White Screen Crash, verify doesn't stick

[Moosey Fate]

Game loads to a white screen with the RS logo in the corner, stalls, then crashes.

Used the troubleshooting guide here:
https://www.ubisoft.com/en-us/help/connectivity-and-performance/article/troubleshooting-technical-issues-on-pc/000061047

system requirements: yes
update windows: yes
update graphics driver: yes
verify game files: alternates between verified and 1 file broken that will be fixed
background applications: disabled


I initially went through all these steps, and got the 1 unverified file that Steam fixed. it launched once, so i restarted my computer, connected all my things, and had the problem again.

The verification once again showed one file wrong. But so maybe a background task conflict was messing up a file? Didn't seem likely, but did the initial procedure again, and with nothing in the background, and files freshly verified, it crashed on white screen again.

Uninstalled, deleted local files, restarted computer, reinstalled. Verified, and it reported all files were fine. Restarted computer and disabled all background tasks again. But it white screen crashed again. Seems like a rare inconsistent fluke when I can get it to run. Even taking every precaution.

I have been trying to play this game for 1.5 years without luck ever since I bought a guitar to learn through this program. I know there's other ways to learn, but it's just been collecting dust, and this whole thing has been quite the frustration. The troubleshooting steps I did just now (described here) are the most "by the books" I have tried to troubleshoot this.

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SOLUTION (WHITE SCREEN CRASH AT LAUNCH)

Originally posted by Moosey Fate:

Time will tell if these conditions remain consistent, but this seems to be the conditions for Rocksmith to avoid the Rocksmith white screen crash:

A) Rocksmith.ini must contain a non zero value for 2 of the variables. Only the following was tested, and worked regardless of actual monitor resolution:
ScreenWidth=1920
ScreenHeight=1080

B) Assumption is that too many audio options in the OS may cause crash. The specific situations that worked was either:
B1) audio interface must be unplugged, or
B2) bluetooth in OS must be disabled

FIX FOR BAD AUDIO

Originally posted by Moosey Fate:

Win32UltraLowLatencyMode=0

IF that doesn't work, try various numbers for this setting, but start with 4:
Latency buffer=4

FIX FOR UNRECOGNIZED AUDIO DEVICE

Originally posted by Moosey Fate:

Windows 10 > Control Pannel > Sound > desired audio device > Properties > Advanced

From "Default Format" sections dropdown, choose:
2 channel, 16 bit, 48000 Hz (DVD Quality)

[Painpal]

Can you try this one thing and see if it makes a difference , Make sure RockSmith is not running set your desktop screen resolution to 1920 X 1080. After making these changes See if RockSmith with launch and display correctly.

[Moosey Fate]

Good idea. But did not work.

Tried it twice. Each time, the same thing. Verified files before launch. Disabled background tasks. I also went a bit farther and turned off all monitors except the one, which was set to 1920x1080. Each time, I validated after it crashed, and the file needed repaired, as stated in the original post.

[MTZIGG]

You can try and press F!! when the game starts to boot.It starts the game in a windowed mode .If it starts then you can go to the in game setting and make the resolution match your desktop res.If it does not .There is a guide in the guide tab to edit the INI or config file .
The 1 file verification is always a fail with that one file so don't stress on that part

Also make sure you have no other things plugged into your USB ports except Cable mouse and keyboard

[Painpal]

You might also try installing directx download from Microsoft( goggle search a good link)

Also under the Verified files , you will always get 1 file that fails ( I was told this was normal)

[Moosey Fate]

f11 will indeed sometimes alternate between windowed and full screen, but the result is the same. Just a white screen with the RS logo in the corner. It crashes either way, no settings to go into either way.

Unplugging all USB besides mouse and keyboard, plus doing all the above steps did not yield any differences either.

Side note: I do not own the real tone cable, so that's never been connected. This shouldn't matter, as there's an option to play with a mic. Defiantly not buying more for something that doesn't work though. But also that shouldn't be relevant. Just mentioning anything I can think of.

OK, so I guess all copies of the game have the verified file issue? Seems kinda representative of the game as a whole at this point to me.

dxdiag reports i already have direct x 12. The game lists 9.0c compliant. I believe that just means i need at least 9.0c.

