Intel HD Graphics Crashes

[sven]

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.

Some abilities along these lines are built into Steam, and now that we have a Steam distro, we could experiment with it a bit. The current Steam version (r18304) is a bit behind the current stable (r18314). So if the Steam build runs for you, that would tell us something.

More generally, the behavior you're reporting is certainly troubling. There's a number of different things that it *might* be related to, but the FMOD changes are probably a red-herring. Just to be certain though, could you email me the contents of your Stars in Shadow/logs directory, after a failed x64 startup? (ashdar.games@gmail.com.)

[bjg]

It doesn't fail (with the 64 bit), just takes forever to load the game - so I kill it. How long do you want me to wait?
With the 32 bit it's actually failing (crashing) - definitely shouldn't.
Just in case - I did run the updater this morning, and it's uploaded the logs (so it's said).

BTW, I've (successfully) started a new game on the laptop with GeForce 9200M GS - it's doing fps 5 on the start screen (32 bit version). I know it's a border line and not officially supported (any more), but 5 fps on the start screen is definitely not right.

I don't have a Steam account. Probably don't want to create one (and install the client).

[sven]

It doesn't fail (with the 64 bit), just takes forever to load the game - so I kill it. How long do you want me to wait?
With the 32 bit it's actually failing (crashing) - definitely shouldn't.

The 32 bit crashes are out of memory errors -- those should become less common when I get around to optimizing the texture footprint. The 64 bit load times are more concerning, because I'm having a hard time figuring out what might be causing them. A multi-minute startup time is certainly not intended. I'm going to attempt to replicate the issue on some of my test hardware.

Just to be clear: after clicking on sis64.exe, it's taking 5-10 minutes to get into the start screen? Does the latency persist after the game launches?

One possibility is that this is indeed a manifestation of a file fragmentation / disk access issue. This is a category of problems that we theorized might become an issue given the way the game stores data, but I haven't yet seen much hard evidence of it. I'm guessing you're using a magnetic drive? If latency due to file fragmentation is indeed what's causing the problem, deleting Stars in Shadow, then re-installing from scratch might help. As, perhaps, might running a defragmentation pass and/or scandisk on your harddrive.

Another thing that may be worth trying would be to temporarily disable any active system security software you may have running -- as features like the Windows Defender 'Real Time Protection' can interact with program execution in ways that sometimes cause significant latency spikes.

[bjg]

Just to be clear: after clicking on sis64.exe, it's taking 5-10 minutes to get into the start screen?

Not at all. It's taking about a minute or two to launch sis64.exe - not really complaining about that. On the start screen (of the game) fps is 1-2. Waited 10 minutes for game to load after clicking "Continue" (the "Loading Game..." was showing), than killed the process. After clicking "Load" (the next time) couldn't even choose the save to load from (nor exit the dialog), than killed the process.
The game is effectively not playable after the last update.

[sven]

Just to be clear: after clicking on sis64.exe, it's taking 5-10 minutes to get into the start screen?

Not at all. It's taking about a minute or two to launch sis64.exe - not really complaining about that. On the start screen (of the game) fps is 1-2. Waited 10 minutes for game to load after clicking "Continue" (the "Loading Game..." was showing), than killed the process. After clicking "Load" (the next time) couldn't even choose the save to load from (nor exit the dialog), than killed the process.
The game is effectively not playable after the last update.

Ok, glad I asked. Could you hit F1 after starting the game (in 64 bit), and send me a screenshot of what comes up? I have the start of a hunch...

[bjg]

Could you hit F1 after starting the game (in 64 bit), and send me a screenshot of what comes up?

Can't do the proper screenshot. The snipping tool doesn't capture till I switch from the full screen, which changes the text. PrtScr (and Ctrl-PrtScr) doesn't copy anything. What am I doing wrong? Is there a chance that text is going to some file?

[sven]

Could you hit F1 after starting the game (in 64 bit), and send me a screenshot of what comes up?

Can't do it. The snipping tool doesn't capture till I switch from the fool screen, which changes the text. PrtScr (and Ctrl-PrtScr) doesn't copy anything. What am I doing wrong? Is there a chance that text is going to some file?

Don't worry about it then. (Alt-PtrScr works for me, but Arioch has had trouble with it on his system as well.) Let me try some hardware tests on my own side here.

[bjg]

r18317 seem to fix it, thanks.

[sven]

r18317 seem to fix it, thanks.

Ok, this is deeply mysterious, as I can think of very little inside r18317 that might have impacted this issue. Let me know if it happens again!

[bjg]

r18317 seem to fix it, thanks.

Ok, this is deeply mysterious, as I can think of very little inside r18317 that might have impacted this issue. Let me know if it happens again!

The C does it a lot. And the Windows does it a lot too. Not to compare these two.
If you can duplicate that F1 output to a file I'd send you that file.

[bjg]

I've (successfully) started a new game on the laptop with GeForce 9200M GS - it's doing fps 5 on the start screen (32 bit version). I know it's a border line and not officially supported (any more), but 5 fps on the start screen is definitely not right.

On that laptop the fps changed from 5 to 10 with r18317. Seems like something had improved in the game performance wise (intentionally or not).

