I am so frustrated with FSX and its crashing that I am almost through with the using the product anymore.

 

My system is as follows:

i5 2500 @ 3.3GHz (no overclocking)

Asus P8Z68-V LE motherboard

8 GB DDR3 RAM

Nvidia GeForce GTX 560 1GB

 

My software:

Windows 7 64bit

FSX with Acceleration w/ SP2

PMDG 737NGX

PMDG 747

Ultimate Traffic 2

 

Flightbeam KSFO 2.0.1

FSDT LAX

FSDT GSX

MegaScenery Southern California

Ground Environment x USA

FS2Crew PMDG 737NGX

REX Essentials Plus & Overdrive

EZdok

Various other addon aircraft.

 

Scenario:

I typically start flights out of KLAX and fly to the Pacific Northwest or east bound using the PMDG 737NGX. Sometimes I am able to make it a whole flight from gate to gate. But at random times, the game will freeze up completely which requires me to bring up the task manager and end the process. I have noticed that frequently when it does hang, the memory for the process is 1,950,000 K or more. I do not get an error message on my screen stating that this or that process/dll crashed.

 

I am attaching my FSX.cfg file and an exported crash file from my last crash the other night in hopes that some of you can assist with figuring this issue out.

 

-d

Try putting this file into your main FSX root folder. http://www.mediafire.com/?mik2mlqdz1w

Good luck!

Thanks for the quick response. I downloaded it and went to copy to the root folder, but I already have that file. However, the one I have is from 7-13-2009, Version 6.1.7600.16385.

 

Should I use the one you linked or keep the one I have?

 

-d

I do not get an error message on my screen stating that this or that process/dll crashed.

 

Uh, your crash report indicates the crash was caused by the terrain.dll.

 

I fixed this problem with one person by recommending he turn down his scenery sliders - http://forum.avsim.net/topic/360144-terraindll-crashes/. Might work for you too. I didn't help another individual who brought back his settings - http://forum.avsim.net/topic/292844-terraindll-crashes-fsx/ - but doing that worked for him too. Your settings really do not look all that bad though. Your config was tweaked by Bojote and you might want to save that fsx.cfg and rename it to FSX.orig then restart FSX and let it rebuild. If things are okay after making some very modest changes in your fsx.cfg, then it is a problem with your config from Bojote.

 

The uiautomationcore.dll in your main FSX directory only fixes menu crashes. Putting it in your FSX directory may cause you more problems. It is not the holy grail of fixes.

 

Since the terrain.dll is related to scenery, you could have corrupted or missing textures that FSX is calling and cannot find them so crashes. I would look at disabling any recent scenery addons in your scenery library if none of my prior suggestions worked. A lot of people will disable all addon scenery, run fsx and see if the problem still occurs. If not, they will reenable half of all of the scenery they disabled, run fsx and see if the problem continues. If not they will then reenable 2-3 of the remaining sceneries until the problem is found.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Best regards,

Jim

I made the changes as you suggested in the thread you linked to, however I had crashes on both test flights. Both times the fsx.exe process became unresponsive, I was able to open up Task Manager and saw that CPU 1, 2, and 3 were all maxed out and the fsx.exe process was at 2,015,132 K memory usage according to taskmon.

Try putting this file into your main FSX root folder. http://www.mediafire.com/?mik2mlqdz1w

Good luck!

 

That file actually caused crashes on my system:

 

Sandy bridge @ 5ghz

Asus P8P67 Pro

8gb Corsair Vengance

EVGA Geforce 670 4gb ram

Crucial M4 SSD x4

Word Not Allowed Tweaks

GEX/REX/Opus/Ezdok/Orbx/MSE

was able to open up Task Manager and saw that CPU 1, 2, and 3 were all maxed out and the fsx.exe process was at 2,015,132 K memory usage according to taskmon.

