[REPORTED]F-18 freezes upon selecting SA on MFD

This happened to me once in mp when I tried to realign the ins because I accidentally moved without flipping to nav. I wonder if it has something to do with ins alignment... or maybe just coincidence.

I will try, if we can get a good description to reproduce it is always a bonus.

 

thanks

I'm not at my rig now but I'll test it later. In all of my hundreds of hornet startups this was probably the only time I opened the SA page before alignment was complete. I could see how there may be a bug there ie "program SA runs, INS if/then; if condition INS complete then run accuracy for SA... but SA is already running". Obviously more complex than that but you see what I'm getting at.

Specifically when I did it the SA page came up fine the first time... but I then realized I forgot to set NAV so I stopped and tried to realign. When that was complete opening the SA page then froze DCS.

Found my Fix

So, this has been happening with me for a couple weeks. I thought I was the only one, until I read this thread. So I posted a couple days ago about my experience then, last night, it happened again. 'Ah Ha', I thought, I am going to track this issue down before re-firing my DCS. So, I start looking for a crash log, but none existed. I looked at my DCS log file to see what was happening before I pressed the SA button, still, nothing.

Then it dawned on me that I needed to open my event viewer and see what my system said about the app crash. I look in Admin and found nothing that corresponded to the time of the crash. I looked in Applications, thinking surely there would be something there, but nothing. In a last ditched effort, I opened the System log and there it was, a single message saying that I was low on Virtual Memory that occurred at the exact time of the crash.

So, I opened my Page file settings to discover that my page file was spanning multiple disks. 4 gig here, 4 gig there.... So I wiped out all the page files, rebooted, then built a little 3964 mb page file on a single disk.

Fired up DCS, went into multiplayer, and walla, I could launch the SA page in the F-18 with no issue. It came up instantly. Don't be fooled, I said to myself, I have seen this before. DCS was playing games with me, cuz the second I go into a different server, it is going to happen again.

I have logged into several servers, Yes server admins, that was me popping in, starting the 18, then popping out. I must have logged into 12 of them, but still cannot get the SA Crash to happen.

So here is what I suggest. The next time you experience a SA page crash, note the EXACT time of the crash and start looking in your event viewer for a message that corresponds to the time, follow that rabbit and you just might fix your issue as well.

It just happened to me again. I was doing cold start, engines on, everything on and Im on refueling time. The only error I got that is contained on Ginaccio's log is this:

WARNING EDCORE: Source ./Mods/aircraft/FA-18C/Cockpit/Scripts/../Shape is already mounted to the same mount /models/.

and

ERROR COCKPITBASE: controller "MPD_SMS_WALLEYE_CROSS" missed in class cockpit::F18::ccMPD_F18

Thanks for the info HawgDawg4Life - still not working for me however - i tried both disabling the pagefile and also making it very large - my system is an i7 with 32gb ram so dont think this is a resource issue. I tried setting a 64GB page file and it still crashes instantly on SA page opening.

Thankful for finding this as keep a pretty keen eye on the individual plane forums and nothing noted.

On the multiplayer server i play on, i get this quite a bit and not the only one to have the issue but couldn't track the problem down - still can't. First noticed it mid / end August.

It is very intermittent and note i've only had this when SA is on the right MFD.

It cannot be my pagefile (its sat unique on a m2 SSD with a 32GB pagefile size, which is overkill i know - i only use this 500GB drive for DCS and windows boot so have lots of free space) I also have 32GB of system DDR RAM running at 3200mhz - i don't run out of virtual memory, GPU is RTX2080 ultra.

I do not use steam - only direct OB from ED.

I've not been able to narrow down - the only other thing worth mentioning is i only fly VR and don't use mods.

its baaaack....

Well, I thought I had some success, but it didnt take long for the problem to resurface. I kept getting low on virtual memory error in Event Viewer (and still do), so I increased my VM to 64 gig thinking, "I'll show you!" but it doesnt matter what I change it to, it still happens.

I am guessing that there is a memory leak or that DCS is not releasing memory that causes this issue. I am looking into my GPU virtual memory now....

Well, I thought I had some success, but it didnt take long for the problem to resurface. I kept getting low on virtual memory error in Event Viewer (and still do), so I increased my VM to 64 gig thinking, "I'll show you!" but it doesnt matter what I change it to, it still happens.

 

 

 

I am guessing that there is a memory leak or that DCS is not releasing memory that causes this issue. I am looking into my GPU virtual memory now....

@HawgDog im afraid so as per my last post - It is frustrating i've not been able to narrow it down yet myself either.

@Hawgdog / @BigNewy - one thing i should note though I'm pretty confident i've not had it when going back into SA - only the first time i attempt to load the screen. I was thinking perhaps its the contents of that screen that is causing the crash and perhaps when its looking for the A2G threats (to draw the threat circles on) that if it cant get the information quick enough it causes the crash, just an idea?

