Thief crash before menu

[ajc158]

SOLUTION LOWER DOWN THREAD

Can anyone help me with this problem:

Thief gets as far as the end of the bar for loading the menu then crashes to the desktop, no message given. This is on an 'Out of the box' install.

My system is:
AMD X2 4200
Gigabyte K8NXP-SLI (non-SLI mode only)
1024mb RAM
Gigabyte 6800GT 256mb (x1)
Operating system on IDE, game on SATA striped RAID.
WinXP SP1
DX 9.0c

This is the first game I've had this level of trouble with. Can run Doom3, Farcry with no problems.

Has anyone any ideas what could be causing this, or how I can determine what could be? (I've been through the readme and done some googling, but can't find anything like this).

[ajc158]

Ok, solved that first problem myself, reinstalled Thief onto the PATA drive, it mustn't have liked the RAID.

New problem has arisen. Now the ThiefTrailer...ESBD.bik or whatever movie with the gargoyle face at the start plays before I can do anything with the menu. If I esc it them click on a menu item quickly before it restarts then the next menu loads then freezes, leaving me to terminate the program externally. If I remove the .bik it tries to play it time and time again and the end result is much the same.

Any ideas on this one?

:confused:

[GlasW0lf]

I've had T3 running on PATA and SATA RAID 0 with no problems. Do you have any USB controllers - keyboard, wheel, gamepad etc? If so, unplug them.

[ajc158]

Thanks! :)

Left my graphics tablet plugged in, unplugged it and it works fine!

Getting ready to play... :rolleyes:

P.S. I don't think it was the RAID specifically, but the fact that I'm being forced to use Pseudo RAID through a 3rd party driver due to XP being crap at dealing with SATA RAID sometimes. I think it didn't like that rather than the SATA RAID specifically.

[ajc158]

Dammit!

This I don't understand. After unplugging the tablet I got the game working and played it. Exitted satisfied. Next time I start it the same problem re-emerges...

Any more ideas...? :(

[ajc158]

I've now solved all my problems with the game, and they were due to dual core.

The problem is to get the game to run on one processor, unfortunately you can't alt/tab out to use the set affinity in the task manager.

This is my solution:

Download process changer:

http://dades.joor.net/article_fitxers/1595/processutil.htm

Now download sleep utility:

http://www.computerhope.com/download/utility/sleep.exe

Put them both in the thief system directory.

Now open Notepad and copy this in:

sleep.exe 10
process -a t3main.exe 01
process -a t3.exe 01

Go to save as and select All Files as type. Now call the file ?????.bat, were ????? is whatever you want.

Now create a shortcut to this file near wherever you launch thief from, and every time you launch thief launch this .bat just before (you have 10 seconds to start thief after you run it, unless you change the 10 after sleep to something else).

Bingo, all Dual core problems should be solved. :)

This process works for other games as well, just change t3main.exe to whatever that program's executable is called.

Happy gaming,

Alex

[hbadger30]

Hi,

I've installed Thief and on loading the game I get an error and I'm told the game has to close. When I click on what data the error report contains I get this:

AppName: t3main.exe AppVer: 1.0.0.1 ModName: ntdll.dll
ModVer: 5.1.2600.2180 Offset: 00001230

P4 3GHz
ATI Raedon 9800
Windows XP
1024Mb RAM

Can anyone help?

Many thanks

[Quillan]

Make sure HyperThreading is disabled. If it's enabled, the game doesn't seem to like it. I don't know if that's causing your error, but it has caused problems for others.

[hbadger30]

Hi,

I tried taking hyperthreading off and it hasn't made a difference. Is there any more information you guys need to help me get the game going??

Graham

[hbadger30]

Hi,

Just to say that I've solved the problem myself after playing about with my display settings! I turned on hardware acceleration for my Raedon 9800 graphics card and the game worked - I'm also playing with hyperthreading enabled.

Thanks anyway.

Graham

[Maeglin Lightfoot]

I recently started having this issue. Twiddling with display settings hasn't helped whatsoever. Here's a copy of my post on TTLG (posting here as well in hopes there'll be a higher likelihood of help) --

I'm running on Windows Server 2003 with all game executables set to Windows XP compatibility mode, ATI 9700 with Catalyst 6.5 drivers and CCC. Just with the vanilla install, the system would often freeze (with T3Main.exe hogging all the CPU). After I restarted, I'd get Windows' Error Reporting service only offering a hint of "ntdll.dll."

I finally discovered how to use Dr. Watson, Windows' resident debugger/logger, and have several saved logs of T3Main.exe crashes. If anyone can help me decipher this, I'd be much thankful. After getting things slightly more stable with compatibility mode, installing the 1.1 patch, and getting GarrettLoader set up, I installed The Bridge. The game has loaded fine the few times I've played, yet the system ends up restarting at seemingly-random points.

