Half-Life (Natural Selection mod) with Voodoo 3 TV

[Don]

The game:
Half-Life (Steam based) - Natural Selection mod

The specs:
Athlon XP 1700+
512 RAM
Motherboard ASUS A7A266-E
80gb HD WD
Monitor Philips 107B 17"
Voodoo 3 3500TV (NTSC)
Win XP Pro (SP2) up to date

The problem:
Well, I've tried every single driver for my card on WinXP. I'm actually using Voodoo 3 (HoE 1.00 +JS) << this one.
I can play with no real problems most of the time, but, randomly, my game crashes. I get no video response, screen totally freezes. No chance of coming back, no alt+tab, no ctrl+alt+del. Just reset and that's it.
Actually, that isn't only with Half-Life. I've tried Serious Sam: The First Encounter too. Couldn't play either. Kept crashing over and over.

My conclusions:
* My card may be overheating (doubt it, checked it myself and it doesn't go over temperatures that it doesn't support);
* There is a miracle driver or dll and I didn't find out yet;
* My processor kills everything together, by some reason I don't understand;
* Voodoo 3 3500TV won't hold 1024x768 with 16bit color depth and 60fps at Half-Life;
* I'm crazy and seeing things. It's just my brain freezing from time to time.

Well, I REALLY hope there is someone out there that can help me for good. I'm getting really tired of rebooting my machine about 5 to 10 times a day. PLEASE, this will save a LOT of my wasted time in front of my computer.

Thank you.

(A very, very, very sad gamer)

p.s.: feel free to mail me any possible answer. thnx again.

[ps47]

well,generally,random hardfreezes is the worst thing that can happen.ok,lets try to gather some information first:
-has the freezing started only recently or was the game freezing from the first day (when you have installed it)?
-do you use an standalone opengl driver (such as wickedgl or mesafx)?
-are you using opengl mode for half-life?

I suggest you uninstall your current voodoo3 driver completely,and install AmigaSport 3.0 XP Full Version - with 3dfx Tools (be sure to check the readme first),I dont really trust that HoE whatever thing.note that if you want to use the tv features of the card (tv capture,or watching tv),you should install AmigaSport 2.0 3500TV-XP,I had problems with the tv features when using the normal amigasport..see if the new driver helps.

[Don]

Thanks for the quick feedback.

Well, the freezing haunts me since I have this board. When I first posted, I wasn't using any standalone opengl drivers, but now I'm using WickedGL and it seems that the crashes have stopped (for a while). I mean, sometimes it still crashes, but at most 1 or 2 times per day. However, I haven't tested any other games to see if the crashes still occur. I'll install some FPS'ers then I'll be posting back here again about it.
Yes, Half-Life is in OpenGL mode. 1024x768, 32 color depth.

About the TV feature, I've managed to get it to work with this driver I'm using.
I don't know if I can post it here since is another issue, but here it goes:
Is there any conversor for the TV to make it work with PAL-M instead of NTSC (which is native from my board, but my country uses PAL-M system) ?
The only way I've managed to get color at my tv was opening virtualdub to convert to PAL-M then going back to 3dfx TV turner. I'd like a solution for that too.

Thanks again.

[ps47]

the convertor exists,but only for win9x I'm agraid.wickedgl is the way to go for halfile and mods,so keep using it if it works.if you still have those hardfreezes,try lowering your FSB a bit (in your BIOS),that may help..

edit: you said you use 32bit colordepth? that may cause issues,use 16bit..