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Heathrow 2008 and g3d.dll


Rafal Haczek

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Hi!

I've finally purchased Heathrow 2008 and couldn't wait to give it a try.

My old habit is that I never start at the new airport I install. I always fly there from another airport to discover and enjoy it gradually.

So, the first flight was AFR2670 from CDG.

While on final approach to 27R (already with flaps set, gear down and ILS active) I saw black screen and FS thanked me for cooperation giving the g3d.dll error.

I went mad but I don't give up easily - things do happen.

After restarting Windows I fired up a very short (less and less patience) flight from EGKK to EGLL. This time I was approaching 09L.

And while on finals again black screen and g3d.dll! :cry:

Has anyone experienced that?

More details:

- I have reinstalled my system some two weeks ago so it is nice and fresh

- there are no viruses

- I tried with different aircraft, different departure airports, flight times and approaches

- I tried flying to another airport and everything's fine

- I haven't seen this error for a looong time now

- there are no conflicts with other sceneries

My software:

- Windows XP home edition PL SP2

- FS9.1

- FSUIPC

- ASv65

- UTE

- GEProII

- AES 1.91

My hardware:

- AMD Athlon 64 3000+ / 2.01GHz

- 1 GB RAM

- Radeon 9800 Pro with latest drivers

It's 3 a.m. now so I'm going to get some sleep.

I'll try tomorrow with more combinations. Hoping to see and enjoy the new Heathrow finally...

Best regards,

Rafal

P.S. I have installed the LOW RES version so will try the HIGH RES too.

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Hi,

as you are not alone, I think it's not a problem on you PC. But, did you both use AES? If so, please try to uncheck EGLL in AEShelp and try the approach (maybe in Slew Mode) again.

I will try to reproduce the problem.

If you place the aircraft direct on the airport, you error will pop up, correct?

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Ok,

I try to reproduce the Error:

- Placeing the aircraft on the runway.

- Slew backwards until the airport is longtime not in view (around 30 km)

- Save the flight as default

- stop and restart FS

- Slew slow (200-300 knots) towards the airport

No error happens.

I try it from both sides, with low and high tex, with and without AI.

It is possible, that the AI Traffic is responsable, so maybe you can try it without AI agian please.

Can you also try if the error happens, when you make the test I do above?

I am only online until 12.00am then offline for a week, but maybe it can helps the aerosoft stuff too, to find the error.

One last Question: Did you have the 9.1 patch installed or native FS 9.0?

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the airport wont load I just get G3d error before I'm there too

Give us more details please:

Which FS Version 9.0 or 9.1?

Which AI Traffic Pack?

Any mesh/Landclass .. Addon for this area?

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Oliver,

FS9.1 in use. No AI planes at all in use...I fly online. AES was in use as well. UT Europe and FSG mesh for Europe in use. I dont have any problem with many other airport sceneries I have for Europe.

Be careful Oliver loading from the create a flight screen and starting at EGLL. Even if you slew away, FS has already loaded the textures. A good point to start for testing would be say at EGHI (Southhampton). Its about 40nm away so the EGLL textures for sure are not loaded but will need to load for the first time as your flying in...thats how I got the error.

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Hi,

in some cases this error is caused by an combination of the aircraft you fly and the Ai-traffic, when its loaded. If there´s something wrong with a simple texture used by an AI aircraft it could crash, even if it doesn`t crash when loading the same airport directly. Unfortunatly this error happens at several airports (ours, others and default ones).

To help us to solve this problem, please deactivate your AI-Traffic (traffic set to 0%) and try again.

Or use the same AI-Traffic and try to fly a different aircraft, at best a default one. This will help us to figure out the possible error. For now it seems that Heathrow2008 could only be "guilty" cause it´s providing all the AI-Traffic gates, that could cause an error you wont get when using the default scenery. Another good test could be to temporarily rename the AF2_EGLL_simwings.bgl (the AFCAD file) to *.off. Than the system uses the same afcad file as the default version with less aircrafts (and maybe the one causing the error is not loaded.

Please report what happened.

POSSIBLE SOULUTIONS SO FAR:

It is absolutly mandatory that you installed the FS2004 9.1 patch correctly as this patch solves most of the G3d.dll errors. Please check that you´re using the latest G3D.dll. It is locatetd in the Flight Simulator 9/Modules folder and should have a date from september 2004. (at my system it is 1st of september 2004, version 9.1.0.40901)

Another hint: I found a report in the FXP forum that a user had this error due to the GB airports. perhaps they are installed at your system. Try to deactivate them temporarily in the scenery library to check.

http://www.wcm.at/forum/showthread.php?thr...goto=nextnewest (german language)

At the microsoft knowledge base ther´s an article about the g3d.dll. It referes to FS2000, but is related to graphic card settings this could also be a hint: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/257401/en-us

Search your system for other AFCAD files named AF2_EGLL*.bgl. Most traffic addons will install their own AFCAD files. backup and remove any other afcad file than the AF2_EGLL_simwings.bgl located in the Heathrow2008/scenery directory.