TL:DR = no change

Very frustrating, but thanks for your ideas.

[Moosey Fate]

I also tried on 720p resolution. As when in windowed mode after pressing f11, it looked to be able that size. But no change.

[Painpal]

The below file is created the very first time the game is played and the user sets their settings. Please try the following.

1. On your desktop right click the option "create a text file"

2. Copy and paste the following information


[Audio]
EnableMicrophone=0
ExclusiveMode=1
LatencyBuffer=4
ForceDefaultPlaybackDevice=
ForceWDM=0
ForceDirectXSink=0
DumpAudioLog=0
MaxOutputBufferSize=0
RealToneCableOnly=0
MonoToStereoChannel=0
Win32UltraLowLatencyMode=1
[Renderer.Win32]
ShowGamepadUI=0
ScreenWidth=1920
ScreenHeight=1080
Fullscreen=1
VisualQuality=3
RenderingWidth=0
RenderingHeight=0
EnablePostEffects=1
EnableShadows=1
EnableHighResScope=1
EnableDepthOfField=1
EnablePerPixelLighting=1
MsaaSamples=4
DisableBrowser=0
[Net]
UseProxy=1
[Global]
Version=1



3. Rename the text file to the following name Rocksmith.ini

4. Place the newly created text file inside your Rocksmith2014

\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Rocksmith2014


5. Make sure your screen resolution is set to 1920 x 1080


6. Start the program Rocksmith 2014

[Moosey Fate]

I'll give it a try. Here's what mine was set to (just for the record):
I notice the differences are EnableMicrophone, ScreenWidth, and ScreenHeight.

[Audio]
EnableMicrophone=1
ExclusiveMode=1
LatencyBuffer=4
ForceDefaultPlaybackDevice=
ForceWDM=0
ForceDirectXSink=0
DumpAudioLog=0
MaxOutputBufferSize=0
RealToneCableOnly=0
MonoToStereoChannel=0
Win32UltraLowLatencyMode=1
[Renderer.Win32]
ShowGamepadUI=0
ScreenWidth=0
ScreenHeight=0
Fullscreen=1
VisualQuality=1
RenderingWidth=0
RenderingHeight=0
EnablePostEffects=1
EnableShadows=1
EnableHighResScope=1
EnableDepthOfField=1
EnablePerPixelLighting=1
MsaaSamples=4
DisableBrowser=0
[Net]
UseProxy=1
[Global]
Version=1

[Painpal]

Originally posted by Moosey Fate:

I'll give it a try. Here's what mine was set to (just for the record):
I notice the differences are EnableMicrophone, ScreenWidth, and ScreenHeight.

[Audio]
EnableMicrophone=1
ExclusiveMode=1
LatencyBuffer=4
ForceDefaultPlaybackDevice=
ForceWDM=0
ForceDirectXSink=0
DumpAudioLog=0
MaxOutputBufferSize=0
RealToneCableOnly=0
MonoToStereoChannel=0
Win32UltraLowLatencyMode=1
[Renderer.Win32]
ShowGamepadUI=0
ScreenWidth=0
ScreenHeight=0
Fullscreen=1
VisualQuality=1
RenderingWidth=0
RenderingHeight=0
EnablePostEffects=1
EnableShadows=1
EnableHighResScope=1
EnableDepthOfField=1
EnablePerPixelLighting=1
MsaaSamples=4
DisableBrowser=0
[Net]
UseProxy=1
[Global]
Version=1

FYI you can just move your original file to the desktop as a backup that way you do not overwrite it .

Hope this helps.

[Moosey Fate]

Well, we seem to be half way there now.

1st launch
It launched, then i switched audio sources over to my interface to configure the mic, using the guided narrated tutorial. It didn't pick up the mic and audio was super scratchy. I would say this is outside the scope of this post, and something for me to fiddle with the clarity and recognition. So table that issue, and the rest of this post will be discussing the launch issue.

