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Possible fix for DK2 Direct Mode crashes

Anonymous
Not applicable
This worked for me and the difference is amazing, so I thought I would share it and hopefully some of you that are having problems with Direct Mode (as I was for hours) can give it a shot.

I got my DK2 last week and was using it with a newer Dell laptop. It worked, but Direct Mode never worked right. Most demos worked in Extended Mode. The graphics quality was low (20fps on Titans of Space, for instance).

So this week I did a fresh install of Windows 7 x64 on a Precision T5400, with a Quadro 4000. Latest NVIDIA drivers. Installed the same Oculus runtime that I used on the laptop. Still had no luck with Direct Mode. Extended Mode wasn't working right either. Basic Unity apps not opening on Oculus. Even the Oculus config util demo scene was crashing. I started thinking the problem was some obscure NVIDIA setting. I had a 1280x1024 monitor and the DK2 plugged in.

When I would run Titans of Space it would log an ntdll.dll error, and the Oculus demo scene crash was referencing nvwgf2um.dll. I searched for that and found some forum posts of the same crash, saying "vertex shaders in LibOVR require shader model 4.1 (i.e. DirectX 10.1) while my GPU only supports Shader Model 4.0 (i.e. DirectX 10)"

So I started going down the path that the problem was DirectX related. everything in dxdiag was fine, it showed DirectX 11. I assumed since I had a completely updated Windows and NVIDIA drivers it would be fine. Then I went to see if there were any updates for DX11, and I found this:

https://support.microsoft.com/kb/179113/

In there is a link to install a Windows 7 platform update for DirectX 11.1. I installed that, rebooted, and since then EVERYTHING runs in Direct Mode, and actually mirrors to my monitor perfectly which I had yet to see.

Maybe I just had some isolated problem or glitch, but I'm curious if anyone else has success with this simple update.
8 REPLIES 8

cybereality
Grand Champion
Interesting find.

I'd like to hear reports from other users to see if this helps at all.
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Harolddd
Honored Guest
Your link for installing DirectX 11.1 as a possible fix takes you to a link for Windows update KB2670838, which has a serious bug specific to stereoscopic video. In effect, if you have Dx11.1 your system will crash if you browse folders containing SBS stereoscopic video files. See my post in the this forum about the update.

Also, the problems you describe with Oculus Rift crashes are exactly the same as mine! So they might be related to the update. In my case I specifically removed KB2670838 (Dx11.1) from my Win7 desktop to stop the system crash caused by the bug. I'm not willing to remove all my stereoscopic videos from my computer. I want to be able to view them on the Oculus Rift. I removed KB2670838 long before getting my DK2. When I got the DK2 it worked without crashing on my laptop (with KB2670838) but exhibited the crashing you describe on my desktop (without the update). So not knowing why the desktop was having problems I upgraded my graphics card, added a SSD, and reinstalled everything. It worked great until I again removed the buggy KB2670838. Do I have to chose between 3D video and the Oculus Rift?

Microsoft must fix this or it will be a big problem for Oculus Rift.

Is there a line of communication between Oculus and Microsoft? They may not care about people who want to view stereoscopic video, but they might care about the emerging Oculus Rift market place.

Anonymous
Not applicable
well.. that certainly does suck! Fix one thing and break another. I don't have any stereoscopic videos, but I'd like to be able to check some out.

When you say the system crashes, what happens? (Windows Explorer, bluescreen, etc)

Harolddd
Honored Guest
It eats up all your memory. You start to notice that your machine is responding slowly, then it just freezes when you run out of memory. Your only recourse is a hard reboot because the computer won't respond. If you know about the bug you can constantly kill the dllhost.exe process in task manager, every few minutes, before it eats all your memory.

It is triggered by browsing, in thumbnail view, a directory with a stereoscopic video file. The runaway process is the attempt to create a thumbnail of the stereoscopic video file. Obviously a simple error of programming, but Microsoft has not fixed it and it has been known for more than a year!

Harolddd
Honored Guest
Update:

Good news.

Microsoft has fixed the bug created by KB2670838 (DirectX 11.1, which is essentially required for Oculus Rift to work). 🙂 The fix for the bug is in KB2977728, which I think was released September 9, 2014. It is important to have both updates installed if you ever expect to have 3D video files on your computer.

PepsRyuu
Honored Guest
Hi ronczarnik

Been trying to figure out why Direct Mode wasn't working for me for ages as well. I disabled my integrated Intel and using the Nvidia K1100M directly, and updated the drivers and firmware etc. The desk demo still kept giving me a similar error with the same dll (nvwgf2um.dll).

I installed the DirectX 11 updated you linked, and I'm now able to run the desk demo in Direct Mode perfectly! I was wondering for ages how other people were managing to mirror the displays. 🙂 Also tried a Unity app (Spirited Away demo) and that's working in Direct Mode now as well.

Thanks so much for the tip, you've saved me from a lot of headaches!

SebKaine
Honored Guest
Thanks guys this also solve all the problems for me
viewtopic.php?f=34&t=18001&p=234379#p234379

Cheers

E

BaseDeltaZero
Honored Guest
"ronczarnik" wrote:

So I started going down the path that the problem was DirectX related. everything in dxdiag was fine, it showed DirectX 11. I assumed since I had a completely updated Windows and NVIDIA drivers it would be fine. Then I went to see if there were any updates for DX11, and I found this:

https://support.microsoft.com/kb/179113/

In there is a link to install a Windows 7 platform update for DirectX 11.1. I installed that, rebooted, and since then EVERYTHING runs in Direct Mode, and actually mirrors to my monitor perfectly which I had yet to see.

Maybe I just had some isolated problem or glitch, but I'm curious if anyone else has success with this simple update.



Holy Guacamole

This fixed direct mode for me 🙂

I have tried everything under the sun and was beginning to think im stupid

so thank you!

Im doing virtual cartwheels right now!
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