Can't play on servers with Flags

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Bozo
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Can't play on servers with Flags

Post by Bozo »

I have a long standing problem that I've completely run out of ideas for. I am unable to play on a server with flags, not even CTF with no super flags. I open BZ, can find servers, choose one and click on join, but if there are any flags I only get to the "Right-click or press i to join" and then nothing. It's not a machine or program lockup, I can hit esc and leave the game and choose another, or quit the program normally. This has happened with all the 2.0.x releases. They all work fine on servers with no flags (basically rabbit hunt with no super flags). I have experimented with all the settings in the options menu to no avail. I have reinstalled numerous times, both with rpms and compiling it myself. I have downloaded new copies of all the 2.0.x releases. This is the Linux client; I can boot to windows and run 2.0.2 just fine. (2.0.4 and 2.0.5b1 both suffer random lockups in windows, but that's for another time) Last night I spent several hours ridding my Linux partition of all references to bzflag (and some were in *really* wierd places) except for the tarballs and recompiling 2.0.4.20050930. No joy, same problem.

Here is my setup:

Athlon XP 2400+
256 mgs DDR ram
ECS K7VTA3 motherboard (VIA KT333CF Northbridge and VT8235 Southbridge)
nVidia Gforce4 Ti 4200 with 128 mgs of memory; nVidia drivers from about a year ago
C Media CMI3738/C3DX PCI sound card
Diamond Supra Express 56K external modem
IBM PS/2 keyboard
Logitech MX300 USB mouse (Linux sees it as a Intelli-Mouse USB; works fine)

Dual booting windows 98SE and SUSE Linux 9.1 Pro on a 160gig WD HD

Anybody have any ideas? Need any more info? Sorry for the lengthy post.

TIA
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Post by A Meteorite »

Have you tried upgrading to SuSE 10? Just a thought, although I doubt that will help...
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Post by Bozo »

A Meteorite wrote:Have you tried upgrading to SuSE 10? Just a thought, although I doubt that will help...
No, I've thought about it, but not for bz. I have a live CD for SUSE 10, but it requires 384 mgs of RAM, so I haven't been able to try it. More RAM is on the shopping list, though, espicially for Photoshop. I'm thinking of formating the HD as a last resort. I've got a lot of junk lying around, and I found bz files in strange places (a directory of downloaded Karmann Ghia pictures, and in the xsane directory) that I don't know how they got there, so who knows what else might be misplaced :( As I said, a last resort. :cry:
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Post by A Meteorite »

Even though it requires 384MB Ram, try it anyways. I bet it will still run, just slowly.
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Post by Bozo »

A Meteorite wrote:Even though it requires 384MB Ram, try it anyways. I bet it will still run, just slowly.
It's a live CD, it needs the RAM for a RAMdisk; it won't even boot with only 256 mgs.
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Post by TD-Linux »

Yes... you should upgrade your memory. I assume your tarballs are not corrupted, right? I have had problems before with corrupted downloads.

A Meteorite: A program that requires 384 MB of RAM will not run without it. Period. However, most computers simulate RAM on the hard drive, so the computer may have a much larger amount of virtual RAM than physical RAM. Of course, this is much slower, and is impossible on a Live CD because it cannot touch any other storage on the computer.
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Post by A Meteorite »

TD-Linux wrote:Yes... you should upgrade your memory. I assume your tarballs are not corrupted, right? I have had problems before with corrupted downloads.

A Meteorite: A program that requires 384 MB of RAM will not run without it. Period. However, most computers simulate RAM on the hard drive, so the computer may have a much larger amount of virtual RAM than physical RAM. Of course, this is much slower, and is impossible on a Live CD because it cannot touch any other storage on the computer.
OK, I know this is OT, but can't they make Live CDs use the swap space if there is any?
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Post by Bozo »

TD-Linux wrote:Yes... you should upgrade your memory. I assume your tarballs are not corrupted, right? I have had problems before with corrupted downloads.
I've re-downloaded several times; always the same problem with all the 2.0.x releases
A Meteorite wrote:
TD-Linux wrote:A Meteorite: A program that requires 384 MB of RAM will not run without it. Period. However, most computers simulate RAM on the hard drive, so the computer may have a much larger amount of virtual RAM than physical RAM. Of course, this is much slower, and is impossible on a Live CD because it cannot touch any other storage on the computer.
OK, I know this is OT, but can't they make Live CDs use the swap space if there is any?
When the Live CD boots, it creates a RAMdisk, a portion of memory that simulates a hard drive; the OS and programs install into the RAMdisk; to the Live CD it *IS* the hard drive. Without the minimum required RAM, it's like trying to install Windows XP onto that old 56 mg hard drive I have; it just won't fit!

Once the OS has installed to the RAMdisk, it can access the /swap partition on the hard drive, just as Linux or Windows can use a virtual memory area on a different hard drive than they are installed on, but it has to have adequete room to initially install on the RAMdisk.

The point of a live CD is to be able to run this new OS on your machine without affecting the current installation at all.
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Can't play on servers with Flags - Fixed!!

Post by Bozo »

A Meteorite wrote:Have you tried upgrading to SuSE 10? Just a thought, although I doubt that will help...
I finally got a DVD of Suse 10; that indeed did fix the problems. :) Looking forward to seeing you all in my sights.

Thanks for the help,

Bozo
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