 

So did you set priorities for your CPU's. I'm not understanding why all cpu cores are maxed out. Something is seriously wrong with your system OR possibly FSX. Since the terrain.dll module was not at fault this time, then it must be a problem with your system memory settings. Did you set the memory settings yourself in the bios or did you allow the MB to provide the settings (which is okay as long as the settings are right)? The crash report in the OP indicated terrain.dll caused your crash but you stated it was a memory issue with no faulting module showing in your crash reports (which is in error according to your attached crash report. Bad settings in the FSX.cfg could cause issues so that's why I suggested you rename the fsx.cfg to fsx.orig and restart FSX. You want to get back to your default settings. I know the sim is not pretty at default settings but you need to find out if it's a bad setting in your config that's causing this issue. If this memory crash is still occurring with default settings, then you have a problem with your system. Opening and running the task monitor while running FSX will use a lot of resource too. You already know your cpu cores are using a lot of memory so no need to be running memory resource programs in the background.

 

If you have CPU-Z, a freeware program, look at the memory tab and look at the timings and DRAM frequency. Now look on the SPD tab and see if the frequency and timings match one of the settings set up for your particular memory. If not, then you will have to go into the bios and reset the memory frequency timings and voltages as show in the SPD tab.

 

Another problem could be drivers for your system bus and for your installed HDD's. Here's the site for your MB http://www.overclock.net/t/1042186/asus-z68-series-information-thread-drivers-bioses-overclocking-reviews-updated-12-11. It provides updated drivers, new BIOS's, and information on keeping your system up-to-date.

 

Best regards,

Jim

Dizza, for giggles try turning max texture load in your config from 4096 back down to 1024. Also try turning your autogen completely off. FSX tuning really is an art and hobby unto itself. I ran a system spec'd very similar to yours earlier this year, and I really had to be conservative on the graphic settings.

 

C

Might try this link and use the MS Fix It in the article. If the link doesn't go the then search Microsoft knowledge base for article 947246. Running the fix it will not hurt anything.

 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/947246

 

Tim

So did you set priorities for your CPU's. I'm not understanding why all cpu cores are maxed out. Something is seriously wrong with your system OR possibly FSX. Since the terrain.dll module was not at fault this time, then it must be a problem with your system memory settings. Did you set the memory settings yourself in the bios or did you allow the MB to provide the settings (which is okay as long as the settings are right)? The crash report in the OP indicated terrain.dll caused your crash but you stated it was a memory issue with no faulting module showing in your crash reports (which is in error according to your attached crash report. Bad settings in the FSX.cfg could cause issues so that's why I suggested you rename the fsx.cfg to fsx.orig and restart FSX. You want to get back to your default settings. I know the sim is not pretty at default settings but you need to find out if it's a bad setting in your config that's causing this issue. If this memory crash is still occurring with default settings, then you have a problem with your system. Opening and running the task monitor while running FSX will use a lot of resource too. You already know your cpu cores are using a lot of memory so no need to be running memory resource programs in the background.

 

If you have CPU-Z, a freeware program, look at the memory tab and look at the timings and DRAM frequency. Now look on the SPD tab and see if the frequency and timings match one of the settings set up for your particular memory. If not, then you will have to go into the bios and reset the memory frequency timings and voltages as show in the SPD tab.

 

Another problem could be drivers for your system bus and for your installed HDD's. Here's the site for your MB http://www.overclock...s-updated-12-11. It provides updated drivers, new BIOS's, and information on keeping your system up-to-date.

 

Best regards,

Jim

 

I made sure all drivers for my motherboard and video card were up to date. I verified the memory timings using CPUz and other applications. After a reboot, I renamed the FSX.cfg file for a backup, fired up FSX and had one heck of a time getting it to even run. After several crashes, I was finally able to load it, change the resolution settings and take a plane up for a flight. Spent about 30 minutes flying a Carenado Caravan. No crashes, but I did notice that none of my addons were loading. Interesting. Exited FSX. Started FSX again, saw the EZdok addon loading and Ultimate Traffic 2. Jumped into the Trike for an easy test. EZdok wasn't available in the addons menu, actually none of my addons were. Exited FSX, started it again, tried loading the Friday Harbor airport, but the loading terrain box stopped at 50% and then nothing for 5 minutes. Started Taskmon, CPU 1,2,3 at 100% again. End-tasked FSX. Loaded it up again, but can't get it to seem to load any airports up. I disabled all addon airports/scenery and tried again. Same issue.