[bjg]

It's happening again, this time without an update. I was playing, and performance was OK. Exited, and can't play again. The binary is loading with a regular speed, but the fps on the "main menu" screen is 8-16 (changing from load to load) with 64 bit binary. It's "better" than the last time, the game would even load (takes 3-5 minutes), but the fps on the strategic map is 1-2, making it's effectively non-playable. Tried rebooting, even did (very minor) video driver update. Did the "asset check" (no errors).
The 32 bit binary is showing the "main menu" screen fine (60 fps), but crashes trying to load my (big) save (which is expected).
Something is skewed. There is nothing on the "main menu" screen to cause a performance that low. Does the game save something between the sessions (besides actual saves)? Is there a way to reset that?
Don't know if you consider my case an "age" one and have time for it now.

[sven]

It's happening again, this time without an update. I was playing, and performance was OK. Exited, and can't play again. The binary is loading with a regular speed, but the fps on the "main menu" screen is 8-16 (changing from load to load) with 64 bit binary. It's "better" than the last time, the game would even load (takes 3-5 minutes), but the fps on the strategic map is 1-2, making it's effectively non-playable.

So, my first guess is that what we're seeing is a symptom of some kind of of inefficient memory use -- perhaps part of the game's resources are cycling in and out of virtual memory; triggering a lot of disk load time. And it's really up to the OS to decided when and how to move things in and out of virtual memory -- if it's making a choice that leads to poor performance, there's not a lot we can do to change it's decision making. What we can (and certainly should) do is to make the overall memory footprint smaller, so there's less of a chance that the OS will decide to fall back on VM.

There is nothing on the "main menu" screen to cause a performance that low. Does the game save something between the sessions (besides actual saves)? Is there a way to reset that?

You could delete your 'saved_options.lua' file, and your 'window_settings.txt' files. Those are the only two persistant settings I can think of. You could also just do a clean install of the whole game -- and/or run a defragmentation pass on your hardisk. (If either of these steps help, I'd like to know, as it suggests that that 'weird memory stuff' is more or less the culprit here. Running a scandisk might not hurt either -- really any diagnostic of your memory system could be illuminating.)

Don't know if you consider my case an "age" one and have time for it now.

Well, you are using a laptop with system specs at the bottom end of what we officially support, on map sizes that we officially *don't* support. So, yes, figuring this out isn't my highest priority atm. That said, if we can figure out just what's actually happening here, and, perhaps, how to fix it, that would be great

[bjg]

So, my first guess is that what we're seeing is a symptom of some kind of of inefficient memory use -- perhaps part of the game's resources are cycling in and out of virtual memory; triggering a lot of disk load time.

I almost never see the "disk activity" light during the game. It could "lie" though.

There is nothing on the "main menu" screen to cause a performance that low. Does the game save something between the sessions (besides actual saves)? Is there a way to reset that?

You could delete your 'saved_options.lua' file, and your 'window_settings.txt' files. Those are the only two persistant settings I can think of. You could also just do a clean install of the whole game -- and/or run a defragmentation pass on your hardisk. (If either of these steps help, I'd like to know, as it suggests that that 'weird memory stuff' is more or less the culprit here. Running a scandisk might not hurt either -- really any diagnostic of your memory system could be illuminating.)

Didn't see anything relevant to performance (except maybe "fast animation", but I didn't change it). How does the game "know" which planet type to show on the "main menu" screen?
I have an SSD (an Intel one, probably Enterprise grade), not sure if it's even possible to defragment. I did run a "quick" hardware test using the Lenovo Solution Center (no errors), running a "comprehensive" one now (it's long).

Don't know if you consider my case an "age" one and have time for it now.

Well, you are using a laptop with system specs at the bottom end of what we officially support, on map sizes that we officially *don't* support. So, yes, figuring this out isn't my highest priority atm. That said, if we can figure out just what's actually happening here, and, perhaps, how to fix it, that would be great

The (not yet loaded) map size shouldn't affect the performance on the "main menu" screen. Does it?

Update: the "comprehensive" test is passed. I'd upload the log, but the forum wont let me. The SSD is actually SanDisk SD5SG2256G1052E. CHKDSK also found no problems.

[sven]

Didn't see anything relevant to performance (except maybe "fast animation", but I didn't change it). How does the game "know" which planet type to show on the "main menu" screen?

Ah, yes, that's something I hadn't thought of! When the game starts up, it pre-caches all the metadata stored with every save in your SavedGames directory. The metadata should be pretty light weight, memory-wise, but, if you have a large number of saves, or a save with very strange properties, I suppose loading that metadata list could be causing issues. The quick test is just to rename SavedGames something like SavedGames2, and see if the issue persists.

The (not yet loaded) map size shouldn't affect the performance on the "main menu" screen. Does it?

I can't think of a reason why it would. Unless there's some huge inefficiency in my metadata format that I'm overlooking... Would you send me a copy of your most recent save's meta.table file?

I have an SSD (an Intel one, probably Enterprise grade), not sure if it's even possible to defragment. I did run a "quick" hardware test using the Lenovo Solution Center (no errors), running a "comprehensive" one now (it's long).

Hrm. Well, perhaps my virtual memory theory is wrong... How much RAM do you have on your machine? Are their any background processes you could disable? (Could you try running with Windows Defender's Real Time protection turned off?)