TheNightTerror on 13/1/2005 at 17:26

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Bah. I'm getting very sick of this. Almost every single time I try to alt+tab out of Deus Ex, I get this error:



The numbers vary usually, but that's the one I was looking at just now. Does anyone know what this means? I've found several threads like this but nobody had answers. It seems like, sometimes, if I wiggle the mouse as I'm alt-tabbing out of the game, it can stop a crash. However, it's not a guarantee.

Now, most people would simply stop alt-tabbing out of the game, but I'm thinking of writing a walkthrough for the game. More detailed than my notes on playing melee only, but not as much as my System Shock 2 walkthrough. I wrote the latter by alt-tabbing out of the game to write down what I'd just done in game, and did every few seconds.

Also, this game seems to be running alot worse than it should be. Sometimes it runs almost as smoothly as System Shock 2, other times a few problems can happen. There's the hiccup: the game will seem to pause for an instant, stop displaying any new changes on screen, then continue on like nothing happened, and do this every few seconds for minutes on end.

Another frequent problem is everything seeming to run in slow motion. It seems to happen most commonly when I'm hacking a security terminal, and there are 3 camera views of different areas of the map. It's hard to get all 3 cameras turned off due to the mouse moving so slowly, but I can usually manage it. Still, does anyone know what might be causing this?

Another final problem, which I think may be memory related and quite possibly linked to the visual hiccups, is with the audio. Sometimes, during conversations JC has with someone, there's very short drop outs in the sound. For example, Manderley's bathroom warning, if it gets buggered up, would sound something like this: "-y the way -enton, -tay out of the la-ies restro-om." I don't listen to the conversations much anymore partially for this reason, usually just click through them until there's a choice in what to say back. Assuming I've shut down every program I can, this problem is very infrequent, but Word seems to gobble enough memory to almost definitely ensure this problem will occur at some point. Any ideas on a way of fixing this?

My computer stats are as follows:

Pentium IV 2.8 gigahertz processor
512 megabytes of memory
64 megabyte Radeon IGP 345M

I have every setting possible maxed out on DX, I'm not sure which settings I should try reducing to get better performance. Just a quick note, reducing to 16 bit textures is completely out of the question. Why? Anything placed on the walls does (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v311/TheNightTerror/shot0080.jpg) this, it's rather annoying, to say the least.

Thanks, I shall cease my ramblings now. :cheeky: Any help will be greatly appreciated, and anyone who manages to help me kill the general protection faults will probably get a thank you note should I ever survive writing the walkthrough. ;)

JDAdams on 13/1/2005 at 18:32

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Does that card have a second VGA out? You could hook up a second monitor and have Word (or Wordpad - less of a memory hog) up on that - the pen / paper option might be cheaper though.

hayaku on 14/1/2005 at 06:34

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I get this when I alt+tab too..... its very annoying.

JDAdams on 17/1/2005 at 18:35

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The main VGA out is the one you use to hook your (first) monitor up - if you've got another one of these (or a DVI port - those are a load of dots with a small cross next to them) you'll need another monitor. f you've got an RCA output (should be yellow) on your PC and an RCA input (also yellow) on your TV you should just be able to run a cable between them. If your TV's only got an RF (aerial) connection, you'll need to use an RF modulator - any old consoles you've got lying around should have one of these with a compatible connector - the Genesis or SNES ones would certainly do.

JDAdams on 17/1/2005 at 21:01

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Try opening user.ini in your DX directory, scroling to the [Engine.Input] section and adding the line f=togglefullscreen (or another key - f might be a bit too easy to hit accidentally) - I'm intigued about that laptop - maybe it's an s-video out port - does it have for small holes around a big square one? If it does an s-video lead and a compatible socket on your TV's what you need.