Okay - in my desperate attempt for answers - I turn to the public for assistance. I have this newly built PC which should not be having any problems... 512 MB SD RAM, Mobo is Abit VP6 (dual CPU motherboard but as of now I am only running one) OS is Win 98 SE, CPU is 700E overclocked to 133 FSB, Graphics card is a GE Force 2 GTS, sound card is Soundblaster Live Value, Cable internet connection - not sure what other system specs to provide here.

Anyway, to make a long story short...I play a game - online - and it has an auto-patch program that loads upon startup. The last patch loaded and when it did - I was thrown back to my desktop - only this time my screen resolution was an unbearable 300x230 (or something to that effect) - the problems I had just trying to fix the resolution! It took me a grueling 4 hours because i couldn't see what I was doing. Since this happened - I have been having problems loading Windows and my computer is just locking up. The screen freezes and i can't move the mouse, or type on the keyboard - so I can't do a proper shutdown. Sometimes it takes an hour for it to lock up and sometimes it takes five minutes - other times it just won't even fully load Windows. I ran Norton - fully optimized the Hard drive - scanned the registry - did a full cleanup. I am wondering what else I can do? I'm not sure what would cause this problem or if there is anything I can do to even fix it. I can barely use the PC like this. Any ideas or suggestions are appreciated and thanks in advance.

oops - forgot to add one possibly important bit of information - when the resolution went to about 300x230 - i had to restart a bunch of times to see what I was doing. I tried to start it in safe mode - F8, F8, F8 - and it wouldn't boot into safe mode at all - no matter how many times I hit the button. Not sure if that's relevant.

PS - been reading the posts and I'm learning a great deal. This site is great! So glad I found it! I'll be back often.

The first thing you need to do is Not Over clock the system .
At least until you have it stable . ( You don’t have a stable system)

So set the system to normal settings and speeds.
To Work out the bugs .

Until then there is not much I can do to help you.
Not knowing if it’s the OC or the software causing the problem.

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[This message has been edited by Rick (edited 01-25-2002).]

Done - system is now running with normal specs. Still have the same problems with locking up.

Hmmm....I could do a windows reinstall - but I don't think that's the problem since norton says everything is A-OK. Don't think it's the processor - it's running smoothly - even when overclocked it runs smoothly - has to be one of the most commonly overclocked CPU's.

Here's a question - could a game patch really hinder a system's capabilities? If this occured only while in game I would consider it to be a routing issue or something - but while in any application I now get the problem.

I am just baffled.

It sounds like the patch kicked the bucket in the middle of something....and if it corrupted/replaced (or not replaced) a systems file the yep any program could have problems....you can run the system file checker...type sfc in the run box and seeif any of yoursystems files where chnaged around the time the problem started.

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

checked that already - but do believe i am getting closer to figuring out what this is.

After the patch - the resolution just snapped. So, it seems to me that whatever the patch did - it bypassed the video somehow (possibly the reason why i couldn't start in safe mode - because doesn't that always start in 640 x 480. The most recent addition to this long list of problems is a strange twitching on my display. I think it must be something with the video. Why or how that would make my entire system freeze up is beyond me - but this is a machine! machines can be fixed!!! I am determined to somehow fix the darned thing.

Have you tried uninstalling and re-installing your video card drivers?

Sounds like some systems file is corrupted and one likely culprit is the video drivers.....or it could not be the patch at all...it could be the video card, try pulling it and trying it in another machine.

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

Hmmm...okay - tried all of the above. Today an interesting scenario arose - was playing the game when CRASH...went back into Windows with a system warning...make sure you have at least 200 MB of free hard drive space on C drive -not enough memory - yada yada yada- checked - on C drive alone I have 4 free gigs. i'm really confused now.

Hmmm, could be a DirectX problem. Have you ran DX diagnostics? Start/Run, type dxdiag, run through all the tabs and check everything out. Many many times when you're bumped back to the desktop from a game, it's because of incompatibility between the video card drivers and/or DirectX.

Something to chew on.



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This space reserved for highly intelligent observations and witty remarks.

"From up on the roof top there came such a clamor, I ran to the window and threw up"
-- Tommy Smothers

Also, what is your AGP aperature size?

With 512MB you are pushing it....iver 512MB Win9x has problems with memory and if you have a large (over 64MB) for the AGP aperature size you can have problems.

Are you manageing your swapfile or letting windows do it?

If you are you may want to try bumping it up a little in size........and clear out the temp file.

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.