In Dr. Watson's log list, I have entries named "T3Main.exe 80000003 ntdll!DbgBreakPoint(7C822583)

Here's an excerpt mentioning ntdll:

*** ERROR: Symbol file could not be found. Defaulted to export symbols for C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntdll.dll -
function: ntdll!DbgBreakPoint
7c82256e ff7514 push dword ptr [ebp+0x14]
7c822571 ff7510 push dword ptr [ebp+0x10]
7c822574 ff750c push dword ptr [ebp+0xc]
7c822577 ff5508 call dword ptr [ebp+0x8]
7c82257a 8be6 mov esp,esi
7c82257c 5b pop ebx
7c82257d 5f pop edi
7c82257e 5e pop esi
7c82257f 5d pop ebp
7c822580 c21000 ret 0x10
FAULT ->ntdll!DbgBreakPoint:
7c822583 cc int 3
7c822584 c3 ret
7c822585 90 nop
7c822586 8bff mov edi,edi
ntdll!DbgUserBreakPoint:
7c822588 cc int 3
7c822589 c3 ret
7c82258a 8bff mov edi,edi
7c82258c 8b442404 mov eax,[esp+0x4]
7c822590 cc int 3
7c822591 c20400 ret 0x4

Anyone have any hunches? Anyone know how to open Dr. Watson's crash logs it generates (I'm assuming it has info about the latest Windows crash)? I see the user.dmp file, yet don't know how to open it with Dr. Watson.

I've already searched, but haven't found any relevant threads, only one on the Eidos forum where the fellow resolved the issue by messing around hyperthreading, a feature not available on my old PC.

EDIT: Thought I'd go back to the original game (via GarrettLoader) to see if it was any more stable. The interface wouldn't even load! The last successful read, according to filemon, is shell32.dll, then:

54892 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\x86_Microsoft.Windows.Common-Controls_6595b64144ccf1df_5.82.3790.1830_x-ww_1B6F474A SUCCESS
54893 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\x86_Microsoft.Windows.Common-Controls_6595b64144ccf1df_6.0.3790.1830_x-ww_7AE38CCF SUCCESS
54894 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\T3EnhancED\Content\T3\Sounds\SchemaMetafile_HardDrive.csc SUCCESS
54895 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\T3EnhancED\Content\T3\Sounds\SchemaMetafile_Memory.csc SUCCESS
54896 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\T3EnhancED\Content\T3\Sounds\SchemaMetafile_DVD1.csc SUCCESS
54897 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\T3EnhancED\Content\T3\Sounds\SchemaMetafile_DVD2.csc SUCCESS
54898 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\T3EnhancED\Content\T3\Sounds\SchemaMetafile_DVD3.csc SUCCESS
54899 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\Thief 3\Content\T3\Maps\Entry.gmp SUCCESS
54900 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\Thief 3\System\T3Gamesys.t3u SUCCESS
54901 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\Thief 3\Content\T3\UTX\Thief3Particles.utx SUCCESS
54902 5:53:39 PM T3Main.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\T3EnhancED\Content\T3\UTX\T3_skycube.utx SUCCESS
54903 5:53:39 PM drwtsn32.exe:732 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\Thief 3\System\T3Main.exe SUCCESS
54904 5:53:39 PM drwtsn32.exe:732 CLOSE C:\WINDOWS\system32\crypt32.dll SUCCESS
54905 5:53:39 PM drwtsn32.exe:732 CLOSE C:\WINDOWS\system32\oleaut32.dll SUCCESS
54974 5:53:55 PM t3.exe:688 CLOSE C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\x86_Microsoft.Windows.Common-Controls_6595b64144ccf1df_6.0.3790.1830_x-ww_7AE38CCF SUCCESS
54975 5:53:56 PM t3.exe:688 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\Thief 3\System SUCCESS
54976 5:53:56 PM t3.exe:688 CLOSE C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\x86_Microsoft.Windows.Common-Controls_6595b64144ccf1df_6.0.3790.1830_x-ww_7AE38CCF SUCCESS
54977 5:53:56 PM t3.exe:688 CLOSE D:\Games\Thief Series\Thief 3\System\T3.EXE SUCCESS

[AlexDenton]

You need to disable hyperthreading, if you have a dual-core CPU

[Maeglin Lightfoot]

You need to disable hyperthreading, if you have a dual-core CPU

Sorry, forgot to mention, I don't have any of these other issues... No dual-core (yeah, I wish, my PC's an old 2001 factory HP).

I almost feel like doing yet another clean install of Windows, yet I got these crashes from the get-go. I've read around that it's something else causing ntdll problems, with the explanation that my system would be quite unstable if this particular system file were actually the culprit, but I don't know what, other than to say T3Main.exe.

[AlexDenton]

Disable that Dr. Watson thing

[Maeglin Lightfoot]

Disable that Dr. Watson thing

What? Now you're telling me Dr. Watson was causing the problems? Seems odd as it collects crash data by default and Thief 3 ran fine before (well, up until recently, then I reinstalled Windows). I guess I'll give it a go, but I'm doubtful.

EDIT: Didn't help. T3Main.exe started hogging all CPU again and nothing happened. I'm starting to think Thief 3 doesn't want me playing it anymore...

[Peter Smith]

Maeglin,

I would not expect Dr. Watson to cause the problem, just respond to it.

I am not aware of anyone else running with a server OS. Thief is very picky, and perhaps there is something with that, even in compatibility mode, that causes it to choke. I suggest that you do a search here and at TTLG concerning "server" and see if you find anything.

You did not mention hardware configuration. Components and driver versions do have an effect. On-board components in particular cause issues. You might want to list your hardware and driver specs, including video and audio.

This thread should really be under Technical, so I am going to move it. Also, we have three different topics going here. It is better to start a new thread if your topic differs. No problem for the present.