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"MoH Airborne crashes"

Looking for any ideas to successfully play MOH Airborne without numerous crashes. Have re-installed and updated to version 1.1 of the game, forceware drivers updated etc etc. Campaign one completed successfully, however now crashes in game on campaign two. Frozen screen, unfreezes, blocky graphics, doesn't respond to key presses, screen alternates between black and full display, crashes to desktop and continues to alternate between black screen and desktop display, then monitor switches off!! Is this the usual offering from EA? Bioshock runs perfectly on same machine.

Spec: Pentium 4 3GHz HT, 1Gb RAM, GeForce 7600GT 256mb, 160Gb Hard Drive

Any solutions would be welcome

Thanks Garin, you've probably hit the nail on the head, so to speak - the old PSU was probably to blame all along - this new one is stormin! Definately arctic weather around the old legs. Merry Christmas.

Dragonlance wrote:
> Question: GFX card fried before with same specs above except
> I've now added the PSU - original 305w. So changed card, and
> yes, no news about warranty from Inno or MicroDirect, and
> changed PSU. Machine has never been cooler!! Fans give feet
> chilblains! Before PSU change, gfx card running at 850,
> now running at 610 after game play. Was the original spec
> under-powered? GFX card probably was but why the dramatic
> difference in all areas, not just gaming?

Missed this question.
In general with PSUs, quality of components, ampage and efficiency are as important as the wattage. In theory 305w should have been enough to power your GFX card. But if its a poor quality PSU then it probably wont delivery anything like that consistently anyway. Its entirely possible your old PSU was contributing to the heat itself by not being very efficient at dissipating heat.

To you all

MERRY CHRISTMAS and A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR

Enjoy

OK had a re-think and perhaps you two can explain the following:

Machine specs now:

Pentium 4 3.0GHz 1Gb RAM BFG GeForce 7900GS OC 160GB HD 450w PSU

Question: GFX card fried before with same specs above except I've now added the PSU - original 305w. So changed card, and yes, no news about warranty from Inno or MicroDirect, and changed PSU. Machine has never been cooler!! Fans give feet chilblains! Before PSU change, gfx card running at 850, now running at 610 after game play. Was the original spec under-powered? GFX card probably was but why the dramatic difference in all areas, not just gaming?

Thanks to both of you, fully understood and won't ask daft questions again - you've both been extremely understanding of my ignorance and most descriptive and explanatory of the requirements and restrictions within machines - many thanks. PS MoHA last two missions are awesome.

The point is best illustrated by an example I think. Imagine 2 systems. AMD processor, 1 gig of ram and a 7600GS. I only need a 350W PSU for that. Even with every component running at maximum power still I would come way under 350W. System number 2 has an Intel processor, 1 gig of ram, and a 7600GS. Ah but intel processors use less power under full load so this time I only need a 300W PSU. So what are you going to be put as a minimum on the game box? If I put 300W as a minimum, its not true for the AMD owner. If I put 350W, I've ruled out a machine that is capable of playing the game at exactly the same settings as the other one.
Every combination of components is going to have different power requirements. Theres no way to pick a value that isnt going to be misleading or confusing to some combination of components.

The fact is games themselves dont have power requirements anyway. They arent using power on their own, they are using the components of your machine. It surely has to be implicit in the ownership of an AMD processor or a 8800GTX or 2 hard drives or extra fans etc.. that you have a PSU capable of powering them. If its not, what else are you going to want to put on the game box? Must have access to electricity supply? :)

Umm, the minimum specs are given on the assumption that if you meet them, you also have a powerful enough PSU to support those components running at their potential.

Like Garin said, you can't just give a blanket estimate of how much power it'll require because it'll vary somewhat between basically equivalent (in terms of performance) components, there's too many combinations of hardware and it's further dependant upon things completely unrelated to the hardware the game's most interested by. Kind of rough but you get the point.

I agree totally, but as machine components will only take what power they need, then a minimum recommended PSU power requirement would be acceptable regardless of what you ran off it. Surely more demand on a component would increase its demand of the available power - or not?

If minimum and recommended specs are given, following testing on machines, then surely the PSU size could also be included as is CPU capacity.

Not connected to above, but Nvidia 8000 series require 450PSU minimum and in sli mode even bigger.

Am I missing the point or what?

Its the components in your machine that have PSU requirements not the games. If you have a 8800GTX for instance and you try to run Crysis with it. Its somewhat implicit that your PSU is capable of powering it. I dont think its the job of the game publishers to make sure your machine is capable of powering all the components in it.

Even if you did want to say its the responsibility of game developers to state PSU needs, how would you do it? Every computer has different power needs. I've got 4 hard drives in my machine at the moment, any minimum PSU requirements would be meaningless because you cant factor in my HDD power requirements.

While I totally agree with Garin's comments, Crysis has just hit the forums and intensive help guides abound with solutions - problems galore.
Tweakguides.com have provided reliable and almost instant solutions to all new game problems and can be a recommended source of information. Installing new drivers for every new game isn't acceptable....
However, information now indicates that PSU power and capabilities are important factors in running new games, especially Crysis.
Having recently read the 'package' specs for Crysis,
this factor is not mentioned. Indeed, Crysis spec requirements are quite acceptable for XP machines with no mention of any PSU minimums.
Having suffered a gfx card fry with MoHA, isn't it about time this factor was introduced to game packaging? Just a thought..