Game nearly unplayable due to frequent crashes - Help?

[Kerbl]

Hello everybody.

I love the game but a couple of things are making it nearly unplayable. The biggest problem is trying to run the game. I currently have 18 crash folders from trying to play for a few hours the past two days. The KSP directory gets so full of crash folders I have to delete them because they take up so much space. It crashes constantly. It almost always crashes when I go from one area of the game to another. IE: From anywhere to the Space Center. It's always a Access Violation either with KSP.exe or mono.dll. My computer specs and a random error log is below. Would really appreciate a fix. I have a decent computer. There is really no reason this game should run so poorly. My second big gripe is the rover physics. Again, nearly makes the game unplayable when you have to spend hours trying to get two vehicles docked (and tear them both up in the process) because the tires don't track the ground, the brakes are bizarre, and the exacting tolerances on the docking ports. Docking should be a typical step in the game, not a day long project. Nothing to do about that but Big Thanks for some help on the crashing. I've searched far and wide on this mono.dll thing and tried everything I thought might help. BTW, I have mods but the game crashes just as frequently without them and for the same reasons. Need more info, just ask.

HP Z-200 Workstation 2.93GHz I7

Win7 Pro 32bit

8GB Memory

ATI FirePro V3800 (ATI FirePro 8700 on the way - just for this game)

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Unity Player [version: Unity 4.6.4f1_99f88340878d]

mono.dll caused an Access Violation (0xc0000005)

in module mono.dll at 001b:1011940a.

Error occurred at 2015-09-15_223518.

C:\Program Files\Steam\steamapps\common\Kerbal Space Program\KSP.exe, run by z200DefaultUser.

72% memory in use.

3520 MB physical memory [985 MB free].

0 MB paging file [3337 MB free].

2048 MB user address space [115 MB free].

Write to location 00400000 caused an access violation.

[BananaDealer]

How many mods are you using? The 64-bit version is still experimental/unwise to use (meaning most mods don't use it) and the 32-bit one is limited to about 3GB of RAM usage. So if you're using a lot of mods that add a lot of parts, textures, etc (plug-ins generally aren't a big issue on RAM), and still trying to run the game on High Res settings, you're probably running into the good-old "Out of Memory" crash. Try using the Active Texture Management mod to reduce RAM load, start with Basic and go to Aggressive if it still crashes. If that doesn't help, try loading the game in OpenGL (make a shortcut and add -force-opengl behind the target), that usually cuts some more RAM usage (at the possible expense of FPS/rendering issues).

Anywho, after actually reading your post beyond "it's crashing and I'm using mods"... About the Access Violation... Might be a firewall/admin issue, so first try to run it as Admin, if you're not already. If that doesn't help, it might be a DEP issue. Go into your Computer's Settings/System Properties, find Performance Options under Advanced and go to Data Execution Prevention then select Turn on DEP except for the listed programs and add KSP.exe to the list. Again, that might help, I'm not sure.

For more accurate help, upload the output_log from the latest crash somewhere and link it.

In any case, welcome to Kerbal!

[Kerbl]

How many mods are you using? The 64-bit version is still experimental/unwise to use (meaning most mods don't use it) and the 32-bit one is limited to about 3GB of RAM usage. So if you're using a lot of mods that add a lot of parts, textures, etc (plug-ins generally aren't a big issue on RAM), and still trying to run the game on High Res settings, you're probably running into the good-old "Out of Memory" crash. Try using the Active Texture Management mod to reduce RAM load, start with Basic and go to Aggressive if it still crashes. If that doesn't help, try loading the game in OpenGL (make a shortcut and add -force-opengl behind the target), that usually cuts some more RAM usage (at the possible expense of FPS/rendering issues).

Anywho, after actually reading your post beyond "it's crashing and I'm using mods"... About the Access Violation... Might be a firewall/admin issue, so first try to run it as Admin, if you're not already. If that doesn't help, it might be a DEP issue. Go into your Computer's Settings/System Properties, find Performance Options under Advanced and go to Data Execution Prevention then select Turn on DEP except for the listed programs and add KSP.exe to the list. Again, that might help, I'm not sure.

For more accurate help, upload the output_log from the latest crash somewhere and link it.

In any case, welcome to Kerbal!

Thanks. I have not tried those things, exactly. I tried Active Texture but it froze and I think it's because I have the force opengl thing in there now. Don't know if opengl and ATM go together? It got to the first image and fell on it's face. Everything is 32 bit. I've thought about creating a *nix partition because error handling is more graceful. I ran the game stock for awhile because I was afraid the mods would crash it but after it crashed over and over without the mods, I figured may as well try them anyways. I've solved the docking alignment issues with the robitics mod. Now I just align the docking port instead of the whole heavy ship. Thanks for the tips and the welcome. Squad really needs to tweak the memory thing somehow because it makes a groovy PC setup kind of irrelevant.

[BananaDealer]

Thanks. I have not tried those things, exactly. I tried Active Texture but it froze and I think it's because I have the force opengl thing in there now. Don't know if opengl and ATM go together? It got to the first image and fell on it's face. Everything is 32 bit. I've thought about creating a *nix partition because error handling is more graceful. I ran the game stock for awhile because I was afraid the mods would crash it but after it crashed over and over without the mods, I figured may as well try them anyways. I've solved the docking alignment issues with the robitics mod. Now I just align the docking port instead of the whole heavy ship. Thanks for the tips and the welcome. Squad really needs to tweak the memory thing somehow because it makes a groovy PC setup kind of irrelevant.

ATM and OpenGL do go together, the OP of ATM even suggests using opengl. The very first load of KSP after installing ATM will be very long and possibly hangy. That's normal as it's converting textures. It'll get faster after that. Also, the more mods you have, the longer the game needs to load. It also tends to hang a bit when Module Manager is loading it's stuff. Just leave it in the background and it'll sort itself, it's what I do...

Also what do you mean you're aligning the docking port instead of the whole ship? Ports don't really need to be in a particular alignment to mate, they just need to be close enough and reasonably parallel, except for RP/aesthetic purposes...

As for the memory stuff, 1.1 update is coming soon and with it Unity 5 integration. That will make for better memory handling, as well as a possibly better/more stable 64-bit version...

[Val]

...ATI FirePro 8700 on the way - just for this game...

If you're gonna buy something for KSP specifically, then get a GTX 900-series. My GTX 980 runs with -force-opengl with no performance hit compared to dx9, and no graphical issue or missing shadows. In my opinion it actually runs better than with dx9.