NVIDIA 500 and 600-series cards- TDR errors in FFXI only.

[Safiyyah]

On my system, NVIDIA cards will get the TDR "display driver stopped responding" errors, only in Final Fantasy XI. AMD cards don't have the error. So far I've tried:

560TI: crash
570: crash
5850: stable
6950: stable
brand new 500 dollar GTX 680: crash

The crashing on NVIDIA cards usually corresponds to spell effects, but not usually. It will always crash within 15 minutes. My system specs:

i7-950, 12GB DDR3, OCZ SSD, Asus P6X58 mobo, Logitech controller

This is annoying. The 680 (like the 570 before it) is a fabulous card, and I can't return it. I'd rather not stop playing XI either, but I can't run it since upgrading from a 6950. $500 video card >>> 10 year old game, and all that.

I've tried all of the standard fixes. Reinstall Windows, reinstall the game, fresh driver installs, etc. Nothing works.

[RAIST]

For the most part, those cards are not officially tested and supported by SE (http://www.playonline.com/ff11us/envi/win/win01.html?pageID=win)for FFXI unless you are using older drivers for some of them:

NV 570/580 - v266.58 driver
ATI 5x00 series - v10.11 for Vista/Win7, v11.1 for XP with some performance issues noted in XP
ATI 6x00 series - v11.1 drivers, with some performance issues noted again for XP

I would suspect a lot of this is due to the way FFXI uses an outdated and rare rendering method that is just not handled well with the newer drivers and cards as they are becoming more DX11 compliant.

[Dacero]

I have 680's in SLI. Disabling Shadows and Weather has fixed it for me, as well as a few other people. It really surprises me you never had problems with AMD Drivers. Those are terrible.

[Mirage]

Maybe things would have been better if the game wasn't emulating something that is again put in a dx9 wrapper which again is played on systems that are gradually losing dx9 support, and instead run in dx10/11 mode natively.

Not talking about upgrading the graphics here or making things look better, just the same graphics but not sent through 5 extra steps to be displayable on Win7 PCs.

[Glamdring]

seriously, they're going to release a new expansion pack, but not update graphics to run on cards made past 2007? C'mon SE, this REALLY needs to be fixed. I'm getting tired of DCing every 60 minutes or so. I mean, we are being PENALIZED for having current equipment? Really? And it's not like they don't know how to run on modern graphics cards, 14 runs just fine.

Fix it, this is lame.

[RAIST]

might be part of the plan with the new expansion, considering the PS2 is starting to slide off the supported platform list.....some much needed core programming changes could be coming eventually.

[Dacero]

If you're using a 600 Series Card, you are going to have to disable shadows and weather effects. That's what I've done for me SLI'ed 680's. It works perfectly for me, and it worked for other people who've complained about this exact issue. I suggest you try it.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/23792-FFXI-Causes-Nvidia-Driver-Crashes-while-using-GTX-680.?p=322212#post322212

[Liuu]

After turning off shadows and weather the majority of crashes did stop, however it certainly didn't fix all my problems after upgrading my PC.

For me whenever I'm in a zone for a long time, be it fighting, or simply standing around idle. Whether I either talk to an NPC, change zones or engage in a mob, POL will crash.

Examples. I decided to do a campaign in Ronfare S. I waited in the zone for the battle to begin, got my tag from the NPC and then spent 30-40 minutes killing the mobs. After the battle, I selected the campaign NPC and pressed enter. POL crash. Lost all my rewards.

Last night spent a good 1hr 30mins in ABY doing some NMs, getting time chests and pop items etc. I decided to do a page while I was there. Killed the mobs and ran over to get rewards, again selected the NPC and the game crashed.

It seems whenever I'm in the game for a long time and then select an NPC and have the game delve into the server, POL will crash.

This never happened before upgrading my PC. I run Win7, i5 2500k CPU, Z68 Extreme4 gen3 mobo, 8gb RAM and GTX 670 GPU.

[RAIST]

May very well be a driver issue...possibly even an overheating issue with the GPU. Nvidia 6x0 cards have not been vetted for FFXI yet (http://www.playonline.com/ff11us/envi/win/win01.html?pageID=win), may need to post a report to nVidia. FFXI is probably not the only DX9 or older program having issues.

[Eekiki]

For me, the game only crashes like this when the "Level Up!" effect flashes on the screen. I'm using a single GTX670 card with the latest drivers.

Between this and the Destrier Beret not being available...I'm kinda sorry I came back. :P

[Continuity]

I am not currently using an nVidia video card anymore, but perhaps I can help.

