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Glidos/TR - Crash when getting to the main menu

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First post, by Unregistered

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Hello there.

First of all, I would like to thanks Paul. Your advice for VDMSound allows me, at least, to run TR on this new machine, even if without music and with standard graphism level.

Second, sorry for my poor english. It would for sure be better in french ...

My concern :
When running glidos (1.24), I get a systematic failover after the first 2 videos of the intro (which runs well), just when getting to the main menu.
Message box : Glidos.exe - Application error
The instruction at "Ox77fc8fe1" referenced memory at "0xff1414a0". The memory could not be "written". Click OK to terminate the program.
Then another Message Box : Glidos
Read Failure.

The memory offset changes. The memory instruction is stable.

My config for glidos (1.24) :
Gamma : right in the middle (default)
Resolution : 1280x1024
Full screen on
"VESASupport: Yes" removed (slow videos - same syndrom with this line in)

VDMSound : installed the 2.0.4 (4/8/2001)

PC Config :
- IBM ThinkPad T23 Type 2647 Model 9RG
- Mother Board : ? - did'nt find the info
- Processor : Mobile Intel Pentium III - 1,2 GHz
- Memory : 512 Mb SDRAM
- Video : S3 Graphics SuperSavage/iXC 1014 - 16 Mb memory (according DirectX Diag)
- Audio : Crystal WDM audio
- OS : Windows 2000 SP 3 (5.0.2195)
- Game : Tomb Raider (standard edition - french)
- Video Mode : Direct3D accelarated (according DirectX diag)

(Hope this make sense. It's close "to chinese" for me ...)

Hope this will help to make a diagnosys ?
Thanks much.
Benoit.

Reply 1 of 29, by Glidos

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Almost certainly the problem is the OpenGL support for the S3 graphics. If you can find more recent drivers, that has to be worth a go.

One other thing worth a try. Go to the Red Baron page of the glidos web site and download the version of OpenGlide from there. Try dropping the file Glide2x.dll into your installed Glidos folder, replacing the existing version.

Reply 2 of 29, by Unregistered

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Good news. Sounds far better !

Not refresh the S3 drivers yet, but I have tried your second advice first (getting the OpenGlide from Baron Rouge) ... and get into the first level of TR (with the music on the menu).

Whouaaooo ! Could not have dream that. That's terrific !!!

Now, where I get to new problems :

- First one is not important : I get a blank area on the right portion of the screen (about 1/5 of the screen) on the main menu.

- Second one, much difficult. I can move normaly within the level, but when I try to make a save (F5) or get back to the menu (Esc), the program seems to hang up, and take 99 or 100% CPU.
I succeed getting it doing things (very, very slowly) by launching the task manager.
- Other symptom, close to the former one : when I stay on the menu doing nothing, and that the program enter in the "demo mode", it does that also very, very slowly again (with the rotating Glidos icon this time).
- It seems very difficult also for him to go from the first to he second level (when displaying the scores for the first level).

Now I have seen the quality of the result I should obtain, it would be very desapointing to have to give up !!

Does the new symptoms help ?
Do I need getting further with new S3 drivers ?

Thanks much
Benoit.

Reply 3 of 29, by Glidos

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It may be worth looking at this thread:
showthread.php?s=&threadid=1444
There'a an attachment to one of my posts that might help you.

On the other hand, new S3 drivers might solve all your problems.

Reply 4 of 29, by Unregistered

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Hello.
Some news from where I am :

- I have downloaded the last drivers for S3. The update drivers wizard do not selected much files to change, and it does not have had any effect.
- I have also try the new version of the .ovl file (glide2xwithnolfbread.zip), but it does not change anything either.
- I also tried the new version of glidos.exe you have included in this thread, without more success.

