Zeels in-depth Troubleshooting Guide

by Zeelmaekers
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Original Post

Zeels in-depth Troubleshooting Guide

[ Edited ]

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Hey everyone.

 

I see a lot of technical issues popping and want to centralize them in one post for easy troubleshooting. I'll be updating this post frequently so most information you'll find here will not be out-dated. If an issue has been patched, the issue will be moved to the archived issues.

 

Feedback is appreciated, if you see typo's or have other troubleshooting tips please contact me in Direct messages.


If your issue isn't fixed after these troubleshooting tips, feel free to create a new post here on technical issues and attach a Dxdiag File to your post. I will rarely reply in this thread or in private message, if you need troubleshooting help please create a post with the information requested above.


Current known issues: 


Connection issues: 


Archived Issues:

  • Razer Synapse crashing Apex Legends  
  • Apex Freezing and showing 100% CPU usage in Task Manager 
  • Mouse stuttering 
  • Random freezes 
  • Engine Error - Profile.cfg 
  • Random Freezing ✓

Click here to visit Archived posts.

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Some users are getting prompted on login with the message "This account is Invalid" and cannot log in to there account.
This can be fixed really fast by resetting your EA accounts password.
Reset Password.
Most people have confirmed resetting their password has fixed the issue for them and are able to log-in again on their favorite game.
EA-Help - How to update your EA Account information

Reaching out to the Support Team
If this didn't do the trick, you might want to reach out to the support team, the English chat option has been reduced to 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m but you can also reach out to them via Facebook and Twitter.


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Some players are crashing with a DXGI engine error.
This issue should be fixed by downloading the latest 442.50 drivers.
These can be installed using Geforce Experience or downloading the drivers manually using this link.

1) Clean install of GPU driver
Try a clean driver install using Display Driver Uninstaller.

If you are not familiar with DDU, I recommend checking out this guide.

 

2) Make sure everything is up-to-date
If you still having these crashes, something else might be interfering with your system.
First, make sure your Windows / BIOS are up-to-date as an outdated OS/BIOS could not play nice with the latest drivers.

 

3) Clean booting
the second thing you can do is doing a clean boot, this will only start windows with fewer services and programs running in the background.
Make sure you don't start any GPU tweaking software while clean booting 

4) Microsoft Safety Scanner
It might sound simple but scanning for viruses and malware. If you don't have an antivirus installed, you can download the free Microsoft Security Essentials from the location below

Microsoft Safety Scanner

5) Verifying system files
Sometimes these crashes happen due to corrupt files. Here has Microsoft a handy tool to repair any corrupted files.

Press your Windows key, type CMD.

Then right-click the command prompt icon and run as administrator.

 

Now type here: DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth

This can could take a couple of minutes to start and maybe around 30 minutes to complete.

 

When that is done, try to run the sfc /scannow.

When you see Verification 100% complete, type exit and reboot.
For a more detailed guide see: Use the System File Checker tool to repair missing or corrupted system files 

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Players are gettings prompted by Origin "Origin needs to download files and is waiting for permission. Please choose "Yes" when Windows prompts you for permission" but no windows prompt is popping up.

Recommended troubleshooting: 

 

1) Deleting Data files
Press the Windows key and type CMD

Right-click Command Prompt, select Run as administrator.
Enter here the following commands:

  • del c:\windows\syswow64\config\systemprofile\appdata\roaming\origin\telemetry\data
  • del c:\users\username\appdata\roaming\origin\telemetry\data

For more information & how to submit a error report please see: Origin Client - Download Paused / Waiting for Permission 

 

2) Turning off UAC

Press the Windows key and type UAC.
Change User Control Settings
should pop up and click this.
Now move the slider al the way down and press OK.
Restart your computer and try installing/Updating Apex Legends.
Make sure to turn on UAC after this!

 

3) Disable OriginClientService
Exit Origin and make sure it is not running in the background.
Press the Windows key and type: Services
Search for OriginClientService, right-click and select properties.

Click the drop-down arrow next to startup type and change it to Disable.

Now restart Origin and try updating / downloading Apex Legends
Make sure after downloading/installing Apex to restore these settings.

 

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Reduced performance could happen for numerous reasons.
I'll go in-depth on a couple of troubleshooting methods that solved the issue for most people.

Recommended troubleshooting: 

1) Clean Booting

Clean boot your system, this will tell you if a program interferes with Apex Legends.
If you can run Apex Legends after this clean boot without FPS drops, try disabling some Overlay programs or other programs that get executed on startup.

Troubleshooting EasyAntiCheat.

Open your File explorer and locate to: C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\Apex
And delete the following files:

  • EasyAntiCheat
  • EasyAntiCheat_launcher.exe
  • EasyAntiCheat_x64.dll

Then locate to:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\Apex\__Installer\customcomponent 

And delete the following files:

  • EasyAntiCheat

Then restart Origin, go to Game Library, click on Apex Legends.
Then go to settings -> Game Properties and repair the game.

