1520 unable to play any The Orange Box Games

hello everyone, just this week i recieved my Dell inspiron 1520 and immediately loaded up The Orange box. When i first tried to run Half Life 2 it got to the blurry image and Loading screen and locked up, i have made no progress since. I am no longer unable to run TF2 after initially being able to. It will now connect me to the game and the first screen comes up where you can click continue and begin to hear game noises. My laptop will then lock up and loop the same 1sec sound clip over and over again.

I have not tried to run any other games but i did successfully run 3d Mark 06 and got around 3600(default resolution)

I have also contacted Dell Technical services and they told me to run diagnostics which i did and the diagnostics said everything was working fine.

My Specs are:

core 2 duo 1.83ghz
1gb DDR2 RAM
8600m GT 256mb
80GB 5400rpm HDD

Windows XP.

Yes i have the latest drivers.

 

Try reinstalling HL2.

 

You can definitely use another GB of memory, and the 1520 only has a DDR2 geforce card, which means its slower than the 1530 ones.

It should still be powerful enough to run the Box (with 2gb of ram of course).

Do you have the latest drivers from Laptopvideo2go.com? I recommend those over Dell drivers anyday!

 

actually, I have that same problem with TF2 sometimes. are you running in windowed mode? I find the best course of action to not skip the intro and let it play and load. Other than that, I really have no idea what's causing it.

 

1gb of RAM should be enough to run HL2, my old emachines m6810 (AMD64 3000+, 768mb ram, 64mb radeon 9600) which is 4 years old ran HL2 fine...

 

Yeah 1GB should be fine in XP with source games.. my old desktop with 512mb RAM and a Geforce 2 runs HL2 and CS:S not too bad. Hope you get it running.

 

Reformated my HDD and reinstalled The Orange Box. I tried to Run HL2, it got to the blurry loading screen like always and after about 5 minutes, i got to the start menu. I then tried to start a new game, got to the black screen with the loading bar and the program encountered an error and needed to be closed. After not sending an error report my laptop promptly locked up

 

Just tried to run TF2, i connected to a game and the loading bar got stuck on "Retrieving Server Info"

The screen then went black and i got a blue screen with white text saying

"The problem was caused by nv4_Disp"

"The device driver got stuck in an infinite loop. this usually indicates a problem with the device itself or with the device driver programming the hardware incorrectly"

nv_4 disp
Beginning dump of physical memory
Physical memory dump complete.

When i rebooted i got a "this system has recovered from a serious error" i got that message after i rebooted after the HL2 lock up too.

 

...do you have the latest drivers, and did you install the latest directx??

 

in the original post, i had updated drivers. I later wiped my HDD and had stock drivers when i got that blue screen error. Neither stock or updated drivers has fixed this error

I attempted to run HL2 again, and again it took a good 5 minutes to load up into the main menu screen. When i got to the menu screen there were yellow artifacts all over and then the game crashed and i got this message:


"Engine Failure/error(dont remember which)"
"Failed to lock index"
"Buffer in CmeshDX8;Lock Index Buffer"

Then i got error messages whenever i tried to open any type of image (opening firefox, properties, My computer, anything) the computer then refused to shut down through the start menu so i had to again, hold down the power button and manually shut it down.

Edit: this is with the 169.09 Drivers

 

169.09 drivers? aren't they for vista!?!?!?!
http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=16345
These are the latest Xp drivers according to laptopvideo2go...


http://support.steampowered.com/cgi-bin/steampowered.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=150

Try this too Steamsupport is quite good.

 

what happens if you install win vista drivers to xp or vise versa?
i have million things running around

 

how u installed the vista version driver to xp,,i am so curious~~~
anyway,,seems u find the solution

 

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=16154

it says winXP 32 bit..

 

This sounds like a serious hardware problem. If you have wiped your HDD, and reinstalled your drivers, but the problem is still there... there is a very good chance this is a hardware problem.

I'd call up Dell as soon as possible to request a replacement computer. Try to call them within 21 days of recieving the laptop (7 days in the UK) so you have a good amount of leverage.

