Instant crash on my Mac [Workaround]

sphane · May 2018

Hi,

Since summerset upgrade, i am getting instant crash while launching the game from launcher or executable (black screen then crash reporter). I did repare process with no success. I restored the game from Time machine then relaunched update download. Same result. I am now reinstalling game from scratch but well...

My set up is Mac Pro 5,1(mid 2010), AMD Radeon HD 7950 3gb, Mac OS 11.6. All was fine and smooth since 64 bits arrived.

Anyone running same kind on configuration with no trouble ?

Any advice to fix this ?

Will upgrading to High Sierra Help to fix (dont really want to but....) ?

Thanks,
S.

Final workaround proposition without downgrading hardware with Xcode Instrument :

1.Edit ~/Documents/Elder Scrolls Online/live/UserSettings.txt
2. Find SET MaxCoresToUse.4 "-1" line
3. Replace "-1" with number of cores of 1 CPU. For example 8 or 6 depend on your hardware architecture.

Alternate Solution provided by support to one of us experiencing this problem :

1.Edit ~/Documents/Elder Scrolls Online/live/UserSettings.txt
2. Find SET RequestedNumJobThreads "-1" AND SET RequestedNumWorkerThreads "-1"
3 Replace -1 with 1 in both lines

Note : from my experience solution 1 is giving 10-15% better fps. Might not be significant on all configurations.

bitranch · May 2018

Same problem here -- click Play, black screen, then crash.

High Sierra (10.13.4) on iMac Pro (2017) 64 GB, Radeon Pro Vega 8176 MB

I started with the update, repaired, did a full reinstall. No add-ons. All attempts result in the same quick crash.

It's throwing a segmentation fault 11. EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGSEGV)

Everything was running fine before the update this morning.

bitranch · May 2018

I attempted to file a ticket, but Game Consultant hangs -- or it takes more than 20 minutes to run. (It's burning CPU, so maybe it's doing something useful.) The ticket system won't let me file a ticket without a Game Consultant file, so I have no way to get someone's attention on this.

sphane · May 2018

same trouble with game consultant as well

Wodinn · May 2018

I also am having the same problem. On baseline iMac pro. Uninstalled and reinstalling now through the launcher. But my game was running just fine yesterday.

ZOS_Bill · May 2018

If you are experiencing crashes on your Mac after the Summerset update, please try the troubleshooting in the article below.

What can I do if ESO is crashing frequently while playing on a Mac?

If you still can't launch the game after trying these steps, you should contact customer support to open a ticket.

starfishhunter · May 2018

I am having this same issue and am using an iMac Pro as well. Everything was fine until yesterday. It is an instant crash at startup that gives the code EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGSEGV). It is obviously not a resource issue since we are running pretty powerful machines. It isn't the launcher (which was what was suggested by the online help) since directly running esp.app does the same thing. I tried safemode in case it was a software conflict and that didn't seem to work. I even tried a repair and not surprisingly that failed to fix the issue.

I am happy to submit a ticket however I do not know how to do this without the game consultant file. The kicker is everytime I try and run the game consultant it freezes. I have tried to run it for at least 1.5 hours and it never progresses it just keeps thinking...

Help!

bitranch · May 2018

@ZOS_BillE

I don't think you actually read what we wrote here and just spit out a canned response.

1. All three people reporting here have made it obvious that we've attempted far more than the troubleshooting article suggests.
2. The Game Consultant hangs (I let it run for 3+ hours last night) and thus it is impossible to open a ticket. Your ticketing system requires a Game Consultant file before it will allow me to post a ticket. Because Game Consultant hangs, there is no way to provide that file, and thus there is NO WAY TO OPEN A TICKET on this issue.

sphane · May 2018

@ZOS_BillE

All described here and more have been attempted.

I installed PTS, and issue is exactly the same.

Cherry on the cake or murphy's law. Cant access to page support to open ticket (obviously i can't open ticket as stated here since game consultant running in the void) even after resetting password... any issue on going this side too ?

bitranch · May 2018

@ZOS_GinaBruno

Could we please get some kind of attention to this issue above the level of pasted-boilerplate tech support? We need somebody that can understand that the game crashes on startup and NONE of us can create a ticket because the Game Consultant hangs and a Game Consultant file is required in order to create a ticket.

sphane · May 2018

God dammit !

