Does Sacred Gold freeze the OS for you ?

[zeb_]

Well, AGP Fast Write option does not exist anymore, but I can try to diasble AGP entirely with NvAGP 0 option.

[zeb_]

Which CPU stress software do you use ?

[sobkas]

Mmmmh... I doubt this is a hardware problem. I have been playing Enemy Territory, Doom 3, Prey, Quake 4, Neverwinter Nights, Jet's and Guns, Majesty, and Penumbra on that same machine without any issue of that kind. Sacred is less demanding than Doom 3 or Enemy Territory for instance.

You might be surprised how erratic broken hardware can acts. Sacred might just use features (CPU, GPU or timing) that trigger the crash.
Don't forget to do the memtest and stress test cpu.

I'll try your recommendations though (strace and other nvidia options). Thanks for your help.

You might want to use more recent readme, one that I linked to is fairly old.

[zeb_]

Mmmmh... I doubt this is a hardware problem. I have been playing Enemy Territory, Doom 3, Prey, Quake 4, Neverwinter Nights, Jet's and Guns, Majesty, and Penumbra on that same machine without any issue of that kind. Sacred is less demanding than Doom 3 or Enemy Territory for instance.

I'll try your recommendations though (strace and other nvidia options). Thanks for your help.

[sobkas]

Hi,

I'd like to know if other people have the same issue with Sacred Gold than I have. Upon starting an adventure (for instance the gladiator), I have very soon a complete hard freeze.

Can you try running game like this:
strace -f -o sacred.log sacred
Lower your graphic settings(you might want to post them here) and try again.
After that can you try some graphic intensive program to check if bug also occurs?

Sounds loops for a couple of seconds and then the system is totally frozen (cannot change console, no response from keybord, etc.)

You might don't like it but your problem is similar(if not identical) to what was occurring to me when I had broken mainboard(due to faulty PSU).

There is no error message in console and the debug file does not reveal anything. In the case of the gladiator, this occurs as soon as the character enters the arena at the beginning. I see the same problem with other characters, and in the Underworld campaign.

This occurs in my 2 Linux distros (Mandriva 2009.1 and Arch Linux) with 2 different versions of the nvidia proprietary driver. My graphics card is a 7600GT AGP. It also happens if sound is disabled.

Try to lower agp mode and disable fast writes(I don't remember name of other option), if it doesn't help switch your card into pci mode.

http://http.download.nvidia.com/XFree86/Linux-x86/1.0-8174/README/32bit_html/appendix-f.html

I have contacted LGP about it, but they told me it would take time because I seem to be the only one to have this problem.

I am trying to find other people who have the same issue, in order to help the debugging.

Thanks a lot in advance.

I smell hardware problems rather than software ones. Especially AGP part. You should make sure that AGP card have enough power. In this case I would start from power supply. Checking capacitors on your mainboard also might help.
Generally check your hardware.

ps. I don't have this problem with sacred.

[zeb_]

Hi,

I'd like to know if other people have the same issue with Sacred Gold than I have. Upon starting an adventure (for instance the gladiator), I have very soon a complete hard freeze. Sounds loops for a couple of seconds and then the system is totally frozen (cannot change console, no response from keybord, etc.) There is no error message in console and the debug file does not reveal anything. In the case of the gladiator, this occurs as soon as the character enters the arena at the beginning. I see the same problem with other characters, and in the Underworld campaign.

This occurs in my 2 Linux distros (Mandriva 2009.1 and Arch Linux) with 2 different versions of the nvidia proprietary driver. My graphics card is a 7600GT AGP. It also happens if sound is disabled.

I have contacted LGP about it, but they told me it would take time because I seem to be the only one to have this problem.

I am trying to find other people who have the same issue, in order to help the debugging.

Thanks a lot in advance.