having major trouble with SL

sorry but i am new to SL and every time i log in within a few minutes it freezes and says something about crash logger and how its detecting the hard drive etc. and then it terminates Sl or I have to as it is not responding

I have Vista, a 1024 GB RAM, 120 GB S-ATA HDD. I was told to post my CPU and GPU but I have no idea what any of these are

also to obtain an updated graphic card which I don't really know much about as it usually works fine with all my brothers games and The Sims 2

Anyone got any ideas on how this can be fixed?

GummyBean

Within a few mins (if that), I get the freezing then the crash logger message. Doesn't give me much info beyond that.

Frustrated!

If you have enough time before SL crashes you can use SL's Help menu, About Second Life, to get some basic system specs. You can highlight them and copy and paste them here.

This site:

http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/referrer/srtest

should help you find your system specs.

Everyone that owns a computer needs to know how to find your system specs.

In windows XP, you can use Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, System Info, to find out a bunch of stuff about your computer.

You can find out how to find your system specs by going to a search engine like Google and typing

"how do i find my system specs "

or similar search terms.

By CPU people are meaning what type of processor, such as an Intel Pentium dual core or an AMD Athlon or what have you.

By GPU (initials of Graphics Processing Unit) they mean either what model video card, or if your graphic processor is built in to your motherboard, what type of integrated graphics processor you have.

For SL system specs should include:

what processor
what operating system - vista basic, vista business, vista ultimate, etc., and whether it's 32 bit or 64 bit, not just "Vista"

Service pack or other upgrade level for your operating system

how much memory your system has,

model of video card (aka video processor, GPU (graphics proccessing unit), IGP (integrated graphics processor) - example, nVidia 8800 GT or ATI Radeon x800

how much memory your video card has,

version of video driver

Version of SL - exact version, with numbers, not just "the main client".

For crashes that happen with SL it's always a good idea to open your computer and make sure it is clean and dust free and that all fans are spinning properly.

You can find your CPU specs by going to your Control Panel then finding the system icon and clicking on it. Your CPU will be listed about mid page. You can find your GPU information by going to the control panel again and finding your device manager icon and clicking it......on the window that opens expand "display adapter" and double clicking the listing for your card/chipset. On the general tab you will see the card name/model.....on the driver tab you can see the driver version currently being used by your GPU.

I can tell you that 1 gig of RAM with Vista is not really enough to run SL well. Vista takes about 800 megs and to run SL anywhere near satisfactorily you need another 500 or 800 megs........you are falling short by at least 300 megs. Depending on what graphics you have and it's onboard VRAM and how much of that is shared with your system RAM you could be well short of enough to run SL at all.

But, let us know what you have so maybe someone here can help you out.

1024 GB RAM, alone is not enough for Vista its barley enough for XP anymore.. I suggest at least 4 gb RAMM to run even Vista with any of its bells on. I would bet that you are crashing on a no memory issue. .. that's your first bottle neck.

http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/referrer/srtest
great to use as well for listing specs. without them we can't really help.

is this a store bought PC? if so I bet a lot is right on front, brand and model, will say maybe AMD athalon or Intell duo core etc... the RAMM
might even say the GPU (graphic card, if its a integrated one.)

but ive downloaded secondlife on this laptop before, less than a year ago..can;t exactly remember how long and it ran perfctly fine so i don't see how it can be my specs

if you get what i mean...

any other ideas?

a year old..., HD is much fuller, fan could be plugged (make sure it is really clean) clean your hard drive, run some checks.. as well SL has grown quite a lot in a year, added more and more making us need better to run the same. aqnd older lap tops and many out of the box "specials" are going to have a hard time with it anyway. they tend to over heat..

again list your specs so we can know
run the app. http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/referrer/srtest here

after choosing Second Life from the drop down menu
and copy and paste the results for recommended not basic or basic is fine there are two tabs.
it will look like this post the results and at least we will have an idea what you are running! We can't tell you anything nor offer help with it worked a year ago.

PU
Minimum: Pentium III/Athlon or better
You Have: 2 processors running - Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T5850 @ 2.16GHz
PASS
CPU Speed
Minimum: 1.5 GHz (XP), 2-GHz (Vista) 32-bit (x86) or better
You Have: 2.16 GHz Performance Rated at 4.21 GHz
PASS
System RAM
Minimum: 512 MB
You Have: 3.5 GB
PASS
Operating System
Minimum: 2000, XP, or Vista
You Have: Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition, 32-bit (Build Service Pack 16001)
PASS
Video Card
Minimum: With Windows XP [NVIDIA GeForce2 + / ATI Radeon 8500,9250+ / Intel 945+] With Vista [NVIDIA GeForce 6600+ / ATI Radeon 9500+ / Intel 945+]
You Have: NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT (GeForce 8600M GT)
PASS
Video Card Features - Minimum attributes of your Video Card

Video RAM: Required - 32 MB , You have - 1.7 GB
Video Card 3D Acceleration: Required - Yes , You have - Yes
Video HW Transform & Lighting: Required - Yes , You have - Yes

Video Card Driver Version (DirectX)
Your driver version number is: 7.15.11.7644
FYI: Your video card driver version is provided for your information, but it is not part of this analysis. But proper video card driver versions are important to the proper operation of your product.

4gb or more is useless without a 64b Operating System...

Vista( home premium) works fine with 2gb.

Vista Home Premium works just fine with 2 gigs........toss in SL and Vista Home Premium still works fine. But SL is suffering. 3 gigs with Vista and SL works fine.

your forgetting take the 4GB ALL 32 bit OS can read and subtract the video card memory and the system top prority use 4 gigs gives you about 2.5-3.5 usable. I get 3142940K of usable with 4GB installed. with 2 gigs its more than half that amount. This set up runs SL, SAM and WIN AMP/PaintShopPro-/Firefox with 2-5 tabs open/SL Voice as well as a shoutcast and runs fast and no hangs.. at 3GB it hung an aful lot.. just my 2 cents..



when I ran 2 on XP and ran the 256gb card I would have 1.2 and less usable ramm.

and I don't know where all these people are coming up with 32bit can only use 2 GB ramm.. this is like the 4th time I have read it /me shakes head in disbelief...

will it run SL and Vista on 2 yep.. don't think about running Firefox or anything else at the same time, you will crash on a memory issue sooner or later.

the Vista laptop is 6GB. but only sees 4GB ( as I hope to change it to Vita 64)

I've always heard 32 bit OS's could use 4 gigs max but after OS overhead the usuable was just at 3 gigs...........pretty much what you said Distilled. Anything over 4 is "wasted" until you get to 64 bit OS's......then it's 8 gig max. Take the OS overhead out and you get about 7 gig usable. I've heard, but don't know if it's really true, that having more memory than your system can see causes errors........but, as I said, that could be so much BS.