Thorsten

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@B777er

I remember from some support question of our balearic islands that a G3d.dll error was caused by the mesh terrain. Could you please temporarily deactivate your European meshes to proof?

GB airports installed?

Thorsten

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Oliver,

FS9.1 in use. No AI planes at all in use...I fly online. AES was in use as well. UT Europe and FSG mesh for Europe in use. I dont have any problem with many other airport sceneries I have for Europe.

Be careful Oliver loading from the create a flight screen and starting at EGLL. Even if you slew away, FS has already loaded the textures. A good point to start for testing would be say at EGHI (Southhampton). Its about 40nm away so the EGLL textures for sure are not loaded but will need to load for the first time as your flying in...thats how I got the error.

Yes, that's why I save the flight at the distance position and restart FS with loading this flight there, so that EGLL is not in the memory.

I just make a "slew" flight from EGHI to EGLL, where I start the FS at EGHI and no Error. EGLL is loading correct.

I have no time to make a flight now, but someone say it happens, when the glideslope comes active. Could you try to make a flight without a ILS approach?

Maybe you can also deactivate all addons in the library, which are active in this area. It's possible, that the problem is happen only in combination with a addon, so if EGLL is deactive all is fine.

I have a native install, with nothing else then EGLL here (and AES).

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Found a possible solution. I had the UK2000 Heathrow Pro installed and yes I had taken it out before I installed EGLL 2008. However, there is a seperate scenery entry with a folder called "af2_high". In this I did take out the old EGLL AF file but I still needed to keep the folder active due to having UK2000's EGCC AF file in there as well. For some reason, when I just deleted this entire folder/scenery entry, I did not get the error the next time. There is a scenery.dat file in this folder that still had some remenants of the old EGLL in it possibly. I am doing a 5.5hr flight into EGLL now..have about 1.5hr to go. Will give an update on this test then.

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Found a possible solution. I had the UK2000 Heathrow Pro installed and yes I had taken it out before I installed EGLL 2008. However, there is a seperate scenery entry with a folder called "af2_high". In this I did take out the old EGLL AF file but I still needed to keep the folder active due to having UK2000's EGCC AF file in there as well. For some reason, when I just deleted this entire folder/scenery entry, I did not get the error the next time. There is a scenery.dat file in this folder that still had some remenants of the old EGLL in it possibly. I am doing a 5.5hr flight into EGLL now..have about 1.5hr to go. Will give an update on this test then.

Ok, sounds good. I don't know, why Gary has a seperate Scenery Directory for his AF2 Files, that's not needed. So, you can try the following:

- When you have only delete the EGLL related AF2 File, delete the Scenery.DAT in the folder above. Take also care, that in the subdir is no empty TEXTURE folder (I don't think there are textures for AF2 Files needed), if he is there, delete it too.

When you restart the FS, the scenery.dat is regenerated without the wrong data of the EGLL file.

- You also can copy the EGCC Af2file to the directory of the related Scenery, you only need to check, if there is another AF2 file maybe, which is not HIGH named (the only reason I see to have a seperate folder)

The FS will allways activate the AF2 file, which is in the topmost position of the libary (like the scenery itself). Then you can keep Garys extra folder deactive in the Library.

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Found a possible solution. I had the UK2000 Heathrow Pro installed and yes I had taken it out before I installed EGLL 2008
After reinstalling my system and installing FS9.1 from scrathch I did not install UK2000 EGLL this time.

But I have my EGKK from UK2000 installed. I will try deactivating it (though it's not the way it should be in the long term).

I already tried with and without AI - no difference.

I also tried both ASv65 weather and clear skies - no results, either.

I will do further testing today and report here.

Thanks for your care, Oliver! Highly appreciated.

And thank you all guys for your reports. Let's get the ... :evil: ...!

Best regards,

Rafal

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did you try to use another aircraft? Same error?
Yes, as I mentioned in my opening post I had tried various aircraft.

The error unfortunately is not aircraft/AI/weather/flight-time dependant. At least in my case.

Going to do some more tests now, especially that Oliver is leaving after 12:00.

