before the game stuttered and then locked up and crashed on me. 

I could hear my fans working, and pulled Task Manager up just to see if anything caught my eye. I think I launched the standard single core, and per the suggestions of the Discord log checking bot, I turned DLAA on, SSLR and SSAO both to off. Watching task manager while flying, it looked like GPU was sitting around 100% utilization (not sure if that's normal or not, though I assume maybe, since Model Viewer runs the same way) while the GPU's dedicated memory usage seemed to hang around 13.6 of 16GB during the flight If I remember correctly, GPU temps were around 63F. RAM usage seemed to hit around 40% of the 64GB available, and seemed to hang there pretty consistently, and I didn't notice a ton of CPU usage. 

I'll throw the log in here, but oddly, after just running it through the Discord log analyzer, it's showing that it's failed IC check again, which is odd, since nothing's changed since the last boot that didn't show that. 

@BIGNEWY Any ideas on what might cause the random IC issues? I see a bunch of errors for failed checks on resources like the Apache's external FLIR dds texture, and being unable to load ED_SOUND files that look to be tied to the Mi-8 (Shared sound file for the Apache, perhaps?). I just can't figure out if DCS thinks these files are missing, can't access them for one reason or another, or what. This is after a clean install and two full repairs now at this point, so I would have to assume the odds of a missing file should be slim, but my time in computers has taught me they can always surprise you with their nonsense. Obviously, it's a bit of an apples-to-oranges comparison, but scrolling through a log someone just uploaded to the LogAnalyzer, they don't show any of those same missing element errors, so I'm definitely puzzled over this one.

I'll keep testing, but I'll also throw the latest log in below.

 

dcs.log

Edited June 4, 2024 by aaronwhite

[silverdevil]

4 hours ago, aaronwhite said:

I'm going to block the directory from Defender just to be safe

null

[aaronwhite]

15 minutes ago, silverdevil said:

null

That's what I've got at the moment (well, the DCS and Saved Games anyway) so that's hopefully not an issue. I'll have to keep digging. 

[aaronwhite]

Another day, another crash. Any chance there's any idea what to do next, @BIGNEWY or anyone else with ED? The crash logs all seem to be the same, but I'm running out of solutions on my end. I hate to think the only idea left is to just uninstall DCS and try again another day. I was looking at grabbing the Kiowa and Kola maps, but it doesn't seem like there's any sense in that if there's no way to know if I can play for more than 10 minutes.

At this point I've rolled back drivers, re-installed them, I've repaired the game more times than I can count, done about 4 clean installs of DCS without anything added or changed, tried running with multithreading and without, run as Admin and without, and checked all of my components as well. I've excluded the game and saved game directories from Defender and tried a variety of game settings. Everything on my end seems to be fine, I've plugged my computer directly into the wall and the GPU, RAM, processor and hard drive all checked out without problem. DCS seems to be the only game running into issues, but I'm out of ideas on what to try now.

dcs.log

Edited June 9, 2024 by aaronwhite

[kfrasson]

I had issues. submitted a ticket. I was told to not use MT as it is full of bugs. C:\program files\eagle dynamics\dcs world\bin. Inside that Foder is an application. I ran it and most of my issues were gone. Not sure about the F4E though.

[aaronwhite]

18 minutes ago, kfrasson said:

I had issues. submitted a ticket. I was told to not use MT as it is full of bugs. C:\program files\eagle dynamics\dcs world\bin. Inside that Foder is an application. I ran it and most of my issues were gone. Not sure about the F4E though.

Hey, I'll give that a shot. At this point, I'm desperate for anything that will get me flying again. Appreciate it!

[aaronwhite]

20 hours ago, kfrasson said:

I had issues. submitted a ticket. I was told to not use MT as it is full of bugs. C:\program files\eagle dynamics\dcs world\bin. Inside that Foder is an application. I ran it and most of my issues were gone. Not sure about the F4E though.

Alright, you may be my hero here on this. I forgot that the default launcher I guess is multithreading now, but it looks like specifically launching the single thread DCS version has prevented my crashing and fixed a lot of the choppiness I was having.

I'm going to keep investigating today and see if I'm able to complete the training with the F-4 and fly around without crashing. Before I was always hesitant, because I could let my created mission run in the background without me doing anything, and it might run for an hour or so, but as soon as I went and rolled out for takeoff or got the thing setup, it would crash.

But so far, today, trying your suggestion, I've been able to fly the AH-64 for about 30 minutes, including a startup and flight over/through some high density Georgian areas, and then fly my Hornet over the same region with some pretty thick SAM coverage running the Skynet script and not crash (yet). 

I'll try and get some more flying in at lunch and see where I am. Thanks again!

[aaronwhite]

Well, I've had two flights now, one just flying around in my AH-64 through a busy Caucasus map, and another successfully completing the Takeoff and Navigation F-4E tutorial. No stutters or crashes. It looks like, for me, my magical solution was as @kfrasson suggested to go into the \bin folder in the DCS core directory and manually run the single-thread DCS.exe file. 

With that, I also seemed to need to disable SSAO and SSLR. I might try turning one or the other on to see what happens, and I guess I'll keep an eye on future DCS updates to see if someday I can actually take advantage of multi-threading and the other graphics updates that my computer should be able to run with the specs I've got. But at least in the meantime, I'm able to actually fly and enjoy the game again, so thanks kfrasson for the suggestion!

[kfrasson]

This was ED's idea, glad it helped!