A couple of weeks ago, my Diablo II started crashing. Since Safari was occasionally crashing, too, I figured there must be something wrong with the computer. I have an extra hard drive on here that just got installed about a month ago, so I thought maybe that was the problem. I tried erasing and reinstalling system software on both drives, booting from both, etc. I tried reinstalling the game. None of that did anything but waste an immense amount of time and reset a whole bunch of preferences (I tried both a clean install and an install that saves preferences and neither worked).
I tried zapping the PRAM, which was harder than it should've been. This Kensington keyboard of mine apparently doesn't send the right signal to my Mac. I had to go get the crappy little factory-standard keyboard and plug that in to have it work. Of course, to no avail. I cracked it open and futzed around with the extra RAM I had installed, checking all the connections to the drives while I was in there. Nothing.
I went through the crash log, but even though I have more than a passing familiarity with Unix, it was greek to me. I tried monitoring the system during a crash to see what was going on, if the computer would somehow point out the problem, and that didn't work. I probably tried about 10 other things, too, that I read in various support forums and knowledge bases. Finally, I gave up and took the damn Mac into the shop.
They kept it for a frickin' week before they even got around to looking at it. I managed (barely), but boy, it sucked not having my own computer. Usually, the Mac place I use is very, very prompt and reliable, but I guess they were all on vacation or something. Finally on Monday of this week, I got hold of the tech and with some begging and pleading, got him to promise to finish it quickly. I took in both of my Diablo II CD's so that he could recreate the crash conditions.
I hadn't taken them in originally because I figured they had everything they needed in the crash log. I bought an extra Diablo II copy a month ago or so when I got this new computer, and I installed it onto Michelle's Mac so I could trade items more easily. I probably have eight or so mules over there now. Three for low-level artifact sets that I'm building, one for amulets and rings, one for gems, one for charms and two for high-level artifact sets and unique items I'm not using at the moment. It's a lot of fun to have a fifth level character running around with most of Sigon's Complete Steel or something like that. He cuts through monsters like butter, even on /players 8 setting.
Anyway, the guys at the shop had been running a few different scripts trying to make the Mac crash, different diagnostics, etc., and they just couldn't make it crash. Finally, what I figured is that it must be the CD. What happened is that somehow a couple of weeks ago, I switched the Diablo II CD that I've used for 3+ years with the new one and started using the new one while the old one was on Michelle's computer. And this new Diablo II CD is flaky.
And I never checked that possibility. So after tens of hours wasted and 10 days without a computer, it turned out to be a bad CD. I just confirmed it today because I was running Diablo II on Michelle's computer, and it crashed. It hadn't crashed in the past, probably because I never kept that other copy running for long, just long enough to trade items back and forth.
The worst part is that I didn't save any of the packaging, so I probably can't even take the CD back and get a replacement (GameStop). And the boys won't be able to play on their computer with that crappy CD either. Bleargh.
Posted by Observer at July 29, 2005 07:09 PMComments on entries can only be made in pop-up windows while those entries are still on the main index page. Sorry for the inconvenience this causes, but this blocks about 99.99% of the spam the blog receives.
Can't you just burn a copy of the good CD? If not, I'm pretty sure it'd be trivial to get a replacement CD from Blizzard.
Posted by: Humbaba on July 29, 2005 11:45 PMUsually with these "key" CD's, you cannot simply burn a copy. I tried that with Heroes III once, and the copy didn't work at all. There's some kind of security to ensure that only people with a copy of the actual CD can play the game. I do intend to check into getting the CD replaced from Blizzard before springing $15-$20 for another one.
Posted by: Observer on July 30, 2005 08:59 AMHrm. I thought as long as the CD-key code typed into the program was valid, they didn't bother with on-disk copy protection. I'm pretty sure that's the case.
Posted by: Humbaba on July 30, 2005 10:07 AMI think the key codes are for making sure online accounts originate from unique CD's. The game also checks to make sure a valid CD is in the drive. Maybe the security is defeatable for making a copy that fools the game, I don't know. Regardless, I'll try to make an image and see what happens.
Posted by: Observer on July 30, 2005 12:34 PMA friend has found that you can use simple copies of the CD on your home box, or even your home network, just fine. (Actually what he has is a "virtual CD drive", has put a single copy of the play disk there, and every machine on his network runs off that virtual disk. This is a Windows network.) Works great when we go to his place and the four adults do collective bashing on monsters. Presumably that is expandable, but AFAIK he's not tried it beyond that.
I'm almost certain that *wouldn't* work if you went to Battle.net, but we have no interest in getting ripped off by the no-life PvP munchkins there.
I have WimpNet at home, that is, two machines with just a simple ethernet cable between the two of them. It didn't bother me at all to just buy a second disk so we have two legit disks when we team-bash.
The only issue we have is one machine has something funky in either its video card or its native DirectX installation, I think. Certain things -- the named special buzzards in the desert, and (unfortunately) Isual (?sp? -- the 'Fallen Angel' quest guy in Hell) -- make the machine lock up (as in, you have to press the reset button to get out of it) when playing solo, or multiplayer when that machine is hosting. If the other machine hosts, it doesn't happen. (This same machine locks up at certain critical junctures in DungeonSiege as well, so it's a repeatable machine-dependent thing, which is why I suspect the video card and its driver.) So to get characters on that machine past those episodes, we have to team-bash.
Posted by: Feff on August 1, 2005 11:18 AM