Intel HD Graphics Crashes

[sven]

game_891
It's an early game, nothing massive is going on yet. My "recepy" against crashes was to don't play long, exiting to have a tea or even to check the forum. Yesterday I've played about 6 hours without exiting.

So to clarify -- in this case, had the game been running for about 6 hours before it crashed?

Do you remember if you played any maps other than this one before the crash occurred?

[bjg]

Yes, about 6 hours, may be even more. Isn't this in the logs?
No, I haven't played other maps. Started that one quite early (game time), and continued it. Loaded previous saves several times (not too many), but didn't exit the game.

[sven]

Yes, about 6 hours, may be even more. Isn't this in the logs?
No, I haven't played other maps. Started that one quite early (game time), and continued it. Loaded previous saves several times (not too many), but didn't exit the game.

Thanks for the info. In the case of an out-of-memory crash, my logging becomes less reliable. I can make educated guesses, but, it's not always clear what's happened. (Updating the log files sometimes requires a small amount of working memory, and so a crash handler may run into difficultly when trying to record information about the crash.)

[Theodotus]

So now that I've had the opportunity to play SIS a bit:

I've been looking over your beta testing logs, and you have indeed logged quite a few hours over the last 3 days! From what I can tell, you're playing on a machine with an Intel HD Graphics 4600 adapter; and you have experienced 3 crashes while running with the 32-bit binary (sis.exe). However, you've also been doing a lot of testing using sis64.exe, and as best as I can tell, it's never crashed for you. Is this correct?

If so, it may be about time to change the updater / installer scripts so any new players on an Intel HD Graphics machine are sent to the 64-binary automatically.

Also -- can I ask how the game has been performing for you? (If you hit ctrl+h in an end-game map, what fps numbers do you typically see?)

Thanks again for all the testing and feedback.

The game invariably crashes while loading either 32-bit or 64-bit if it tries to use the Intel adapter. It runs with no crashes so far if I use the Nvidia card in the laptop. (I haven't tried the 32-bit version in conjunction with the Nvidia card.)

I always have to make sure, after every update, to use the Nvidia control panel to set the .exe to use the Nvidia card, as it seems to default to the Intel adapter, which then causes the game to crash while loading.

It seems to me that it's not 32-bit or 64-bit that matters, but whether the game tries to use the Intel adapter or the Nvidia card.

I haven't made it to an end game yet, as the updates have come along frequently enough in the last three days that I've started over several times. But the game's performance has been very smooth and responsive.

The game is most excellent, even in it's current unfinished state. I can't wait for the diplomacy system to be added in.

[sven]

The game invariably crashes while loading either 32-bit or 64-bit if it tries to use the Intel adapter. It runs with no crashes so far if I use the Nvidia card in the laptop. (I haven't tried the 32-bit version in conjunction with the Nvidia card.)

Ok -- glad I asked. I was badly mis-interpreting those logs.

I always have to make sure, after every update, to use the Nvidia control panel to set the .exe to use the Nvidia card, as it seems to default to the Intel adapter, which then causes the game to crash while loading.

This is not good. To clarify -- is the crash when using the Intel adapter a crash during program startup, or does it crash while you're playing the game?

It seems to me that it's not 32-bit or 64-bit that matters, but whether the game tries to use the Intel adapter or the Nvidia card.

The Nvidia opengl drivers do tend to work much better with the game. I suspect that if you switch back to using the 32 bit build with your Nvidia adapter, you may get slightly higher framerates, at a slightly larger (but still very small) risk of memory crashes.

I haven't made it to an end game yet, as the updates have come along frequently enough in the last three days that I've started over several times.

It's not usually this bad. As a general rule, I try to refrain from posting patches that warrant a "bug warning" on older saves. But over the last week, it seems like every new build includes a fix with a bug warning.

But as an FYI, I tend to err on the side of caution when marking saves as "bugs likely". Many beta testers just ignore those warnings entirely -- if it's just a ship spec or weapon change, all it really means is that you may need to redesign some of your ships. If a patch includes serious breaking change, I'll mark old saves as "incompatible". That's only happened a handful of times in the life of the beta.

But the game's performance has been very smooth and responsive.

