Play like it's 2002!

[Kiaring]

Playing NWN currently on lowest/compatibility settings, with the sound disabled, and I still experience a freeze or two each day; Here is a description of my problem.


Game Version: 1.69
Game Language: English
Processor Manufacturer: AMD
Processor Type: Phenom II x4 920
Processor Speed: 2.86 Ghz
Operating System / Service Pack: Windows XP
System RAM: 4 gigs
Video Card Manufacturer: Nvidia
Video Card Model: Geforce GTX 275
Video Card RAM: 1 gig
Video Card Driver Version: 186.82

Using on board Realtek HD Audio - driver version: 5.10.0.5919

Problem Description:

Ever since I switched to this new machine I have been unable to play NWN. I have tried re-installing, turning off all custom options (overrides and the like) and have attempted the fixes offered for Realtek audio (installed the drivers), new NVidia cards (updated drivers, tried running on virtually all graphical settings) and multi-core processors (CPU affinity has been set to 1). None of this has had any success in solving the problem, which is the following:

The game runs fine on menus and such. As soon as I'm actually in game, it will freeze up randomly, After a good minute or so it will unfreeze, only to freeze again afterwards.

Frequency of freezing has gone way way down since I lowered every single graph setting, disabled sound, updated drivers for my gfx card to a version Wern attested had solved his problems for him.

Any help, improving my settings or getting rid of crashes altogether will be greatly appreciated. I'm sick of playing NWN on a 2002 computer. :(

[IxTheSpeedy]

I'm curious, did you build the machine yourself?  or is it a DELL / HP / Lenovo, etc.?

[Porkolt]

Note that NWN doesn't hold well with multi-core processors. You can change Processor Affinity by opening Task Manager, going to the process tab, right-clicking the nwmain.exe process and then picking the appropriate option.
 
Uncheck all CPUs except CPU 0.
 
 
Not sure if this will work, just that it might.

[FleetingHeart]

There is a better way to do this. There`s an option in the NWN config, I believe. Setting the processor affinity on the EXE itself just gets reset when you reboot.
 
Just search NWN and processor affinity for more info. Lots of how tos out there on it.

[Paha]

I have gtx 280. At certain games, these new graphic cards have little freeze and move after some frames problem. There is a setting, frame buffer or something at it's options.

Rougly translated it's something like predrawed buffers or something. It's at 3 on default, set it to 0. That helps in many things, and if it doesn't here, one thing crossed out.

[Kiaring]

As stated, I've attempted the multi-core CPU fix, to no avail.

Game seemed to respond much better after I turned pre-rendered frames down to 0. That being said, however, it still locks up here and there, rendering it somewhat unplayable.

[9lives]

There's another setting in the Nvidia control panel to try out, but I can't for the life of me recall what it is. I run in a dual core machine and have had no issues.

[Nickless]

Are you running a Cisco program to connect to the internet?

[Mort]

Have you turned off Threaded Optimization for NWN in your nvidia control panel?

[Kiaring]

If you mean trilinear optimization, I have it off.

Built the computer myself.

Not using any cisco programs.