2nd launch
When I restarted, same white screen crash.
Everything the same, except while Rocksmith was running from the 1st launch, I changed my audio output to the audio interface (Audient iD14), as it didn't recognize the bluetooth headset I was using when launched (gave a popup window to this effect on the first launch). In the Rocksmith settings, there were sound input/output options for the various audio interface channels, so it was recognized. Both 1st and 2nd launch the interface was plugged in, but its software was off (in case of conflict, and I can still input/output if the software is off).

Next 20 or more launches
90%+ of the time, if i had the audio interface plugged in, it white screen crashed. And if I didn't, it launched. There were just a couple of exceptions, for example once I plugged in the interface, and it did launch, but I am assuming Windows failed to switched the audio source over to the audio interface, and that's why it worked. There were also a couple times early on that it wouldn't launch either way. But the more I tried it, the more stable it became. I reset the computer, left all background tasks running, and same results (so no conflict with background tasks). I also was able to launch it, under the same stipulations of the audio interface not being plugged in, on my 1440 widescreen, and 1440 ultrawide monitors at this point. Through all of this, the program never changed my .ini file (nor did I change any settings, i simply changed monitor resolutions outside of Rocksmith).

So the problem seems to be that both these conditions must be met:
1) The audio interface needs to not be plugged in
2) There needs to be a non zero value for the monitor resolution in the .ini file. It doesn't need to be what the monitor resolutions are set to.

I believe both 1 and 2 conditions must be met, because I tried just condition 1 yesterday with the advice of unplugging all USB devices besides keyboard and mouse, but I did not have condition 2 met. And it still white screen crashed. But a few times during my 20+ tests today, the crash was inconsistent anyways, so could have been a fluke.

I tried manually switching the EnableMicrophone between 1 and 0, and that didn't have any impact on it crashing.

So condition 2 is resolved, but condition 1 remains a problem, as it is needed for the mic. Fantastic idea with the .ini file Painpal, thank you!

[Moosey Fate]

5 more tests.
https://www.reddit.com/r/rocksmith/comments/s3xgjz/rocksmith_2014_remastered_white_screen_crash_on/
On this thread, I found a note the "condition 1" problem above. The last poster resolved this by disabling other audio devices. I attempted a more simple version of this, and simply toggeled off my bluetooth (the bluetooth functionality for the computer, not the bluetooth device, which was already off), as it wasn't recognized by Rocksmith anyways.

My consistent result was:
1) audio interface plugged in, bluetooth disabled = worked
2) audio interface plugged in, bluetooth enabled = same white screen crash

[Moosey Fate]

Time will tell if these conditions remain consistent, but this seems to be the conditions for Rocksmith to avoid the Rocksmith white screen crash:

A) Rocksmith.ini must contain a non zero value for 2 of the variables. Only the following was tested, and worked regardless of actual monitor resolution:
ScreenWidth=1920
ScreenHeight=1080

B) Assumption is that too many audio options in the OS may cause crash. The specific situations that worked was either:
B1) audio interface must be unplugged, or
B2) bluetooth in OS must be disabled

[Moosey Fate]

Audio quality is still an issue. It is super scratchy, and possibly feedbacky. But I will fiddle with that on my own. If I cannot resolve, I will create a new post for that topic. But conciser the scratching resolved, unless, over time, the apparently consistent results become inconsistent (as it's a relatively small sample size).

Thank you very much to Painpal and MTZIGG who lead to the solution!!!

[Painpal]

Just one last tip on audio sources ,
On your PC the audio sources should be set as your main (default) before ever launching RS2014. RS2014 needs complete control over your audio device as it launches and runs. (If you make any changes to your pc's audio interface , relaunch RS2014) I personally have never had any luck with anything except the RS2014 official cable between the guitar and my pc.
I wish you luck, I have played RS2014 for many years and a ton of hours and (trust me) I have my own set of problems with this 9 year old program that has little to no support at this time.

[Moosey Fate]

dang, sorry to hear about your headaches. i have heard that plugging into an audio interface can be hit or miss. but figured the mic should work.

i'm not through with my other issue, but i've made some headway, and hopeful to make more. i'll keep in mind the issue of needing to be setup before launching. i'm glad i stumbled into the solution with turning off the bluetooth now that you mention that.

thanks so much Painpal!