DP startup issue

[grave_digga]

I noticed a strange "problem" with my DP. I didn't played Quake for some weeks now and i now resumed play. Normaly DP needs on my machine 6 seconds to start up and run the demo. Now, when i boot up my rig and run Quake for the first time it needs 2 Minutes and 30 seconds to start up. The first 2 minutes it happens absolutely nothing, only the LOADING screen is visible. Then after 2:05 the progress bar appears and it loads up DP but slower then normal. After about 2:30 it runs as usual. If i now quit Quake and start it up again it needs about 6 seconds as allways. I use:

- darkplacesengine20110328beta2

- Windows 7 X64 with all updates

Any suggestions?

[Lerster]

get rid of the high res texture pack.

Switch to a medium pack or something.

As i bet if u remove that pack, and run it, it'll load instantly.

It's probably that ultra pack that your trying to use.

If it is ultra, try the high pack.

I haven't messed with that stuff in along time now, but i recall the ultra pack took awhile to load on my old pc. I ain't tried it with this one.

As i'm a proquake user.

[grave_digga]

I have the high pack, ultra kills my rig. Maybe i made myself not clear enough, a few weeks ago i had with the same config allways 6 seconds to load. And it's allways only at the first startup after reboot/boot...

[LambentHammerBurst]

Odd maybe something got added to your config without you knowing it (like it happened to me many time in Half-Life:Team Fortress Classic). Try moving your config to another folder and rebooting DP to see if there's any difference.

[grave_digga]

Well i forgot to say that i also tried a really clean setup, freshly installed Quake (untouched) and only added the dp engine to it. Same problem...

[LambentHammerBurst]

Tried any other Darkplaces builds? I've only had this issue with Reforged Ultra installed and loading up Chthon. Had to make him on normal texture size.
There been any hardware or driver changes and are any other games taking longer to boot up?

[grave_digga]

I had the dp from last august und after having the issue i tried darkplacesengine20110328beta2. The only thing i "changed" are the normal Windows updates, maybe one of them is causing the problem. Also there is something like a time window. If is start it up the first time with the 2:30 issue and then shut it down again i could fire it up a few times without any problem like normal. But if i have it closed for some time and then i try to start it again i have the 2:30 again. I tried Painkiller and it acted normal. I also have added darkplaces.exe to the exclusion list of my antivirus scanner (MS Security Essentials) but its still the same...

[LambentHammerBurst]

Try this beta (backup your present one) - latest beta from 05/24/2011
http://icculus.org/twilight/darkplac...10524beta1.zip

or even this auto build and see if it still happens:
http://icculus.org/twilight/darkplac...eautobuild.zip (June 19th autobuild so it's quite new lol)

[grave_digga]

Well, nothing changed. I also tried a 2006 Version just for fun but it's still the same problem.

[grave_digga]

Is there a way to write a log file when dp starts up? Something like debug...

[LordHavoc]

-condebug -developer2 on the commandline will yield a pretty detailed log of the startup process...

But what you're describing sounds like an interactive firewall issue (ZoneAlarm or similar), or an antivirus program doing a deep scan for some reason.

Or your hard drive is in PIO mode for some reason (driver issue?)

Or you have too little ram and it's thrashing swap...

Or you plugged in a really crummy USB flash drive and it thinks it's a great time to use it as a readyboost device...

Just guessing here.

[grave_digga]

Hi LordHavoc.

First of all thank you for your reply, it pushed me in the right direction. After studiying the Windows event log a lot and trying different services activated/de-activted and so on i stumbeled upon an entry in the System event log. It was about "atapi device is not answering". Well, the only atapi device in my rig is the DVD burner which worked fine. So i replaced it with an other one and the issue is gone.