As a result, I am in the same situation :

- From the beginning of a level, everything is OK (even on the third level with the spinning logo).
- As soon as I try to open a menu (Esc, F5, or Action to put a key in place for example), the game become very very slow, even if it does not crash (about one elementary "move" each 4 seconds - for example, it takes about 30 secs and about 7 elementary moves for the poor Lara to make a single jump).
- I have also this effect on the demo mode.

The CPU stay then close to 100%.

Any other ideas ?

Thanks,
Benoit.

Reply 5 of 29, by Glidos

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Have you tried using the new glidos.exe with the new glide2x.ovl?

Reply 6 of 29, by batracio

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Hi,

I am the Voodoo2 guy who opened the thread where Paul uploaded the Glide2x.ovl with NOLF read. It works fine on me at 800x600 (with Glidos running native 3Dfx's Glide2x.dll), but I also own a Savage4 as primary display, so I have a bit of experience about tweaking S3 chips. It's not the most stable and powerful OpenGL performer, I know, but with an updated ICD, it's a valid card for playing TR up to 1024x768. Although some graphical glitches appear on certain textures, Glidos neither crashes nor slows down the gameplay.

Savage4 and SuperSavage/IX chips are very similar (SuperSavage might be considered the mobile version of Savage4), so we could expect the same level of compatibility. Maybe you need the latest drivers, as Paul said, but you didn't find the right ones. Here are the official and certified S3's reference drivers for SuperSavage/IX:

http://ranger.s3graphics.com/swlib/584drv/

You can also try these alternative drivers from SavageNews.com, the most complete compilation of tweaked savage drivers still available (unfortunately several links are broken):

http://www.savagenews.com/drivers/s3/savageix.php

Good luck!

Reply 7 of 29, by Unregistered

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Hi Paul and Batracio.

Paul,
I just tried the new version of glidos.exe with the new version of .ovl file, and it does not change anything.

For the drivers, I took yesterday the first one you mention, Batracio, but the Wizard selected only one file !
As I was worried with that, I searched again, and find more adequate things on the IBM site. It seems IBM uses Savage chipset on their own board (?). I found there very recents drivers (2 weeks old) and install them this evening. They told they have solved some "problems" with OpenGL 😉

... and, it's a little better :
When using my initial resolution (1280x1024), I can now access once to the menu, get back to the game "normaly", but the second time I go to the menu, I come back to the speed problems.

I followed also Batracio's advice and reduce the resolution(1024x768 and even 640x480) : In this case I can access twice to the menu, but the third time, it's KO again.

It sounds that Paul's initial diagnosys was the right one : the quality of support of OpenGL by S3 graphics ?

I also attached the glidos trace for a sequence (with 1240x1024), but I'm not sure it will be of any help.

Do you think I should stay on that state, and get out of the game after each save to reset the all thing ?

Thanks,
Benoit.

Reply 8 of 29, by Unregistered

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I also have a similar problem described by the original unregistered poster (I am a different unregistered poster!)

Game crashes after first two into videos and I can't get to the menu.

I can't start the game using the Glidos button from the server...Glidos crashes straight away. I have to start the server and then run the Tomb.Exe file from the game directory to even get this far! When the game crashes I get the Glidos read failure error message.

I am running Direct X 8.1

VDMSound : installed the 2.0.4 and the update

PConfig :
Elite K7S5A Motherboard
- Processor : Athlon 2.1 GHz
Nvidia GeoForce 4 video card.

Soundblaster audio card
- OS : Windows XP Pro
- Game : Tomb Raider 1

I've tried using all different resolutions in Glidos and also tried all of the different compatability modes in Windows to run the EXE file.

Have also tried dropping in the Glide2x file from the Red Barron page but it makes no difference to me.

Any help appreciated as I'd love to see TR1 in 1024 mode...

Thanks

Dave

Reply 9 of 29, by Glidos

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Which drivers for the Geforce 4?

Have you tried any of the other files mentioned in this thread?

Don't use compatibility modes. That's for old programs, and Glidos isn't an old program. Of course TR1 is an old program, but compatibility modes don't help DOS programs.

