OK, I solved all my CTD's, and all of the "out of memory" problems. There is one that is never solved and that is black screens due to ATC.DLL errors. I have searched on the internet and on the AVSIMs forums and nobody in the FS9 world knows of anything to do with ATC.DLL, what it does, why it conflicts. What I can tell you is that it crashes my flights always about 5 miles out on approach, never any other time, always at large payware airports, more recently at KSEA by FlyTampa and that I keep my AFCAD files pristine without duplicates and no empty texture files. The crashes are about once every 5 or 6 janunts with large payware aircraft, but spares no particular vendor, happens with PMDS, PSS, Captain SIm, you name it,it's been a party to it. So....as usual, any takers???Randy Jura, KPDX

Funny enough I had my first CTD the other night with that ATC.DLL file.I did some research and did not find much on what it does or if anyone knows what it is or if it is required. Hopefully a freindly soul can shed some light on the DLL.[hr color=#000000][table border=0" width="98%" id="table1" height="4" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="2][td width=500]Jason CYOO - Formerly MYNN[br /]General Aviation Fan[br][/b]P4 3.2Ghz, 1GB Ram, FX5900 128MB, XP SP2.[br /][br /]

I'll bite...-A google search brought this up:AVG Anti-virus:C:Program FilesGrisoftAVG FreeATC.DLLDo you have AVG installed? Perhaps disable on access scan? -Just from a search within the AVSIM forums, I've found one reference to AVG. The same post also suggested running AFCAD2 and the error check within it on all AFCAD2 files.-Other posts suggest either a traffic BGL issue or duplipcate AFCAD files.-Have you renamed ATC.DLL and re-installed from CD?-How many ATC.DLL do you find on your C: drive?-Have you tried any utility like FSSTART to minimize any outside influence?-What was the last payware item installed before you started having problems?-When was the last time you: 1. Ran an AV scan? 2. Searched for spyware? 3. Ran Defrag on C:?Jim

Gents,This is a deep-rooted bug in FS2004 and nothing to do with AVG or any other software. The problem is being looked into by a very knowledgeable programmer who may or may not be able to come up with a fix.Don't waste any time trying to solve it. It is a bug in the code.Cheers,

Ray, Thank you for that. At the least it is a known bug, hope the FS10 team knows about it and if that programmer can come up with a fix.....I'll but a $100.00 bottle of champagne and drink heavily! ........at the very least, thank YOU for the good answer !Randy Jura, KPDX

I've had the "ATC.DLL" show up in my event viewer too after a CTD. It seems to be associated with a specific geographic area also. I have also seen "AI_ playr.DLL" in the event viewer after a CDT in the same geographic area.I've replaced those DLLs from the install disc's. After back to back CDT I was able to get through that geographic area by turning down the traffic to about 25 from 60. I surmised the problem might be between the ATC.DLL and the AI_playr.DLL.

Very interesting Daryll, I've never made that similar observation, but now that you've stated it, I must say that my ATC.DLL has never been associated with that other DLL you mentioned;however, most of my ATC.DLL errors have occured with high traffic airports, the most frequent one KSEA, a FLy Tampa product. I fly into KSEA the most of any airport on the planet and at that at 100% traffic. I am going to set up my traffic through FSUIPC to run at less than 100, say 80 and see what happens !! This seems like a worthwhile experiment to me, If you could private message me how that works for you, I could do the same. It will take a few weeks to compare results, but I think you may be onto something, or at least I hope you are.Randy Jura, KPDX

Randy, I don't know how to test the hypothesis.I presume the "AI_playr.DLL" is the module that controls the AI aircraft that you encounter en route. How that interacts with the "ATC.DLL" and the "Traffic.DLL" I don't know. I use windows XP pro and the symbol for my DLLs in my module folder are gears that mesh. This suggests to me that maybe the gears aren't meshing between a couple of the DLLs which causes the CDT.If I am using flight following, ATC is supposed to warn me of a traffic conflict. Maybe the CTD happens when the "AI_playr.DLL" can't supply the airplane so the CDT happens and my event viewer shows the error was caused by the "ATC.DLL". In those CTDs that the "AI_playr.DLL" shows up in my event viewer, maybe I wasn't using flight following and that's why the "ATC.DLL" didn't show up in the event viewer as the cause.If your CTDs are happening at KSEA you are in controlled airspace and the "ATC.DLL" that causes the CDT was really caused by the "AI_playr.DLL" gears not meshing and not supplying the AI aircraft. I'm just guessing here......