The 1520 should have no problems running the Orange Box.


Important question, can you run other games on your computer without crashing?

 

i dont have anything besides The Orange Box, i ran 3dmark06 if that matters at all (3600 score on regular resolution, with the 169 drivers)

 

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/...howtopic=16345

is only for Quadro FX 570M and Quadro NVS 140M too...

 

Blitz, download a game demo and try it out to see if it works. Try the Unreal Tournament 2004 demo, it's a small download and easy to set up. Amazing game too.

If that doesn't work, I really recommend that you call Dell as soon as possible before your return window expires.

 

i just installed this driver:

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=13380

and i got the blue screen driver/hardware error again when trying to run HL2

 

UT 2k4 ran fine at highest settings and 1280x800 res

 

i attempted to run the CoD4 demo, but my laptop locked up every time i tried to extract the files

 

Make sure you are using the Modified .INF file for the graphics drivers!

If this persists this bad, call Dell.

 

hmmm...sounds like it s the notebook's problem and nothing software/driver related, try getting a replacement.

 

i am using the modded .inf

im going to call dell today about a replacement

 

There was jsut a post about this a couple days ago, but here goes again. Try this:

In Steam File>Settings>In Game>Uncheck "Enable Steam community in game"

I was having this problem where the orange box would crash at the loading screens and this solved it.

 

Try reinstalling the game, and maybe updating the video driver.

 

If this game is running fine but HL2 not, then it is a problem with the game itself. Have you tried to run it at the lowest settings and see if you have the problem? Another possibility: instead of only reinstalling the game, reinstall the steam software.

 

i have wiped the HDD and reinstalled Steam + Orange Box 3 times now and i am yet to even get to the main menu of HL2 (except that one time, then it crashed right after).

I tried turning off enable steam community, didnt work I got another Blue screen driver/hardware failure screen

I am using the 156.83 drivers. It seems no matter what drivers i am using it doesnt run, I have tried stock, the updated dell drivers, and the laptopvideo2go.com drivers, nothing has worked. I was able to run HL2 fine on my old emachines laptop (64mb radeon 9600) with stock drivers, never once encountered a problem

 

Good thing you tried out that UT2004 demo.

This problem happens to me (just with Portal). Here's how I fix it, right click on the game in the Steam window, go to properties, then advanced startup options. Add the "-window" to the startup options.

It should start in window mode, then once you're in the game, go to video settings and click "full screen". That will allow you to play in full screen.

Unfortunately, it means that I have to start in windowed mode all the time. Luckily it only affects Portal.

There was a fix on the Steam forums regarding the "steam community overlay". I don't remember how to do it though, sorry. You could search the Steam forums if you wanted.

 

so if my laptop can run Utk4 fine, does that mean its a software problem and not a hardware problem?

 

Just do statistics, so far 1 game does not runs (HL2/TF2, etc are from the same source) and 1 game runs fine. Download another demo and try (Doom3, FEAR, etc.) and see if they run fine.

I would guess it is not a hardware problem. If you think it is the video card go and play a movie and see if everything runs fine. I mean, try different ways to make sure what your findings point out.

 

i was able to play a dvd just fine.

 

I just tried to run the FEAR demo and everything went smoothly until the opening cutscene where a soldier is crouching over you, he immediatly turned all Yellow except for his gun, i hit esc to try and skip the scene and the screen went black. I alt tabbed out of the game to see my resolution had become VERY low and the colors were distorted, when i tabbed back into FEAR the screen turned black like i had turned it off(it was still on) and became totally unresponsive

 

What was your GPU temperature during that time?

 

nvm, i just installed 2gb Ram taking my system total up to 2.5gb, FEAR ran on max graphic settings and on 1024x768, and it ran totally smooth. Trying HL2 now

Edit: HL2 now runs very smooth at high settings!!!(TF2 too!) It appears my lack or RAM was holding my system back (although how i was able to run HL2 with 768MB ram on my old laptop and not able to with 1gb on this one is strange, any explanations?)

thank you everyone for your time, patience and tips!!!

 

that means one of your ram dimm's was bad...have fun gaming