 

I haven't made any changes to priority of the CPU cores for FSX to my knowledge.

 

None of my other games have issues running and some of them are way more intense graphics wise, CPU wise and memory usage wise.

 

-d

The fact the Carenado Caravan can run without crashing the sim, suggest it’s the result of an add-on combo overload.

 

Even if every add-on was perfect, the combination of too many heavy add-ons is deadly.

 

Let’s not forget FSX is a 32 Bit process and will remain so.

 

When Microsoft was in charge, they had a “budget” (processor time, virtual address space allocation) for everything, aircraft, scenery, AI etc..

 

These days…

 

Aircraft builders will want Hi Def textures so that their customers can go “Wow, amazing, super”

 

Scenery builders will want the same.

 

Weather generator devs will want the same.

 

They all work separately, and wrongly assume they own the whole FSX virtual address space.

 

Every dev will convince you the problem is not his, which is technically true. I mean you’ll get the suggestion to install fresh FSX, load their add-on and you won’t see major problems, because it’s a scenario they would have heavily debugged.

 

It is further confounded by the fact customers are often only making judgements on appearance (first sight).

 

There is a reason why Microsoft didn’t use high quality textures. And trust me, it’s not because Bill Gates couldn’t afford a high-resolution camera.

 

It is for the above reason that while we were initially tempted to run the speech engine (for voice control) inside the FSX process, we decided against it, and made it run as an external process.

 

The speech engine is a heavy memory consumer, and over the duration of the flight a lot of things can go wrong with it, never mind the fact it will deprive aircraft and scenery add-ons of some of the virtual address space they desperately need.

EZdok wasn't available in the addons menu, actually none of my addons were.

 

The dll.xml file in the same folder as your fsx.cfg is responsible for showing the addon menu in fsx. If you are not seeing any addons, then there is something wrong with this file. It is difficult to edit or check for errors as it has a special formatting. In the Flight1 Library, they have a program that supposedly can fix dll.xml files but not even I can understand how that program works. I think you have a corrupted installation. Like I've stated before (not in this thread), FSX/Acceleration works great and has great framerates, etc., until you install the addons. That's when things get nasty. Here's a link to the PMDG post on repairing the dll.xml and how it is organized http://support.precisionmanuals.com/KB/a92/dllxml-information-and-troubleshooting.aspx. You can then open yours and see what program or programs caused the corruption and maybe edit it and fix the problem yourself. An educational guess would be the EZDok program has a corruption. In the FSX folder containing the fsx.cfg and dll.xml, some developers save the dll.xml before putting their entries into the file. You might try renaming one of those to dll.xml and see if that fixes your problem. Otherwise, I'm afraid you will have to completely uninstall FSX and then reinstall it and all of your addons (ugh!).

 

Best regards,

Jim

I went through the dll.xml file and did fix an entry that FSUIPC screwed up when it installed the other day. All addon's are loaded again within FSX.

 

I did a quick flight from KLAX to KPHX and immediately after taking off from LAX, my cpu's were at 100% again.

 

I'm attaching some screenshots:

 

 

I did a quick flight from KLAX to KPHX and immediately after taking off from LAX, my cpu's were at 100% again.

 

I'm reading the charts and where are you seeing fsx is using 100% of your CPU's. Your image shows you have a total of 130 processes running, including FSX, and CPU usage is 57%. That's normal.

 

Glad you were able to fix the dll.xml. Happy flying!

 

Best regards,

Jim

The screenshots are from two different times, maybe 5 minutes apart. The first one I took after cores 1,2,3 were all at 100% for more than 2 minutes and the game was stuttering. It then would drop to maybe 70-80% on each core for a few seconds and then max out again. I took the screenshot during one of those times. From what I can tell, FSX isn't using the first core at all.

 

The second screenshot is from a few minutes later when the memory usage was almost at 2GB and I hadn't even flown 10 miles away from the departure airport.

 

Thanks for the tip about the dll.xml file.