Flew LB2 for hours tonight with no problems ( except for two times when the blue Windows clock in the task bar was visible in the cockpit lol ). The difference? I wasn't using the X-45 stick, I was using my ancient Gravis Gamepad ( I'm not sure how old it is but it has hieroglyphics on it lol ), then I uninstalled the SST, re-installed it and switched to my X-45 WITHOUT using the profile I made for it. Stick rudder and throttle worked but was using the keyboard for most other functions, again hours of blissful helo flight.
Later I will load a copy of the profile and see what happens, if it still CTDs I will rebuild it manually. I have a sneaky suspicion it will have to do with a repeat rate on one or more buttons, or it may have simply gotten corrupted somehow.

You can play LB2 on a gamepad? Wow, talk about turning a great sim into a console fiasco!

Seriously, it's good that you've kept an eye on what you're doing differently and being able to pinpoint issues. Hopefully you've cracked your problem. Just out of curiosity, at this current point what game fixes do you have applied (if any)?

I've never bothered with fancy sim joysticks and profiles, so forgive me if I could have identified this particular area as a potential problem earlier. I admit that game controllers are probably my one big 'lack of intelligence' area, especially as far as LB2 goes.

Keep us posted.

All of the normal fixes, 2209patch, DDU, HEAP, HAD to use the WAC even though some don't with the dgVoodoo wrapper.
Gamepad was interesting since there was no yaw input on the pad so air to air was impossible without the invulnerable cheat.
When I was flying with the pad and with the stick with no profile I was constantly switching views and even rapidly running my finger back and forth across all the F keys like a piano, no fails, no CTDs.

Any of PositiveG's or Phoenix's fixes?

Tried them before with no results.

Just got done with four or five missions with frantic button pressing on the stick, only CTD was the only mission I flew with the SST software running so it's probobly a glitch in the profile dat. I will build another from scratch tonight.

Do enemy forces ever fire artillery? I just landed at a FARP in Azurbijan with arty coming down on me lol.

I really dislike the Saitek software, and have always ended up uninstalling it - it does odd things to my system - the so-called "Magic mouse" and "Magic Something else" seem to interfere with other items on my machine. I end up using the Direct X mappings on the stick and throttle and the keyboard and mouse for the rest of the functions.

The first software ( SGE???? ) was horrible and some built thier own with notepad editing, the SST has been vastly better.
Magic Mouse and Magic Keyboard, I have no idea what they do and hope they are not part of my problem.

Might have a chafing wire in the joystick, sometimes when moving the joystick around the cannon would fire on it's own.

That would be great if it was the root of the problem and easily/inexpensively fixable!
Regarding the Magic keyboard and mouse still present in the new software - the magic mouse enables the tiny cursor stick for programming; I forget what the "magic" keyboard does. But I reinstalled the SST and hoped the revised software would cease screwing with various other functions on my keyboard and in some sims. It didn't, sad to say.

Rebuilt the profile and almost immediately got CTDs. Deleted the entries for the two A B buttons on top of the stick that I use to switch MFDs and the right and left sides of the hat on top of the stick that I rarely use to change ranges on the ASE and TSD screens and have had no CTDs since.
Tomorrow I will add view commands to the hat on the front of the throttle as that switch has also been involved with CTDs in the past. Once everything gets stable I will singularly add commands back to the stick and see what happens.

Yes the enemy does fire artillery, if the mission has them programmed to do so!

It's interesting about the Saitek software causing trouble, this might actually be a bit of a landmark in some respects - as I'm sure some of the other people I have come across with unexplainable CTDs may be in the same situation as yourself. There's one guy who I've recently tried to help (via e-mail) and he can't even get his LB2 started. I wonder if he has any controller software installed (can't remember!)?

What I do know is that on some Windows XP/Vista/7 systems LB2 doesn't like ANY other software actively running beside it. I used to take screenshots in LB2 using HyperSnap-DX and video in FRAPS, but on my current Win7 system LB2 always crashes when HSDX or FRAPS is running. Also, don't ever try ALT-TAB'bing out of LB2 - it is highly likely to crash.

Well after two or three weeks of almost zero CTDs I think I can confirm it was the SST or the X-45 drivers.
A few weeks ago Madcatz and I exchanged a few Emails and he linked me up with some new stick drivers and "Saitek ProFlight" profile software. Now from time to time it still does some goofy stuff like locking up all the stick and keyboard controls, but that's rare ( flying every night and have it happen once or twice a week ). So far I can profile my stick buttons any way I want with no issues what-so-ever, it's all good and NOW I can actually enjoy LB2 right up until the ridicules blade stall kicks in, VRS I can tolerate and overcome but the blade stall is a joke.

Here is how I am currently running the graphics and such, but the CTDs were from the X-45s software and drivers.

WOOOO HOOOO!!
Three missions in a row with ZERO CTDs, that's a record for LB2 on this rig!!!
Re-installed LB2
Patched with the 2209
Patched with the DDU ( tried it without the ddu and just the Voodoo wrapper but it didn't work )

Set up the dgVoodoo wrapper with:
32 bit
32 bit
Mon freq
vert sync
Force trilinear****or not
use hard cache
use fastwrite
text mem:8192****or 16384
Rez: set by app****or 640x480 gets rid of lines in pit as well as the Windows clock
Enable Glide gammaramp****or not

Had to use the WAC

did the HEAP edit

Open the CA.INI file and add this to the top

[Backdoors]
HEAP_PERCENT=0

and set the OpenGL on my ATI Radeon card to:
AA: app pref
AF: app pref
and set Wait for vert sync to : Default on.


Flyboy, thanks for all the help, we helo wannabees gotta stick together