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I recently reformatted my hard drive and now every time that I run quake II on my machine (online or single player) the program just shuts down and kicks me back out to my desktop. Sometime I can play 5 minutes before Q2 shuts down and sometime less than 5 seconds. It seems that it’s always when I move my mouse real fast like when I jump up and turn around in the air to rail someone behind me. It’s the only program that I am having problems with but it’s also the only graphic intensive program that I am currently running on my system.

It seems as though it’s a video problem but I’m not completely sure. I’ve got an old video card, a voodoo 3500, and had to install the original drivers because I haven’t been able to find newer drivers anywhere on the web. I also have an old version of DirectX loaded (6.0 I believe) and that may be part of the problem as well.

Does anyone have any idea what is happening?

need to know your CPU and motherboard, please

I think he still has a bh6 and 300@450.

Go here to get 3dfx drivers Ecko, latest ones I know of. They even have xp voodoo drivers.
http://www.voodoofiles.com/s/3dfxdrivers

If that fails then I'd suggest getting the newest directX for your os. And maybe see if there's updated drivers for your mouse too.

Thanks Blade!

btw, this is the same card that you sold me about a year ago

I'm not sure which one I need for windows98? CAn I use the Voodoo 3 WinXP Drivers

That might be your problem, see the one I sold you is a voodoo 3000 or 2000, not a 3500.

Get the drivers for whichever os you are using. Hopefully that along with new dx will work for ya.

Of course completely uninstall the drivers you have now.

Also make sure you have the latest version of Quake II (3.20) I believe I had that problem long ago and it went away by upgrading to the latest version. Good luck.

http://www.planetquake.com/quake2/files.shtml

BTW, there are several different 3.20 patches. One which includes the Capture the Flag mod and the extra deathmatch maps (~18meg), One which include only the deathmatch maps (~13meg), and then one with the barebone patch (~5megs) that don't have any extra maps or mods. Pick which suits you.

Blade,
I've always just updated my drivers through the device manager. Is there a more efficient way to do it that will remove all traces of the old drivers?

oh yea, thanks for the links and info Ex and H_T!

Okay,
I've updated all of my drivers, re-installed Q2 and all of the patches (downloaded all new patches to make sure the ones that I previously had weren't corrupted), installed directX 8.0 and STILL can't seem to play Q2 without it booting me out to my desktop. Can anybody think of something that I may be overlooking? This is starting to piss me off.

Okay, some ideas and observations:

- DX version doesn't matter - Quake2 only requires Dx3 and ONLY for audio.

- You should NOT be using OpenGL. The original V3 drivers did NOT support OpenGL properly, and besides even with later driver OpenGL performance is lousy anyway. You should be using the 3Dfx Quake Miniport.

- You're using a V3-3500. Are you using the correct 3Dfx Quake Miniport driver? For the 3500 you MUST use version 1.49 NOT 1.48 (which is for V3 2000/3000) or 1.47 which is for Voodoo2. The miniport should be on the installation CD, or you can get it here: http://www.voodoofiles.com/3582

- The original V3-3500 drivers were AWEFUL. There was a better one released later. There's a recent beta driver here from the underground 3Dfx community which should work much better: http://www.voodoofiles.com/2495

Also, I've been informed that what's left of 3Dfx has an official driver site being sponsored by WinDrivers.com: http://www.windrivers.com/company/3dfx/ ... /index.htm


Hope this helps...

FP,
As always, very informative answer. To clarify one point though, the card that I have is a V3 3000 not the 3500.

You mentioned that the miniport was on the installation CD but do I actually have to install the miniport separately? I was under the assumption that the miniport was automatically installed with the drivers...

I would not rely on the fact that the miniport is installed automatically. I used to have a V3 3K and I 'm pretty sure I had to select the miniport as a seperate install on the installation menu.

It can't hurt to run the CD and install the miniport either way, then make sure you have OpenGL - 3Dfx Miniport selected in the Quake2 (or any quake engine game) video menu.

Also, if you have a regular V3 then you DEFINATELY should be using the at least the 1.04 beta drivers. They can be found at Voodoofiles.com

FP,
I've done all that you have suggested but I'm still getting the boot.

When you say "make sure you have OpenGL - 3Dfx Miniport selected I'm sure that you mean in the video settings but the option that I see is OpenGL - 3Dfx without the word Miniport. I'm assuming that they are one in the same but thought I would bring it up just in case it is a potential problem.