Good! You were fortunate enough to come in shortly after a large set of performance improvements went into the beta, and if you've noticed no latency, that suggests that those changes are paying off

[Theodotus]

The game invariably crashes while loading either 32-bit or 64-bit if it tries to use the Intel adapter. It runs with no crashes so far if I use the Nvidia card in the laptop. (I haven't tried the 32-bit version in conjunction with the Nvidia card.)

Ok -- glad I asked. I was badly mis-interpreting those logs.

I always have to make sure, after every update, to use the Nvidia control panel to set the .exe to use the Nvidia card, as it seems to default to the Intel adapter, which then causes the game to crash while loading.

This is not good. To clarify -- is the crash when using the Intel adapter a crash during program startup, do does it crash while you're playing the game?

It seems to me that it's not 32-bit or 64-bit that matters, but whether the game tries to use the Intel adapter or the Nvidia card.

The Nvidia opengl driver's do tend to work much better with the game. I suspect that if you switch back to using the 32 bit build with your Nvidia adapter, you may get slightly higher framerates, at a slightly larger (but still very small) risk of memory crashes.

I haven't made it to an end game yet, as the updates have come along frequently enough in the last three days that I've started over several times.

It's not usually this bad. As a general rule, I try to refrain from posting patches that warrant a "bug warning" on older saves. But over the last week, it seems like every new build includes a fix with a bug warning.

But as an FYI, I tend to err on the side of caution when marking saves as "bugs likely". Many beta testers just ignore those warnings entirely -- if it's just a ship spec or weapon change, all it really means is that you may need to redesign some of your ships. If a patch includes serious breaking change, I'll mark old saves as "incompatible". That's only happened a handful of times in the life of the beta.

But the game's performance has been very smooth and responsive.

Good! You were fortunate enough to come in shortly after a large set of performance improvements went into the beta, and if you've noticed no latency, that suggests that those changes are paying off

No latency at all, except the very first time I started the game, when there was some lag on the race selection screen. But then that cleared up, and there's been none since.

The crash when using the adapter happens almost as soon as the game starts loading. I've never actually made it into the game when using the adapter.

The 64-bit version works so well that I don't feel any need for higher framerates. But I'll try the 32-bit version for testing purposes sometime soon.

Good to know about the difference between "bugs likely'" and "incompatible". Next game I start, I'll see if I can't get to the finish.

[sven]

The crash when using the adapter happens almost as soon as the game starts loading. I've never actually made it into the game when using the adapter.

Ok. In a way, that's good news. Crashes during program load are very rare, and there are plenty of beta testers with Intel Adapters who have never run into one. That said, crashes on launch are actually more likely the first time you run the game. Can you confirm that the Intel adapter crash has happened for you after successfully running with the NVIDIA adapter?

In any case my hunch would be that the crash is somehow connected to the interactions between your two video adapters -- and that's an issue that can be worked around. I will need to see if there's anything I can do to save people the hassle of going into the NVIDIA control panel to get the game working properly. (I suspect there is -- and it may be a pretty easy feature to add, actually.)

Thanks again for all your feedback -- and for the debugging help.

[Theodotus]

The crash when using the adapter happens almost as soon as the game starts loading. I've never actually made it into the game when using the adapter.

Ok. In a way, that's good news. Crashes during program load are very rare, and there are plenty of beta testers with Intel Adapters who have never run into one. That said, crashes on launch are actually more likely the first time you run the game. Can you confirm that the Intel adapter crash has happened for you after successfully running with the NVIDIA adapter?

In any case my hunch would be that the crash is somehow connected to the interactions between your two video adapters -- and that's an issue that can be worked around. I will need to see if there's anything I can do to save people the hassle of going into the NVIDIA control panel to get the game working properly. (I suspect there is -- and it may be a pretty easy feature to add, actually.)

Thanks again for all your feedback -- and for the debugging help.

I'll need to specifically test whether running with the Nvidia card fixes the problem with the Intel adapter. (I've never running with the Intel adapter after setting the .exe to use the Nvidia card.) I should be able to test that tomorrow.

You're most welcome for the feedback. I've beta tested games before, and this is the most fun game I've ever tested.

