Very weird crash problems

[Carthago Nova]

I have Civ 4, Warlords, as well as Beyond the sword. They are all patched up to date, and i have tried so many trouble shooting steps it isn't even funny.
The problem is that the game will play fine for a long time. Around 100bc-100ad, the monitor starts crashing, but the game comes back. It does it a few more times, then the whole thing crashes and the computer shuts itself off. If I close out of the game after the first crash, it will continue to crash every other time, even if I start over. It does this on the versions of the game. I cannot figure out why this would happen, and it is really pissing me off. below are my system specs. They aren't the greatest, but I can play games like Oblivion (on high) and other "intense" games.

Windows Vista Home Premium 32 bit
Dell Dimension DIMC521
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4400+2.30ghz
2046 MB RAM
Monitor is a SE198WFP (Digital)
Sound is a SigmaTel High Definition Audio CODEC
Graphics card is a 128 MB ATI Radeon X1300


Please, any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ori]

welcome to cfc

does the windows event manager show any error message when it crashes?

 

[Carthago Nova]

That is the strangest thing, it doesn't. I have no idea why this is doing it at all.

 

[Carthago Nova]

Well, I FINALLY got some kind of answer. I finally got an error message (somewhat). A yellow triangle appeared on the bottom right corner. It said a hardware device had failed. Below is the message and solution. Description
A problem with your video hardware caused Windows to stop working correctly.

Problem signature
Problem Event Name: LiveKernelEvent
OS Version: 6.0.6001.2.1.0.768.3
Locale ID: 1033

Files that help describe the problem (some files may no longer be available)
WD-20080731-0309.dmp
sysdata.xml
Version.txt

View a temporary copy of these files
Warning: If a virus or other security threat caused the problem, opening a copy of the files could harm your computer.

Extra information about the problem
BCCode: 117
BCP1: 8630F510
BCP2: 8C81DAFC
BCP3: 00000000
BCP4: 00000000
OS Version: 6_0_6001
Service Pack: 1_0
Product: 768_1
Server information: ac89f4ee-c969-4704-b3db-0ce98f314440

The solution was to update drivers for my ATI card. Thing is, when I go to update it, it's already at the most current update! Hooray! My next step would be to contact freaking ATI or dell itself for help. I do not know why this is happening. I am feeling pissed that I spent money on this game and what-not to have it start f*****g up.

 

[ori]

could you post your dxdiag results?
maybe actually going back to an earlier driver version might help.
you can attach file to a post by clicking on go advanced and then on manage attachments

 

[Carthago Nova]

Yes I can. Please refresh me on how to get into dxdiag. Also, so far it seems OK. I had to go to ATI's own website and found a new driver setup and whatnot. It SEEMS OK now. But yes, please show me how to do this dxdiag and I will post it.

 

[Carthago Nova]

Never mind, I am a moron. I don't know why I forgot how to get into dxdiag. Here it is.

 

[ori]

glad it works now
if not just post again.

 

[Carthago Nova]

Thank you. It seems to be working fine now.

 

[Carthago Nova]

Well here we go again. It works fine, but will still occasionally crash or the computer will just completely freeze. Can't ctrl+alt+delete it, have to manually shut it off. I don't know what is going on. This is getting to the point of ridiculous. If someone can help, please!

 

[Carthago Nova]

WELL WELL WELL, I FINALLY found out what the problem is. For the very first time, I was told what had caused the problems. Something called "ATIKMDAG" had failed and restarted. Apparently it is some kind of driver. I am on driver haven trying to figure it out, but it is very confusing. if anyone can help, please do. I would so appreciate it.

 

[ori]

try a slightly newer driver:
http://game.amd.com/us-en/drivers_catalyst.aspx?p=vista32/common-vista32

 

[Carthago Nova]

try a slightly newer driver:
http://game.amd.com/us-en/drivers_catalyst.aspx?p=vista32/common-vista32

Yep. Thank you though. I have all the updates! This is such BS. All I want to do is play Civ 4.

 

[praktik]

Ya dude, I'm having the occasional lockup too.

Things 'll play fine, from a little bit to a good little while, then everything just goes frozen, and I have to manually restart.

I just reformatted in large part because of this hindrance to my enjoyment of the game.

Started a new game a few mins ago - 3 mins in - IT HAPPENED AGAIN!

So now I'm truly at a loss, but what I can tell you is that I also have an ATI card - an x1950pro

Running a dual core E6750, 3.2ghz, windows XP Pro, everything is freshly installed including ATI's latest drivers.

I am running at 4xAA and 16xAF at 19x12 - think I'll dial back the filtering and the AA but right now its trial and error and I have no idea what it could be.

I thought the reformat would lick it for sure.

 

[praktik]

seems to be fixed!

looked in some other threads and saw that people with similar symptoms had overly dusty fans.

I clean my CPU fan regularly but checkin the GPU fan slipped my mind.

THere was a band of dust that Im sure was restricting airflow greatly. REmoved it - and now things havent crashed in hours.

w00t!

 

[SirScoggins]

What to do? I Can't Figure it out, It keeps crashing