Credits: ZeelmaekersThe_Tibber & EraVentura

 

2) Clean Driver install 

Download DDU (Display driver uninstaller),

Run it and Have it remove all NVIDIA Software / Drivers.

If you previously Owned an AMD, have it remove those as well.

Download the Driver Package.

Install drivers using Custom.

Uncheck the services you do not use.

Check the Clean Install box.

3) Locking FPS in advanced Launch options
Open Origin, click on the top bar View.
Now open Game library and click on Apex Legends.
Here you will find settings when you press that click on Game Properties.
Go to Advanced Launch Options.
Now click on the text box below Command Line Arguments:
Type here: -refresh X and +fps_max X
Depending on the refresh rate of your monitor you have to change the X 
Most monitors have a 60 - 120  or 144 Hz refresh rate.
Example for a 144Hz monitor:

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4) Apex Legends Priority.

After some investigating I noticed people followed "Apex performance guides" that involves going into Regedit adding lines and changing variables to set Apex Legends to a High priority.
This causes Apex Legends to become unstable on lower-end systems and causing instability and in some cases crashes.
Never change anything in the Regedit if you don't have a restore point or if you don't know what you are doing.

If you have followed one of these guides and locked Apex on High priority, here you can find the needed steps to restore your Priority back to normal and for people with CPU issues: Below Normal.

 

Only do these steps if you are sure you changed the priority in the Regedit!
Press the start key (windows key) and type here Regedit or Registry Editor.
Open this program and follow the path:

Find the folder: Hkey_Local_Machine then Software
When you are in Software locate to: Microsoft.

Here you will find Windows NT open this and locate to CurrentVersion

Here should be a folder: ImageFileExecutionOptions open this and you should find a folder r5apex.exe.
Click this open and click on the file indicating CPU priority.
Here change to number to 2 for normal priority.
If you do not see an r5apex.exe folder, that's even better can you can use the troubleshooting steps below.

If you having 100% CPU usage and it throttles sometimes or a lower-end CPU.
Don't change to number to 2 but fill in 5.
This will make Apex Run in a lower priority and will make sure Apex is stable in most cases.

If you haven't changed the priority in Regedit.
Open task manager and have Origin Running in the background.
Find the Origin task, right-click and click Open details.

Find Origin.exe and right-click it, now select set priority.
Here, set Origin to Normal or Below normal.
(This could / Will affect other games, so normal is recommended!)

 

If you are using any advanced launch commands.

Make sure to check and remove the -High command out this textbox.
If your system is running fine then it's not really needed but if you are experiencing some lag.
It's worth to check if this is causing the issue.

untrusted.png


This problem happens when the game loaded a system dynamic-link library file that failed an integrity check.
The error is most of the time solved with repairing those files using the command prompt.
Recommended troubleshooting:

Press your windows key, type CMD.

Then right click the command prompt icon and run as administrator.

 

Now type here: DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth

This can could take a couple minutes to start and maybe around 30 minutes to complete.

 

When that is done, try to run the sfc /scannow.

When you see Verification 100% complete, type exit and reboot.

Now try to launch Apex Legends again.

 

If this did not solve this issue.
It could be that your computer is infected with a virus.
therefor scan with an antivirus tool recommended: Malwarebytes

If you finished this scan now launch Ccleaner and run a Registry Cleaner.
Make sure you do the recommended steps and save the Registry, just to be sure.
When this is done, reboot your system and Launch Apex Legends

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Lot's of players are reporting Apex is crashing on startup after the easy anti cheat pop-up
I'm currently investigating this issue and troubleshooting this issue.
I'll update this post when I have more information.
Recommended troubleshooting: 

Troubleshooting EasyAntiCheat.

Open your File explorer and locate to: C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\Apex
And delete the following files:

  • EasyAntiCheat
  • EasyAntiCheat_launcher.exe
  • EasyAntiCheat_x64.dll

Then locate to:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\Apex\__Installer\customcomponent 

And delete the following files:

  • EasyAntiCheat

Then restart Origin, go to Game Library, click on Apex Legends.
Then go to settings -> Game Properties and repair the game.

Removing Easy Anti Cheat from Firewall / Anti Virus.
Open your anti-virus software and locate yourself to the exception folder.
If you have here added an exception for Easy Anti Cheat, try to delete this exception and see if this solved the issue.

Download latest Visual C++

Update to the latest version of Visual C++ by following the link below.
Click here to download the latest supported Visual C++ 


Thanks for reading and I hope this post solved the issue you had.

If you use this post as inspiration to help others, please link this as the source.

 

Have fun playing Apex Legends and thanks again for reading.
This is a community post, I do not work for EA.