[Theodotus]

I tried out running the 64-bit .exe with the Intel adapter, after loading it using the Nvidia card, and it loaded fine with the adapter under those circumstances. So it appears you were right -- once it runs one time with the Nvidia card, that solves whatever the problem is with Intel adapter. This is under 14902.

If you could make it so that the program detects and auto-selects whatever other graphics card is in a computer besides the Intel adapter, I think that would solve the entire situation. (I don't know how possible that is, however.)

I'm going to try to play this next game all the way to the end. (That may take me a couple of days, given time/work constraints.) I'll post any issues I encounter.

[sven]

I tried out running the 64-bit .exe with the Intel adapter, after loading it using the Nvidia card, and it loaded fine with the adapter under those circumstances. So it appears you were right -- once it runs one time with the Nvidia card, that solves whatever the problem is with Intel adapter. This is under 14902.

Ok -- that all fits with what I think I understand about these bugs. The crash on launch was probably triggered by an "asset build" problem -- and that's a catagory of bugs that should go away once we start shipping a much larger library of "pre built" art. (And those changes are scheduled to happen when we get setup to start distributing via Steam.)

If you could make it so that the program detects and auto-selects whatever other graphics card is in a computer besides the Intel adapter, I think that would solve the entire situation. (I don't know how possible that is, however.)

It's on my list of things to look into today. We'll see if there's an easy windows API call or something I can take advantage of.

I'm going to try to play this next game all the way to the end. (That may take me a couple of days, given time/work constraints.) I'll post any issues I encounter.

Best of luck! Be aware there's one more "bugs likely" change in the pipeline, but, as long as you're not playing Phidi, it most probably won't affect you.

[bjg]

Something is wrong with 64 bit version after the last update. Takes way longer to start, fps on the start screen is only 2. Don't even try to start a game. I've seen it happening before from time to time, but restarting the game helped. Now it's consistent (even after restarting the laptop).
The start screen fps on the 32 bit version is 60, but in the past the 32 bit version had crashed on me after a short while (about 30 minutes, for sure under an hour), so I've stick to the 64 bit.

Update: the 32 bit version wont even "continue" the game now - crashes with "out of video memory" error.

[Arioch]

I have noticed that starting or loading a game seems longer in recent builds (especially with the 64-bit version), but I don't have any hard evidence of this yet. I'm wondering if this might be some kind of interaction with the FMOD version.

[bjg]

It worked fine today (before the last update), and the new FMOD is there a few days, isn't it?

The 64 bit version hadn't loaded the game after 10 minutes of waiting, giving up for now.

[zakblood]

i'm breaking a habit posting here, as i tend to not wander off and read others posts, as i'm not here for this, so will be a once only post with no replies.

Open the Nvidia Control Panel and locate Manage 3D Settings. Change, in both Global and Program, the Preferred Graphics Processor to High Performance NVIDIA Processor.

for those who have dual GPU laptops, as it's a common problem that games aren't sure which one to use.

next is going into power settings and alter power and sleep, to high performance in mains only, and don't run the game off batteries.

next tip if you have 2 hard drives, is back in power and sleep, look for hard drives and make sleep = 0

as windows has a tendency to make drives sleep if they aren't in use, which can hang a game or app once woken if you have either a laptop with one drive or a desktop with 2.

last tip is, don't let the bios assign to much to the onboard GPU, it only has to be a % of the overall amount, and you with then not have enough left over for windows it self, 8gb main memory means 1gb shared to GPU is more than enough, any more and you risk loosing performance in your o/s so 16gb installed can be 2gb

but also remember if you use windows 10 which comes with DirectX 12 under Windows 10, it increases the memory use to a video card by adding in more system ram to help with the video card memory under a certain given circumstances, so sometimes it shows a larger number that is actually used or needed, so it's not always a bad idea and if the BIOS hasn't done it, it can't be undone either so is something which you have to live with, but rule of thumb for me is, more ram in the system the better, and 4gb assigned to a GPU isn't as good as a 1gb dedi card.

[bjg]

BTW, the ability to roll back the last update or just play the previous version would be very useful in (rare) situations like this. Besides the ability to play it would've given me the the ability to make (almost) absolutely sure that the problem is with the update.