Quite honestly, it sounds as though the tightly-coupled variables being used to intercommunicate between the various .dll files that make up the "system" are experiencing an "out of bounds" condition under high stress situations.In simpler terms, it sounds like a classic case of memory pointers attempting to access memory outside the scope of their array, i.e., 'corrupted stack pointers.'In certain geographic areas, I get a consistent failure of "ai_player.dll" even when sitting on the ground, simply letting FS9 "idle" while monitoring ATC or watching the AI traffic.I have noted however, that if I disable GA Traffic, I can leave the sim running in one of the problem areas for weeks with zero crashes.I used Marcus Brunner's GA Traffic tool to generate a HUGE compilation of all my GA aircraft, so I suspect that one - if not more than one - of the GA models I'm using might be the proximate cause of the collapse of ai_player.dll...Maybe I'll find some time in the next week or two to run FS9 in a "debug session" so I can trace the precise cause of my particular problem... ;)

Bill/Daryl : What you guys makes sense and making sense is not easy to come by in debugging FS9. I never use flight following, I dont use FS9 ATC at all, I use VOXATC instead, which may mean that this is not really an ATC problem so much as our AI addons, such as Ultimate traffic, which I use to the max, overwhelming a non-robust AI system never intended to be used as many of us use it, 100% full of AI traffic. With that in mind, I like the idea of turning off GA Traffic, which I do not care about anyway and see if the ATC problem disappears. I am also prepared to reduce the percentage of commercial AI traffic, say to 90% and then go from there. This is obviously a very protractred experiment and may be all full of hot air, but guess what, we have nothing else to do for what, 6 more months before FS10. I just hope to God that the Microsoft team has noted that their ATC and AI systems need a complete overhaul and need to be more robust.OK, well, I'll keep in touch on this.Randy Jura, KPDX

Randy I just noticed in my trouble shooting exercise that I accidentally deleted and disolved in my recycle bin my "ATC.DLL" 9.1 version and my "AI_Playr.DLL" 9.1 version and I guess my "TrafficInfo.DLL" 9.1. When I replaced them from the disc I never thought that I was replacing them using the 9.0 versions. If you have the "ATC.DLL" 9.1 , "AI_playr.DLL" 9.1 and "TrafficInfo.DLL" 9.1 could you maybe zip them and send them to me so I won't have to do a re-install. Maybe there is a [email protected]

Same problem here. around KDTWany further development?GhiomMalaysia

I hate to throw a wrench in this whole deal, but I get them when online without any AI. Sometimes it happens in certain areas and sometimes it doesn'tMost recently I've been able to complete the entire flight, exit Squawk Box, the AI aircraft show up, then Bam!, black screen, and I have to hard boot with the power switch.I used to get the usual out of memory error, but I'm now just getting the black screen freeze so to speak where you can still see everything in the sim.I use Active Sky and Ultimate Terrain if that matters. I've tried various settings and just can't come up with an actual reason.I'm halfway tempted to say that's its my Radeon 9800 XT Pro with 256mb g-card. I just installed the latest drivers and I still see no improvements in the game play nor can I get over 25fps. I never have. I also didn't get the freeze before I installed these drivers.I've got so much stuff in my FS now, I'm certain that I'll never find the actual cause.

Guys, see this thread:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...topic_id=320702Please check your FS9/BACKUP folder and make sure that all the .dll's listed there are the 9.1.0.... versions in your FS9/modules folder.It appears that pre FS9.1 addons and those from FS2002 updated to 2004, will overwrite the 9.1 version .dll's without you even knowing.I only found out when I removed the F1 Meridian and got a startup error.You can easily fix this by reinstalling the 9.1 patch.I am not 100% sure that this is the cause of the problem in this thread, but it sounds like it may be. Worth checking I would think.Regards,Glenn

Glenn,Many thanks for the info. I'd like to try this even if it doesn't work.Just to make sure I got this right.....Just re-install the 9.1 right over everything no loss of any add-ons, etc?Thanks again.