I used to own a GTX 560Ti, and after a certain driver version, would get TDR problems periodically, usually when browsing the internet. I discovered that the cause of the TDR problems stemmed from a combination of my cards BIOS settings and the driver's changes to power/voltage management. Basically, nVidia became more aggressive with power savings, and as a result, the video card was receiving less voltage than it should have when running in one of it's middle power states. Now, I'm not guaranteeing that this is the same issue, but as far as I know, nVidia never fixed the issue on their end regarding the TDR issues I was having, instead leaving it up to the manufacturers.

What you can try, is a workaround known as PowerMizer, which would allow you to (temporarily in this case) keep your video card running at a full power state, effectively disabling power savings management. If the crashes stop after that, then it will suggest that the problem is power related as mine and many others have been in the past. If the crashes are unaffected, then it's entirely unrelated.

[Liuu]

I am not currently using an nVidia video card anymore, but perhaps I can help.

I used to own a GTX 560Ti, and after a certain driver version, would get TDR problems periodically, usually when browsing the internet. I discovered that the cause of the TDR problems stemmed from a combination of my cards BIOS settings and the driver's changes to power/voltage management. Basically, nVidia became more aggressive with power savings, and as a result, the video card was receiving less voltage than it should have when running in one of it's middle power states. Now, I'm not guaranteeing that this is the same issue, but as far as I know, nVidia never fixed the issue on their end regarding the TDR issues I was having, instead leaving it up to the manufacturers.

What you can try, is a workaround known as PowerMizer, which would allow you to (temporarily in this case) keep your video card running at a full power state, effectively disabling power savings management. If the crashes stop after that, then it will suggest that the problem is power related as mine and many others have been in the past. If the crashes are unaffected, then it's entirely unrelated.
Thinking about my problem, this sounds very much like what's happening with my game. As mentioned in my previous post, the game is fine so long as I'm constantly changing zones and engaging NPCs, however once I stop for awhile or stay in the same zone, then the crash will happen once I start changing zones or talk to NPCs again.

I decided to experiment with my driver settings (I use a 670gtx) and I upped all settings manually to near max (driver level) and then returned to the game. It played fine for hours without a single crash, even when I was AFK or just standing around in Jeuno. It did eventually crash, but after a much longer period of time.

It's almost as if upping the card settings and making it work harder stopped it from shutting down into power saving mode and so ran the game for a longer time.

I'll give PowerMizer a try sometime after work through the week and see how it goes.

[Continuity]

PowerMizer is a technology developed by nVidia in order to conserve energy. The tool I have tried was known as "PowerMizer Manager", for which the main site seems to be down, and I don't know if links are allowed anyways. But if you search for "PowerMizer Manager" you will find the software. You can tell the features are designed for laptops, but it works just as well on any PC. What I would recommend trying is to set it to "Max Performance" on AC power.

The option in the nVidia control panel dealing with power management is similar, but still not full power.

Now do note, if you enable Max Performance, it will run the card at 3D clock speeds (state 0?) 100% of the time... Which is not desired. It's mainly for diagnostic purposes, and I wouldn't recommend keeping the video card at 3D clock speeds all the time. However, also note that actual power draw is not just dependent on the clock speeds, but the load as well, which means it will still drain less power at idle, even at max clock speeds... Still though, worth a try.

[DarkMarc009]

Man It Sucks Because I Was Excited To Get Back In To This Game And Now I Can Only Play It With Weather Effects And Shadows Turned Off And It Is Not That Great To Look At. I Mean Its Playable But I Just Wish They Fixed This. But I Highly Doubt They Will....

[Drofar]

See my thread here:
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/27263-FFXI-Crashing-during-Job-Ability-or-Spell-Activivation

The only thing SE wants to do with this problem is dodge it. Good luck!

[SE_Chris]

I'm sorry to hear that you are still unable to play without issue. It's refreshing to see that you have been able to try many different combinations and system configurations. By the symptoms we've got here it sounds like there may be a conflict with the device and the system/installation. We'd always want you to make sure that you've uninstalled any previous device drivers you have if you're jumping between cards (you may even want to try a registry cleaner like CCleaner to be sure). We'd like to get you some more directed support by having you submit your DirectX diagnostic information to our support center, create a ticket, and then contact our live phone or chat technical support directly (https://support.na.square-enix.com/contact.php?id=20&la=1) with that ticket number so they can look into your issue with a microscope. Thanks you for reaching out for support, and our thanks everyone who's provided solutions and advice.