It's linked to the multi-core change in architecture.

I manually reduced the numbers of core using Instrument (coming with Xcode) and then game started.

On first try performance are terrible, will try to adjust...

@ZOS_BillE can you look into this ?

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

Wodinn · May 2018

ZOS_BillE wrote: »

If you are experiencing crashes on your Mac after the Summerset update, please try the troubleshooting in the article below.

What can I do if ESO is crashing frequently while playing on a Mac?

If you still can't launch the game after trying these steps, you should contact customer support to open a ticket.

Nothing has changed. And this 'auto response' does nothing to help. This NEEDS TO BE DELT WITH... or those of us with eso+ should get reimbursed for the time we are unable to play the game, or even get the consultant to work to submit a support ticket.

We are waiting...

Wodinn · May 2018

sphane wrote: »

God dammit !

It's linked to the multi-core change in architecture.

I manually reduced the numbers of core using Instrument (coming with Xcode) and then game started.

On first try performance are terrible, will try to adjust...

@ZOS_BillE can you look into this ?

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

I don't know how the hells to do that.

bitranch · May 2018

sphane wrote: »

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

@sphane

Can you get Game Consultant to run with that config? Hoping somebody can get a ticket submitted and maybe get some actual attention to this issue.

sphane · May 2018

bitranch wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

@sphane

Can you get Game Consultant to run with that config? Hoping somebody can get a ticket submitted and maybe get some actual attention to this issue.

Sure will try

Wodinn · May 2018

sphane wrote: »

bitranch wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

@sphane

Can you get Game Consultant to run with that config? Hoping somebody can get a ticket submitted and maybe get some actual attention to this issue.

Sure will try

Thank you for trying for us. This is getting pretty frustrating. And good luck with it.

sphane · May 2018

Wodinn wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

God dammit !

It's linked to the multi-core change in architecture.

I manually reduced the numbers of core using Instrument (coming with Xcode) and then game started.

On first try performance are terrible, will try to adjust...

@ZOS_BillE can you look into this ?

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

I don't know how the hells to do that.

1.Install Xcode (might take a while 5Gb or so if i remember well) from Appstore.
2. Among tools coming there is an App called "Instrument"
3. Launch it and in Preference panel there is a slider to reduce the number of cores to use. Its not permanent. You can revert or it's reverted when restarting your computer. Normally its for developers who want to test performance of there apps.

sphane · May 2018

Wodinn wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

bitranch wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

@sphane

Can you get Game Consultant to run with that config? Hoping somebody can get a ticket submitted and maybe get some actual attention to this issue.

Sure will try

Thank you for trying for us. This is getting pretty frustrating. And good luck with it.

Game consultant not working better. Sorry...

It Remains stucked or idle most of the time. On log (./Launcher.app/Contents/MacOS/host.developer.log) last line is "Unsupported cursor (move) using default instead. To implement this cursor add move.png to the Resources directory" then nothing seems to happen... process monitoring report it as idle or stucked.

bitranch · May 2018

@sphane

I can verify that reducing cores from 16 to 8 allows the game to run. It's an extremely hackish workaround, but it works. Thanks for finding that!

Later in the day, I'll see if I can file a ticket from within the game.

Wodinn · May 2018

Still not working. I haven't tried anything with the cores. But this is ridiculous.

Wodinn · May 2018

sphane wrote: »

Wodinn wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

God dammit !

It's linked to the multi-core change in architecture.

I manually reduced the numbers of core using Instrument (coming with Xcode) and then game started.

On first try performance are terrible, will try to adjust...

@ZOS_BillE can you look into this ?

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

I don't know how the hells to do that.

1.Install Xcode (might take a while 5Gb or so if i remember well) from Appstore.
2. Among tools coming there is an App called "Instrument"
3. Launch it and in Preference panel there is a slider to reduce the number of cores to use. Its not permanent. You can revert or it's reverted when restarting your computer. Normally its for developers who want to test performance of there apps.

