HELP: GDEMU installed - black screen and freeze mid-game

Ok, so I got my GDEMU, got everything installed correctly, popped in a 32GB card with some games, started playing Vampire Chronicle (region-free and vga patched) and got thru one fight and "eeehhhhhhhhhhhhh" noise/black screen/total control freeze - had to hard reset. Started playing the same game, got all the way to the last fight in the chain, boss screen comes up, and "eeehhhhhhhhhhhhh" noise/black screen/total control freeze. Up until that point it worked beautifully. I know I need to test quite a few more games before doing anything or making a judgement, but I figured now is the time to ask about this. Anyone else have this happen and what did you do to fix it?

System is hooked up to the TV via a third-party VGA box to S-Video/composite, and other than the laser suddenly stopping reading before I tood the GD-ROM out, I never had any problems with this DC, no random restarts or other woes.

I can get a direct S-Video cable made by Retrogames (like the one I have on my Saturn) if it could be the VGA box... Or should I not patch the games for forced VGA mode if I'm only using S-Video, despite it running thru the VGA box to do it?

I had read about overheating with the changed airflow from having the GD-ROM unit not blocking anything anymore causing similar symptoms, and can drill some holes in the case along the power supply side/block the back vents to increase the airflow across the power supply and motherboard again, but I look at that as drastic measures and would rather not do it if I don't have to.

FWIW, Crazy Taxi on attract mode for 10-15 mins and the case isn't even warm... and no issues with freeze/screen either (is that even a valid test?).

Any thoughts?

 

Try using another SD-card.

 

I played a whole Vampire Chronicle game using my GD-EMU without issue. It was using VGA but the game wasn't region patched.

But, I second the SD card change. Try another one, your is maybe corrupted.

 

OK, I'll have to dig around to find another one and just try that game on it.

If it is that the card got corrupted (or just that game, even), if I reformat and reload the games on the card is it likely salvageable? It's brand new, Sandisk, and $20 is $20...

Also I realize the tone of my first post could be seen as pointing fingers at the GDEMU - I am totally NOT doing that, this unit is an amazing piece of work and I see no issues with it at all. I knew going into this that any issues would be from my DC hardware or something I am probably doing on my end for sure.

 

Depends. Can be factory flawed. Can be physical (non fixable) or software (fixable).
But if the same game has got the same issue with other cards, then we will know it's probably the game image. If the game works on the other cards, then it's the card.

 

ok, I put the same image on a different card and it played flawlessly. So now I'm messing around with the first card, to see if anything else is messed up or if it was just a bad transfer from GDROM Explorer/bad unzip of the image beforehand (the one that worked was a newly unzipped copy of the GDI, so I can't say definitively it's the card or even the format of the card...) but at least I know it's not my Dreamcast, the overheating idea was a red herring. Thanks for the guidance, hopefully I won't have to replace the card.

 

So, if it's the card, you format it fully once. Then, you retry it with games, putting as much of them as the card can handle and see for yourself how it goes. Sometimes, a simple format fix the problem (software error, can happen). If you have troubles again, then you can ditch the card or try to get a replacement if there's still warranty.