You could try taking the "VESASupport: Yes" line out of the TR section of the glidos.ini file.

Reply 10 of 29, by Glidos

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Oh yeh: disable nView if you have it on.

Reply 11 of 29, by Unregistered

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Hi, this is Benoit again.

I have had some more testing, but no progress.

I think that with 3 "easy" access to the menu, it could make it.

But only 2 will probably be too tedious to play the all game (If you use a key for example to open a door, then make a save, you will be on the 3rd access situation to get out of the game in order to "shake the bytes" before entering back, and it will then take you about a minute ...).

Any more idea to get to a better situation ?

Reply 12 of 29, by Glidos

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Ah, one thing I forgot: there are loads of old versions of Glidos on my site. If you look at the link for v1.24 and edit the 24 to be other numbers you can try out older versions.

Reply 13 of 29, by Unregistered

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Hi, (this is Benoit, still fighting !)

I've tried with 1.23, 1.20 & 1.12, with small variants in the way it reacts, but basically I've got the same problem, and the better case seems to be with the 1.24.

Do you see any reason for the situation getting progressively bad and slow ?

Oh, some new info, perhaps useless, but just in case :
I've tried to get out of the game by killing the task with task manager (to avoid the tedious minute when getting in the slow mode).
In this case, I've got again the (error) message box : "read failure" (even if I was with the No_LFB_Read version of .ovl).

If you think there is no way to get to a better situation, except cross fingers and wait S3 Graphics to build a better support for OpenGL, do not hesitate to tell me !

Thanks.

Reply 14 of 29, by Glidos

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This thing with the whole computer slowing down: have you tried PolPipeNoPri.zip?... not sure what thread though.

Reply 15 of 29, by DosFreak

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Unregistered wrote:

If you think there is no way to get to a better situation, except cross fingers and wait S3 Graphics to build a better support for OpenGL, do not hesitate to tell me !

hehehhehe....hahahahahahha....mfffffffff.......bwahahaahahhahahahahahaahahahahahahahahaa!!!!!!!!!!!
.
.
.
.
.
hahahahahahaahhahaahahahahahhahahahahaa!

🤣!

That was great. Really...really great.

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Reply 16 of 29, by Unregistered

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Glidos wrote:

This thing with the whole computer slowing down: have you tried PolPipeNoPri.zip?... not sure what thread though.

I Just try with the pollpipe.dll found in nopri.zip in "development/pit perfect" thread (hope it's the good one) :
No change.
I've also tried the version in varpri.zip (same thread, few posts later) : no change either.

Was it the version you had in mind ?

Reply 17 of 29, by Glidos

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nopri.zip was the one. I just can't think what can be causing this. I'd have thought a problem with the S3 drivers, but others have had it work. I'm running out of ideas.

Reply 18 of 29, by Unregistered

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Yes. Well, I suppose I was ready to that verdict !

I still have hope with the drivers, as this chips for labtop is not so old, and the refresh I have done on the drivers allows me to access twice to the menu, which was not possible with my initial version.

Last chance perhaps :
I have notice some interresting stuff : when I get to the "slow mode", the CPU ressource consumed by kernel operation fall down from about 70-80% (sounds stable when the game is working normally) to less than 5% (red curve on task manager).

In comparison, when I play TR directely under DOS, the kernel consumes only 2 or 3% CPU, even if CPU (green curve) is close to 100% in the 2 cases.

Is that of any help ?

Reply 19 of 29, by DosFreak

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Do you mean playing TR using Glidos as opposed to NTVDM? Your really running it under both it's just that GliDos wraps to OpenGlide which requires a solid OGL implementation on your graphics card.

From what your saying it seems that you have plenty of processing power CPU wise but when you use OpenGlide is seems that your graphics card isn't powerful enough. Try to lower some of the graphics settings and see what that does.

Also, when you were playing TR under NTVDM were you playing with VDMSOUND or without?

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