I can find 'instruments', but I don't see a preference panel anywhere. Any word from ZoS at all?

sphane · May 2018

Wodinn wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

Wodinn wrote: »

sphane wrote: »

God dammit !

It's linked to the multi-core change in architecture.

I manually reduced the numbers of core using Instrument (coming with Xcode) and then game started.

On first try performance are terrible, will try to adjust...

@ZOS_BillE can you look into this ?

Update : game launched when i divide core usage by 2.

I don't know how the hells to do that.

1.Install Xcode (might take a while 5Gb or so if i remember well) from Appstore.
2. Among tools coming there is an App called "Instrument"
3. Launch it and in Preference panel there is a slider to reduce the number of cores to use. Its not permanent. You can revert or it's reverted when restarting your computer. Normally its for developers who want to test performance of there apps.

I can find 'instruments', but I don't see a preference panel anywhere. Any word from ZoS at all?

1.Go in Menu Instruments then choose Preferences.
2.Go through panels (it depends on your version, mine is 7.3 and it's in CPU panel), might be in "General" or "CPU" but anyway find a slider saying "Active Processor cores". Probably it will go from 1 to 16 (i guess you have 2 CPU) then put to 8. It's immediate. Then launch the game. When you are done, just bring it back to 16. Or just restart your computer

I am afraid, it will not be fixed soon, I guess On Mac, developers have considered only 1 CPU multi-core to make their changes. Our configurations seems "too strong"...

@ZOS_GinaBruno .

Wodinn · May 2018

I finally found it. But it won't let me *** do it. Keep asking me for my password, repeatedly. WHY THE F is my luck so ***. This whole thing is *** ***

Wodinn · May 2018

Wodinn wrote: »

I finally found it. But it won't let me *** do it. Keep asking me for my password, repeatedly. WHY THE F is my luck so ***. This whole thing is *** ***

ok nvm. Replied too soon.

starfishhunter · May 2018

I tried this work around with Xcode. I can confirm that the game can now launch with only 8 cores being used however I now have a different problem. It is telling me I have an old client that needs to be updated! It then dumps me right back out. Since I do have the updated client I really don't have the foggiest at this point.

sphane · May 2018

starfishhunter wrote: »

I tried this work around with Xcode. I can confirm that the game can now launch with only 8 cores being used however I now have a different problem. It is telling me I have an old client that needs to be updated! It then dumps me right back out. Since I do have the updated client I really don't have the foggiest at this point.

There is a maintenance on going with a client update. Maybe tied to that ?

Wodinn · May 2018

I can also confirm that, decreasing core usage, through Xcode does work. I finally was able to figure it out myself. And yes they are doing NA maintenance today.

Annelid01 · May 2018

Pity if you do not have Xcode and are stuck on Sierra for other reasons.

Rowjoh · May 2018

Same issue here - I click Play then immediate crash with crash report.

High Sierra (10.13.4) on Mac Pro (late 2013)

I've updated, repaired, reinstalled. No add-ons. All attempts result in the same crash.

Report is showing:

Exception Type: EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGSEGV)
Exception Codes: KERN_INVALID_ADDRESS at 0x0000000000000078
Exception Note: EXC_CORPSE_NOTIFY

Termination Signal: Segmentation fault: 11

Everything was running perfectly before the update

Rowjoh · May 2018

The workaround detailed by @sphane solved it for me, and I don't have any performance or graphics degradation either.

Genius!

Wodinn · May 2018

Rowjoh wrote: »

The workaround detailed by @sphane solved it for me, and I don't have any performance or graphics degradation either.

Genius!

I read the patch notes for the update today. I'm no programmer at all, but in the performance section it did make mention that they made changes so that that game would finally make use of multiple core cpu's. I can't help but think either that, or the multithreading has something to do with this. Again, I'm no programmer, this is just a guess. Taking that into consideration, and a couple of other points they made on that topic. Decreasing the amount of cpu cores right now, temporarily, won't make any difference on the performance. tbh, my game seems to play smoother, and looks a bit better even.