 

Zeelmaekers

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Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

[ Edited ]

 

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Common Connection troubleshooting
If you are experiencing disconnects, check first if EA is experiencing connection issues.
They will tweet this out on their twitter:@EAHelp or on the help page found here: EA Help - Apex Legends
Click on the top right server status, here will the Xbox, PlayStation and PC server be displayed separately.
If the servers are down, @EAHelp will give frequent updates and answer any question you may have.

 

Sever online but still having connection issues? 
Sometimes you cannot reach the EA servers this could have various reasons and we will go over the common and more advanced troubleshooting methods.


Power cycle your network devices.
Sometimes cold booting or power cycling your device can solve the issue.
Turn off your device and unplug it. wait for 20 seconds before you plug your device back in.
When the 20 seconds have passed, plug your device back in and see if you can connect to the EA servers.

Flushing DNS
A DNS flush on your system is often an effective solution if you’re experiencing technical problems.
 open your Start menu and type CMD
Now right-click the window and run as Administrator.
Now type here: ipconfig /flushdns
Wait till this is done and close the command prompt.

 

Opening Ports
Having connection issues with your EA games? You can open (forward) some TCP or UDP ports for troubleshooting.
This could drastically improve your network connection with the EA Servers.
For an easy read guide, please visit EA Help - Opening Ports

 

Using A GPN or VPN
Sometimes your packets use too many hops that lead to a high ping.?

Therefore using a Virtual Private Network could lower the number of hops your packets have to take and improve your ping and packet loss.
Recommended GPN: WT Fast
Recommended VPN: TunnelBear


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Switching to a different DNS is a techie trick that can help you if your DNS is unreliable.
if something goes wrong with the DNS you are using, you can experience lag or get no connection at all.

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Change DNS Windows 10:
Right-click the bottom left windows icon (start menu).
Select Network Connections.
On the left you will find a tab Ethernet, here you will find an option Change adapter options.
When you clicked on this a new window will open up showing your network card, right-click your network card and select properties.
Scroll down till you find the option: Internet protocol Version 4(TCP/IPv4).
Highlight this by clicking on this once and click on Properties.

Here you will find on the bottom the DNS settings.
select the Use the following DNS server addresses.
Now fill in the DNS of Google:
Preferred DNS server: 8.8.8.8
Alternate DNS server: 8.8.4.4

Click OK and close this window.

Now locate the Internet Protocol Version 6(TCP/IPv6) and click it to highlight it.
Select properties and now select "use the following DNS server addresses:"
Now fill in the following:
Preferred DNS server: 2001:4860:4860::8888
Alternate DNS 
server: 2001:4860:4860::8844


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Change DNS Xbox:
Go to the Xbox One home screen, then go to settings.
Click on Network then Advanced settings then DNS settings.
and click on Manual.
Now fill in the DNS of Google:
Preferred DNS server: 8.8.8.8
Alternate DNS server: 8.8.4.4

Now locate back to the home screen.

 

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Change DNS Playstation:
Scroll right to Settings and go to Network.
Click on Set up Internet connection and click on the type of connection you use.
Now select the following: IP Address Settings (Automatic), DHCP Host Name (Do Not Use), DNS Settings (Manual).
Now fill in the DNS of Google:
Preferred DNS server: 8.8.8.8
Alternate DNS server: 8.8.4.4
Then MTU settings Automatic and locate yourself back to the Home screen.

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Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

[ Edited ]

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Archived Issues
Heya, nothing to see here yet.
Here will be archived issues that have been solved but pop-up once in a while.

Currently working on this post Standard smile


Archived issues:

  • Razer Synapse crashing Apex Legends 
  • Apex Freezing and showing 100% CPU usage in Task Manager 
  • Mouse stuttering 
  • Random freezes 

Razer Synapse crashing Apex Legends.

Older versions of Razer Synapse could make Apex Legends unstable or lock your PC.

Recommended troubleshooting:

Uninstalling the old RΛZΞR Synapse and installing the latest version.
Click here to install the latest Razer Synapse version 


Apex Freezing and showing 100% CPU usage in Task Manager.

Players are experiencing Apex Legends freezing and noticing Apex Legends is utilizing 100% of the CPU.
This issue looks only to be related so certain CPUs (I5-I7-I9) and some Ryzen Processors.

Recommended Workaround: 
Launch Apex Legends and alt-tab out to the game.
Open task manager, find Apex Legends, right-click and select Go to details.
Select r5Apex.exe and right-click and click set Affinity, uncheck <all processors> and check only 4 cores or less.

 

If you still experiencing this issue, try to set usable cores to 4 or less.
This issue was fixed by a patch, this workaround might not work for new issues
Apex Legends Dev Tracker - PC game hangs with 100% CPU usage 


Mouse stuttering.
Some players are experiencing the cursor/mouse stuttering when Apex Legends is running.

