Half life 2 ep1 Problem, graphics?

[Mike-bham]

I bought Ep1 the other day off amazon, and it arrived today, Ive put it on the computer, and it all loaded up fine... All the other games work fine too, including hl2, deathmatch, counterstrike etc....
The game works fine on my computer, until I get to the second (or third?) level, when It appears that the map hasnt loaded or something.
Items are there, but as soon as i cross a point or boundary infron of the begging of the level, it all goes black!
I still get shot at, and the bird still says her usual rubbish, and prompts to carry on, but i cant see bloody anything, until i walk backwards back into the beginning point of the level.

Ive done this vid on my phone to try and illustrate the problem, and a pic of the settings.

Any help would be appreciated! I'm stuck!

Mike

 

[Mike-bham]

http://s103.photobucket.com/albums/m127/Mikefroggatt/Half Life/?action=view&current=Video246.flv

 

[Munson]

What's the machine spec dude? Do you have the latest drivers for you gfx card?

 

[Mike-bham]

Well apparently my drivers outdated, but it still works everywhere else, which is odd. Im not sure how to find the exact specs on m computer (im no techno wizz lol) But i found these on the net.

Ive been through the link it gives you to update it, but it says it doesnt recognise it. Its probably as its one of those aldi computers from about 3 years ago!
Its apparently a ati radeon 9800xl, which i cant even find on the ati site.
Im downloading updates from the medion site, but doubt they'll do anything.
I dont think its the graphics card tho, as everything else seems to work. Could it be the game didnt intall properly or anything like that at all?

 

[Darren S]

Bit bizarre that. I haven't got EP1, so I don't know that bit that you are at. It actually looks more like a game issue rather than a gfx one to me. As if the scenery hasn't updated into cache at that point in the game.

As Roy says, have you got the latest gfx drivers installed?

D.

 

[zack40]

Is There Any Updates Or Patches For It?..i Had A Problem Like This In Far Cry.. I Downloaded The Latest Patch.then It Was Fine..it Might Help

 

[Munson]

Is There Any Updates Or Patches For It?..i Had A Problem Like This In Far Cry.. I Downloaded The Latest Patch.then It Was Fine..it Might Help

Steam games dont need patching. They stay up to date. I would also try going back to an earlier game save and seeing if it still happens when you get back to this point. I agree it does not really seem like your average driver related issue but the game is not buggy in my experience at all (and I've played it through 3 times)

Graphics drivers is all I can suggest. Surely they are vaialble on the ATI site??

 

[Munson]

Catalyst 6.8 should support all Radeon cards I would have thought? I've not been an ATI man for about 3-4 years now but I'm sure the Catalyst drivers are backwards compatible??

 

[Rasclart]

Catalyst drivers do support all cards!

 

[Mike-bham]

You are right indeed!!!!!!!!

Ive been through several downloads, patches and updated from steam, ati and microsoft,

And i finally installed Catalyst Control Center from ati, and although it took a while, it appears to do the job!

Ive just had a quick go, starting the level properly again (which didnt work before though) and it goes straight through it now!
Cheers guys!
Shame the mrs is furious with me now, as ive been sat here hours this evening lol!
Im off to bed!

Thanks, Mike

 

[Munson]

Knowsit.

FFS man your drivers were basically 3 years old. I'm amazed the game even played as far as it had.