Sound and Closure [SOLVED]

[Lian.9275]

Hey,

 

I have 2 problems with Guild Wars 2 on my main computer.

 

1. 8 times out of 10 Guild Wars 2 won't shut down when choosing Exit to Desktop. Instead it will remain "active" with only the Guild Wars 2 mouse cursor visible and no audio and my desktop wallpaper visible but I can't click anything on the desktop so I have to Ctrl+Alt+Delete to open the Task Manager. In the Task Manager it says that Guild Wars 2 is not responding, so I have to force it to shut down by navigating with the arrow keys and then hit delete.
2. The Background Music changes volume from normal(the setting I have chosen) to lower and back again, indefinitely. Both on the Character Selection screen and in-game.

 

I have tried everything, by which I mean:

• Repaired the client
• Completely uninstalled the game and then made a clean install
• Updated every driver possible
• Tinkered with in-game settings(I have no addons)
• Played with background apps running and without
• Conferred with the Reliability Monitor in Windows to spot any potential culprits
• Ran sfc /scannow in cmd.exe to repair any corrupt Windows files
• Completely updated Windows 10

 

My system is:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5900X

GPU: AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT

Motherboard: ASUS ROG Strix X570-F Gaming

RAM: 32 GB DDR4 @ 3600 MHz

SSD: WD Black SN850 M.2 SSD

OS: Windows 10 Home 64-bit

 

I have no issues in any other game. I play everything from old JRPG games in Steam to other MMOs like FFXIV, with no problems at all. I don't have sound issues or closing app issues with any other program than Guild Wars 2. If anyone has any idea what is going on and can point me towards the solution I'd be immensely grateful. Although both issues are fairly minor they are both very annoying and I'd very much like to have them resolved.

Edited January 6, 2022 by Lian.9275

[fluffypaws.2860]

Hi, are you running the game in dx11 or dx9 mode.

Try running the game without full screen optimisation and as administrator. Go right click on the gw2.exe and go to properties to change it.

 

Also, as a following 6900xt owner, I would suggested you try running the game in Vulkan with dxvk Async.   It's more performant than the dx11 beta !

[Lian.9275]

Thank you for your suggestions! I tried two of them - Disable Fullscreen Optimization and run as administrator - they were both things I hadn't tried but sadly the problems persist.

 

I'm running the game in dx9, I have tried dx11 but after I encountered some colour corruption on certain objects I disabled it again. The game runs great though, as an example; I have my fps capped at my screens 144 Hz and earlier today I was in the Heart of Thorns maps and pretty much had 144 FPS the entire time.

 

The only problem I really have with Guild Wars 2 are the two in my original post, other than the occasional stutter etc. that I believe most of us encounter.

 

One thing to note is that when I Disabled Fullscreen Optimization I could no longer get the AMD metrics overlay to work in game.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

I don't use AMD, but have you tried running the game without 'AMD Metrics'?

Often an overlay can cause the closure issue.

Edited January 6, 2022 by Inculpatus cedo.9234
typo

[Lian.9275]

That is what I thought was causing it as well at first, but I've tried disabling the overlay completely and to no avail. I tried it again just after reading your post and was once again forced to close Guild Wars 2 through the process mentioned in my original post.

 

What I find so strange is that it is not happening 10 out of 10 times, there are times when the game manages to close by itself but it is so random that I cannot for the life of me figure out what I did different those times it did.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

Tried disabling the entire app?  Sometimes overlays are hidden/invisible. 

[fluffypaws.2860]

This might sound crazy but, I think If you do a fresh windows install from scratch you'll find it fixed the issue

 

[Ashantara.8731]

Could it be an overheating issue?

[Lian.9275]

I haven't tried disabling the AMD Software completely as I use it to control my GPU fan curve. I have made sure that the processes that control the overlay are not active in the Task Manager after I disabled them through the settings in the AMD Software.

 

A fresh install of Windows could possibly fix it but that would be the absolute last resort.

 

I'm fairly sure it is not an overheating issue as my GPU is below 50 °C and my CPU is below 60 °C while gaming, which is pretty much freezing temperatures for both of them as they are both built for operating temperatures way higher than that.

 

If it is a corrupt Windows file that I can't reach through the steps in my original post then it is so unbelievable that it isn't affecting any other program, only Guild Wars 2.

 

Thank you all for your suggestions!

[Ashantara.8731]

8 hours ago, Lian.9275 said:

I'm fairly sure it is not an overheating issue as my GPU is below 50 °C and my CPU is below 60 °C while gaming, [...]

Okay, good. 🙂

8 hours ago, Lian.9275 said:

If it is a corrupt Windows file that I can't reach through the steps in my original post then it is so unbelievable that it isn't affecting any other program, only Guild Wars 2.

Did you make sure your Windows installation was not corrupted, i.e.

DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth

before you executed SFC /scannow?

In addition, did you check your drive for possible issues?

Edited January 8, 2022 by Ashantara.8731

[Lian.9275]

No, I ran SFC /scannow first and I haven't had to run the /RestoreHealth prompt as the DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth didn't find any corruptions.

 

The only program I use to check the health of my SSD and my portable SSD is CrystalDiskInfo (64-bit) and they are both fresh as a daisy according to it.

 

I found a folder in AppData\Roaming\Guild Wars 2 that contains 15 .dat files which are all named similar to "Corrupt-7ae07b48". They are all from October last year which means they predate my reinstallation of Guild Wars 2.

 

Should I have emptied that folder before installing the game again?

