Masked Marauder Posted March 5, 2011 Share Posted March 5, 2011 (edited) I have this recurring problem with Vice City crashing. Sometimes within only a minute or two of playing. Sometimes I get the "unhandled exception" error, but not very often; more or less expected once in a while. Sometimes it pukes, I go to the desktop, annoying Dr. Watson tells me that VC has a problem (really?) and needs to close. But the really strange crashes are when my whole system seems to take a dump. Even the monitor gets no signal and I end up having to hit the kill switch and do a hard restart. The BIOs gets all pissy because the clock settings are all screwed up, blah blah blah. This happened twice within about 60 seconds of playing. Then I started VC a third time the same way as always. But this time after I loaded the same save file then entered the same cheat codes as always with a certain trainer I tabbed out, closed the trainer, and had a non-stop kill fest against the cops until I got tired of it. So I am wondering if this trainer is making my machine take a painful crap all of the time and if anyone else has had a similar problem? My machine is all up to snuff: processor, drivers, monitor, video card, hard drive scanned for errors and defragged, buckets of RAM, store bought copy of the game, no patches, and no mods that make major overhauls. Any input would be appreciated. I was starting to think that maybe the game crashes because it can not find a way to get me killed, busted, or even shot. But that could not be it... or could it? Thanks, Masked Marauder Edited March 5, 2011 by Masked Marauder Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Masked Marauder Posted March 6, 2011 Author Share Posted March 6, 2011 After cleaning house, and updating anything and everything that I could possibly think of, I now suspect that I just have a crappy CD ROM drive. Great, mo' money shot to unholy... hello everybody! Remove this topic if you wish, Moderation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JustADummy Posted March 6, 2011 Share Posted March 6, 2011 The BIOS failure doesn't sound like a crappy CD ROM drive. Try resetting the CMOS or put a new battery on the motherboard; the cause of the VC problems might be the trainer, the III and VC early engines are really pissy and sensible with any change. Always ending up on an Unhandled Exception. On another note: What's your OS? Dr. Watson directly telling you there was an error sounds like Windows 98 (though others also use the Dr. Watson engine) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Masked Marauder Posted March 6, 2011 Author Share Posted March 6, 2011 $116.00 later for a new video card and problem solved; so it seems. I am SO glad that I quit buying higher end stuff some time ago because this stuff just seems to puke on demand. My previous card was only a year and a half old for pity sake! Had a USB controller that did the same thing recently. I told the salesman that if I crashed my car into a tree that, yeah, there could be something wrong here. But stuff like graphics cards and what not it's just "POOF!" done. Running XP SP 3 cuz Vista blows and I was too late for the 7 upgrade. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JustADummy Posted March 6, 2011 Share Posted March 6, 2011 I actually thought for a while you were running an old machine But good it got solved, the graphics card can be a very hard to diagnose problem too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Masked Marauder Posted March 6, 2011 Author Share Posted March 6, 2011 Thank you for your input Spider Vice. The salesman said either the video card or overheating. I could not imagine overheating all of the sudden, especially since I keep my machine fairly clean and I had no signal to the monitor even if I let it sit for a while. After my controller had puked so instantly I thought that maybe the same thing had happened to the card. Turned out to be true. Thanks again! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Masked Marauder Posted March 10, 2011 Author Share Posted March 10, 2011 Since my problem has been diagnosed, I do not know how long this topic will remain available. But in case there some members or visitors reading this who are trying to solve a similar problem: If your machine abruptly shuts down and restarts. If your game (downright old or somewhat newer) crashes frequently - sometimes with a minute or two, yet sometimes not at all, and you often end up with no signal to your monitor and end up having to do a hard system restart. If you game copy is legal and legitimately purchased (you are not missing anything and no files are corrupt or incompatible). If you have scanned for system errors, defragmented your drive(s), have all drivers up to date with the correct versions, and meet or exceed the necessary system requirements. If you have no mods installed that could be corrupt or contain errors of some kind. - - There is a very good chance that your video/graphics card has puked or is puking out. - - The card that recently expired was an nVidia GT220. The only other possible cause given to me when I talked to a computer tech/salesperson was overheating, but this problem could happen shortly after system start up, so I did not give that option much credibility. Since I have had more than 2 USB controllers crap out on me practically instantly, I leaned more towards the burned out video card, even though I had never heard of it happening to things like that before. I have been doing a lot of work on 3D models in a C++ Visual environment and playing a lot of 3D immersed games, so perhaps the card just "wore out". Hopefully this information helps others who MAY be having the same issue. It's better than coughing up $50.00 or more to have a computer service tech figure out in 60 seconds what is wrong, then another $100.00+ for a new video card. Good luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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