Best regards,

Rafal

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I will chime in here because I had exactly the same crash just now. Flying from LSGG to EGLL in Leonardo's Maddog. Just under 30NM from 27R, poof! I had ILS 110.30 active. STAR BIG 1F

Yesterday, I did a perfect flight in the PMDG B737-700 (EDDF-EGLL) to the same 27R and all went well.

My AI is extensive but "clean", I have no UK2000 EGLL installed (when I bought it, I made a manual install and yesterday before installing the new EGLL I un-installed it).

Also, I keep ALL (except some special cases) AFCAD files in Addon-scenery and always check for duplicates.

Will do some more tests and report back...

Regards,

Jure

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Jure, welcome to the team! :wink:

Quick report:

I have just had the first flight without the crash. :shock:

What changed this time?

- I have departed from EGLL (so far I was only trying to arrive there)

- I have used the default Cessna 172

- I have used the default wx theme (fair weather)

I was even able to turn back and land safely.

I have absolutely no idea why this time it worked.

I will report more later (now taking my wife shopping).

Best regards,

Rafal

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Hi,

I think the issue is generate by the AFCAD of EGLL maybe, because of the special situation, that in EGLL the ILS frequences are the same for both directions of the same runway: 09L has 110.30 and 27R has 110.30

Maybe different airplanes have a problem with this situation, when they get the same frequense twice. The Cessna seams to handle it, but other maybe not.

Attached you find a replacement of the AF2 file for EGLL, where I only deactivate the backcouse for all ILS, maybe that helps.

If not, we must try to change the ILS frequense of one side to have a differnent frequenz, maybe 27R to 110.35 and 27L to 109.55

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Oliver,

thank you very much for the replacement AFCAD! I will try it ASAP.

I can reproduce the crash now.

- default Cessna, fair weather

- ILS active (110.30, RWY 27R)

- Flying from VOR BIG to cf27R

Somewhere around wpt det29, the crash occurs. When I let FS Navigator fly the FP, it doesn't tune the ILS until passing cf27R! In that case, all is well. However, if I manually tune the ILS before that, I get a crash.

Rafal, can you confirm this?

Regards,

Jure

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Wish I could report how my flight ended but alas, I was using the PMDG 747 and my computer ran out of virtual memory (a well well known problem reported by many using the PMDG 744 and not in any way related to Heathrow). Thus my FS crashed. So with that said, I have invested 12hrs of actual real world time flying to EGLL and both ended with two different types of crashes. The aforementioned OOM and the g3d.dll one. Looks like Oliver may have a fix for it though with the ILS deal. In my g3d.dll crash earlier, it was also on the ILS but after flying into EGLL from EGHI on the same freq, it did not happen but I had then deleted that other folder described above. Nothing against anyone but this is the most personal trouble I have had trying to fly into a new scenery. I must be cursed. I now have to work all weekend and I guess will give a 3rd try on Monday.

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Me again...

Did two test flights, same conditions as before.

1. Started at BIG, ILS active

2. Started 37 NM from EGLL same FP, ILS active.

Both time reached EGLL successfully! :)

Looks like the new AFCAD cured the crash! Thanks again Oliver!

Talk about support!

Rafal & Oliver, meet at EGLL and we go for a beer? 8)

Regards,

Jure

EDIT: Full AI and I have 30FPS landing on 27R! :D

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Me again...

Did two test flights, same conditions as before.

1. Started at BIG, ILS active

2. Started 37 NM from EGLL same FP, ILS active.

Both time reached EGLL successfully! :)

Looks like the new AFCAD cured the crash! Thanks again Oliver!

Talk about support!

Rafal & Oliver, meet at EGLL and we go for a beer? 8)

Regards,

Jure

Ok,

sounds good, so I can go happy in my holiday soon.

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Can I just ask what the situation is with this problem now. Does the above mean that the new AFCAD from Oliver idefinitely cures the crashes and that I should overwrite the AFCAD in the main EGLL download (haven't bought & downloaded it yet; later today - maybe the new AFCAD is already part of the package).

I have the UK2000 EGKK; presumably there is no clash with this new EGLL then (as one or two mentioned in posts here)?

Thanks. Really ooking forward to seeing the new Heathrow ..

Martin

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Hi Martin,

yes seems like that the new AFCAD file cures the problem, which was caused by the circumstance that Heathrow uses the same ILS frequencies

for both runway ends as Oliver has explained. And some aircrafts couldnt handle this. (The aircrafts I used for testing handled it well, but those were less complex)

Also in other Forums users have reported that the new file cured the problem. But testing goes on!

Of course any new file will be part of the installer, but not before monday, when Aerosoft is back in office. In the meantime I recommend to use the AFCAD file posted by Oliver.

Gatwick is definetly not the problem.

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