Some have Apex running as a high priority application that causes this issue.

Recommended troubleshooting: 

Check the priority of Apex Legends in Task Manager.
Open task manager when Apex Legends is running in the background.
Find the task in the list, right-click and click Go to Details.
The r5apex.exe should be highlighted in the tab Details.
Right-click it and go to set priority and make sure this is on normal.


Client freezes
Most of the time these freezes happen in champion select, before dropping/ on landing and in combat.

The issue causing these freezes hasn't been found yet.


Recommended troubleshooting: 


Turning off Discord Hardware Acceleration.
Open discord settings and appearance and scroll down to Advanced.

Check if Hardware Acceleration turned off, if not move the slider to the left

Removing friends
As some freezes look friend-list related deleting friends with special characters / using the Chinese / Russian language could solve this issue.
Source:Reddit: Apex Crash 

Forcing Origin / Apex Legends to use fewer cores
People in the Apex Legends discord are confirming reducing the available cores.
How you can do this is as following:

  • Open Origin and let it run in the background.
  • Open task manager and look for the Origin service.
  • Right-click Origin and click go to details.
  • Here Origin will be highlighted and right-click again.
  • Select the set Affinity option.
  • Here uncheck one of the cores, preferable the last core in the list.

Do not uncheck Core 0 as this can make Apex Legends unstable in some cases.
If you tried changing the Affinity of Apex Legends, you will get the error message Access Denied.
You can only change the affinity of Origin or you will have to go into Regedit (not recommended)


Engine Error - Profile.cfg

An error that is popping up after the December 3rd update is the Profile.cfg error.
what causes this issue is not clear but can easily be fixed with the steps below.

Recommended troubleshooting: 

Navigate to the shown folder (the path is C:/Users/<YOUR USER>/Saved Games/ ), and rename/delete the mentioned file.

After that, start the game.

 

The file should get recreated, and the issue should be resolved. If it does not get fixed, try repairing the game.

If the above does not work, delete the mentioned files again, restart your PC and run Origin as administrator.

If that didn't work 
Try clearing the Origin Cache first.

Then go to your Game Library and open the Apex Legends settings.

Then Game Properties and go to Cloud saves.
Click here on restore save.

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Random Freezing
Most of the time these freezes happen in champion select, before dropping/ on landing and in combat.

The issue causing these freezes hasn't been found yet.


Recommended troubleshooting: 


Turning off Discord Hardware Acceleration.
Open discord settings and appearance and scroll down to Advanced.

Check if Hardware Acceleration turned off, if not move the slider to the left

Removing friends
As some freezes look friend-list related deleting friends with special characters / using the Chinese / Russian language could solve this issue.
Source:Reddit: Apex Crash 

Forcing Origin / Apex Legends to use fewer cores
People in the Apex Legends discord are confirming reducing the available cores.
How you can do this is as following:

  • Open Origin and let it run in the background.
  • Open task manager and look for the Origin service.
  • Right-click Origin and click go to details.
  • Here Origin will be highlighted and right-click again.
  • Select the set Affinity option.
  • Here uncheck one of the cores, preferable the last core in the list.

Do not uncheck Core 0 as this can make Apex Legends unstable in some cases.
If you tried changing the Affinity of Apex Legends, you will get the error message Access Denied.
You can only change the affinity of Origin or you will have to go into Regedit (not recommended)

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Re: Season 3 - Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

★ Guide

Thanks for this clear and all around great post.

 

This goes to eleven.

Message 4 of 67 (177,122 Views)

Re: Season 3 - Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

★ Novice

How do i do that on ps4 pro?

Message 5 of 67 (177,101 Views)

Re: Season 3 - Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

★ Apprentice

Thanks for this awesome guide, I am facing the "freezing and 100% cpu", and the game is almost unplayable, hope it will be fixed soon.

Message 6 of 67 (176,943 Views)

Re: Season 3 - Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

Champion (Retired)

Tremendously useful posts Zeel. Thanks for your efforts!

Message 7 of 67 (176,502 Views)

Re: Season 3 - Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

★★★★★ Newbie

Im on xbox and I havent been able to play a single proper game in a week. A cluster Truck of problems from constant freezing to, consistent laggy, stuttering games. I havent even been able to get into games to begin with. But i power cycled my router and changed my dns server and it worked like a charm. Thank You good sir.

Message 8 of 67 (176,036 Views)

Re: Season 3 - Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

★★★ Newbie

literally had to revive my account to give credit to this man

EA promote this guy to mod, please.

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Re: Season 3 - Zeel's Troubleshooting in-depth Guide

★★★★★ Newbie
@Zeelmaekers thank you it worked Standard smile
you sir are a genius
Message 10 of 67 (172,847 Views)