Your on Target

@Hawgdog / @BigNewy - one thing i should note though I'm pretty confident i've not had it when going back into SA - only the first time i attempt to load the screen. I was thinking perhaps its the contents of that screen that is causing the crash and perhaps when its looking for the A2G threats (to draw the threat circles on) that if it cant get the information quick enough it causes the crash, just an idea?

I too thought this was the case, but from time to time, I can get the SA page to come up and show rings around my area like SAM engagement zones, that I KNOW are not there cuz I created the mission. When I see this, I know that the next time I select the SA page I am going to crash. This happens when I select the SA page when only one engine is started and as soon as I start the other engine and select the SA, Boom!

Also worth noting is that I can avoid the SA crash once in any given mission by selecting the SA page during startup and before I am finished starting. But then, If for some reason I need to load a new aircraft, it is guaranteed to happen. Also, Even if I restart DCS completely it is guaranteed to happen.

Im telling you, this smells like a memory leak.

Watching Memory

OK, so I finally opened my resource monitor while running DCS to watch the memory usage. DCS consistently uses about 18 gig of my physical memory, which I have 24, so it shouldn't be an issue. Well, until I press the SA page.

Anything else that I do changes nothing in memory usage outside of 5% variances. However, when I press the SA page and the game crashes, my Ram usage jumps from 18 gig to 40 gig, like instantly. This only happens if the SA crashes my dcs. If I get lucky, like the first time I launch the SA page everything works fine and there is no spike in physical memory usage. But, the second time I jump into a new plane and fire up the SA, Boom, 40 gig usage and crash.

OK, so I finally opened my resource monitor while running DCS to watch the memory usage. DCS consistently uses about 18 gig of my physical memory, which I have 24, so it shouldn't be an issue. Well, until I press the SA page.

 

 

 

Anything else that I do changes nothing in memory usage outside of 5% variances. However, when I press the SA page and the game crashes, my Ram usage jumps from 18 gig to 40 gig, like instantly. This only happens if the SA crashes my dcs. If I get lucky, like the first time I launch the SA page everything works fine and there is no spike in physical memory usage. But, the second time I jump into a new plane and fire up the SA, Boom, 40 gig usage and crash.

Im seeing very similar behavior, which could be indicative of a memory leak - when the SA page is opened, the game crashes, and the memory usage immediately spikes up. I have 32GB of RAM, so should be more than sufficient to handle DCS.

Im still having this bug, F-18 is completely unplayable for me. Everytime I select the SA page, there is a massive memory leak and then game crashes without and error logs. Will try to reinstall it now.

Ok. I have some Real Info

Ok, So It dawned on me and some of my buddies that all of the servers I connect to seem to have SAM's in them. So My buddy says, create a mission with no SAMS and see if it still happens.

Brilliant suggestion, I thought. So I did...

I created a basic mission with a few yaks, an AWACS, Some Dumb Ground Troops and an F-18. (NO SAMS)

I run the mission Multiplayer and I do NOT have an issue. I even flew out, killed the Yaks, Blew up the ground units, Talked to AWACS, Ejected several times and got into a new plane. Still, the SA page displayed like a champ. Instantly upon press. Like the problem doesnt exist.

I then Opened the Same Mission in the ME and added 4 SA-8's to the map.

I fire it up again and in my first sorte, on the ground during startup, as soon as I press the SA button on one of the MFD's My RAM filled up and my DCS Crashed.

This seems to be related to SAMS and the SA page. I havent tried other SAMS, like the 6 or the 11, but I will be doing that. Definately happened when I added SA-8s.

Upon Further Testing

I can confirm that the SA page Crash is directly related to having any SAM that produces a Dashed Range Circle on the SA page. I have tried this with the SA-8, 6, 2, 3, and one other.

It doesn't seem to matter what puts the range indicator on the SA page. if its in multiplayer it crashes my DCS.

I can confirm that the SA page Crash is directly related to having any SAM that produces a Dashed Range Circle on the SA page. I have tried this with the SA-8, 6, 2, 3, and one other.

 

It doesn't seem to matter what puts the range indicator on the SA page. if its in multiplayer it crashes my DCS.

Are you able to upload a trackfile that has the crash in it? Sounds like the ED devs need to see a trackfile to be able to find out what the exact problem is. All the ones we have uploaded so far have been corrupted because they were on large multiplayer servers, but it sounds like you are able to reproduce on a local MP server?

7 Track Files

Here is a Zip file with 7 track files in it. If you arrange them by date, the latest one is a SA crash the one before it is no crash, the one before it, Crash, the one before it, no Crash.

It is all based on whether or not I put SAM's in the Mission.

Oops

I tried to attach the file to the last post but it was 1 mb larger than the alotted 9.? mb. So I busted the track files into 2 zips.

5 Track Files.zip

2 Track Files.zip

Here is the mission

This is a copy of the mission I created to reproduce the situation. To test it both ways, add and remove SAM Sites. When they are in the mission, SA Crash, when they are not, NO SA Crash.

sa_test.miz

And Just like that....

Seems like this thread just Died!