[Lian.9275]

So I uninstalled the game again and completely removed the Guild Wars 2 folder in \AppData\Roaming and I also removed the Shader cache in \AppData\Local\Temp. Then I restarted the computer and began a fresh install from scratch. I sat in front of the screen during the entire download process so that I could see if there were anything odd happening. Once it finished I restarted the computer again and booted Guild Wars 2 and the sound issue appeared to have been solved - it wasn't, it later came back - I played for 5 min and then I clicked 'Exit to Desktop' and the very first shut down of the game was unsuccessful, the closure problem was still a fact.

 

Gutted I figured "Why not try the other suggestion made byt Midnight.9657":

On 1/6/2022 at 9:58 PM, Midnight.9657 said:

Also, as a following 6900xt owner, I would suggested you try running the game in Vulkan with dxvk Async.   It's more performant than the dx11 beta !

 

So I did some research and got Vulkan up and running with an Async patched dxvk and went through the choppy hell it first was and has now started to see the benefits from using it. Not only is the game running smoother but I've also closed the game more than 10 times, successfully each time.

 

Which means my closure problem has - until further notice - been resolved! My computer seem to be allergic to dx9 when it comes to Guild Wars 2, for some mysterious reason.

 

Long story short; dx11 seem to have fixed the closure problem.

 

The sound problem was the lesser of the two so I'm really happy. I often listen to something other than the background music whilst playing anyways, but I do like to activate the BGM sometimes for nostalgic purposes, so my search for the solution to that issue will continue.

 

Thanks to all of you who helped and special thank you to Midnight.9657 for introducing me to Vulkan!

[fluffypaws.2860]

12 hours ago, Lian.9275 said:

So I uninstalled the game again and completely removed the Guild Wars 2 folder in \AppData\Roaming and I also removed the Shader cache in \AppData\Local\Temp. Then I restarted the computer and began a fresh install from scratch. I sat in front of the screen during the entire download process so that I could see if there were anything odd happening. Once it finished I restarted the computer again and booted Guild Wars 2 and the sound issue appeared to have been solved - it wasn't, it later came back - I played for 5 min and then I clicked 'Exit to Desktop' and the very first shut down of the game was unsuccessful, the closure problem was still a fact.

 

Gutted I figured "Why not try the other suggestion made byt Midnight.9657":

 

So I did some research and got Vulkan up and running with an Async patched dxvk and went through the choppy hell it first was and has now started to see the benefits from using it. Not only is the game running smoother but I've also closed the game more than 10 times, successfully each time.

 

Which means my closure problem has - until further notice - been resolved! My computer seem to be allergic to dx9 when it comes to Guild Wars 2, for some mysterious reason.

 

Long story short; dx11 seem to have fixed the closure problem.

 

The sound problem was the lesser of the two so I'm really happy. I often listen to something other than the background music whilst playing anyways, but I do like to activate the BGM sometimes for nostalgic purposes, so my search for the solution to that issue will continue.

 

Thanks to all of you who helped and special thank you to Midnight.9657 for introducing me to Vulkan!

Great to hear !

I just wanted to see if you put

DXVK_ASYNC

1

 

In environment variables.

The stutter should only be brief

[Lian.9275]

9 hours ago, Midnight.9657 said:

Great to hear !

I just wanted to see if you put

DXVK_ASYNC

1

 

In environment variables.

The stutter should only be brief

I did, but the stutter hell was before I patched it to Async. I made the mistake of not going for Async straight away. Now it's really smooth!

 

I do get the occasional odd graphic bugs reported in the "DirectX 11 beta graphics issues" thread. But I guessed that is to be expected until ANET works further on the dx11 beta.

[fluffypaws.2860]

At this point it's more performant to run the game client in dx9 with the Vulkan wrapper.

 

Dx11 mode will produce graphical bugs ..but only in windows! Linux is perfect lol

[Lian.9275]

3 hours ago, Midnight.9657 said:

At this point it's more performant to run the game client in dx9 with the Vulkan wrapper.

 

Dx11 mode will produce graphical bugs ..but only in windows! Linux is perfect lol

But Async does work with dx11 as well, no? Because if I go back to dx9 my closure issue begins again. Right now everything is smooth and I only experience drops in performance when I'm around a large group of other players.

 

Given that I have the issue with closing Guild Wars 2, do you still suggest that I should go back to dx9?

[Lian.9275]

So...there has been some development. I had a lot of different glitches happening when using dxvk both with dx9 and dx11 so I ended up removing it completely.

 

Which led me to the final dreaded 'crazy' suggestion:

On 1/7/2022 at 1:04 PM, Midnight.9657 said:

This might sound crazy but, I think If you do a fresh windows install from scratch you'll find it fixed the issue

 

I cleared my drive's partitions and made a bootable USB-drive with Windows 10 64-bit on it and performed a clean install of the OS. I updated Windows through Windows Update and then installed all the important drivers; chipset and GPU. Nothing is on my computer at this point, only the important and necessary files.

 

I then install Guild Wars 2 and after a couple of tries to exit the game the closure issue is there once again. After a few expletives I shut down the computer and went to bed thinking I might have to send my computer back to have it checked out.

 

Then the next day, when I was sitting at the toilet, I searched through the Guild Wars 2 forums - one would think that this should've perhaps been an earlier step - and I found this gem. Other people who back in 2017 had the exact same issue as I have now, none of them found a solution.

 

They provided very little information on their respective systems but one can deduce that there are at least 2 versions of Windows(8.1 and 10) and both Nvidia and AMD GPUs, exhibiting the closure issue. I have no clue what I have in common with the people back in 2017 and 2018, when it comes to hardware and software, but I'm guessing not a whole lot.

 

One thing I'm certain we do have in common though is the closure issue and the only question is 'Why?'.

 

The sound issue of the volume going up and down was caused by Corsair's iCUE software/drivers. I'm now using Dolby Atmos for Headphones with perfect sound with no issues. Funny how a 100 € headset with outstanding quality parts comes with such a low quality software(iCUE).