EVE-Online Patch Makes XP Unbootable

Nobo writes "CCP's latest major patch to the EVE-Online client, Trinity, comes with an optional DX9-enhanced graphics patch that dramatically improves the visual quality of the in-game graphics through remade models, textures, and HDR. It also has an unfortunate bug: the incredibly stupid choice of boot.ini as a game configuration file, coupled with an errant extra backslash in the installer configuration. The result is that anyone who installs the enhanced graphics patch overwrites the windows XP c:\boot.ini file with the EVE client configuration file, bricking the machine on the next boot. Discussion in a couple of forums threads is becoming understandably heated."

Ppffftt!

[morgan_greywolf]

Isn't this something should have been found in, oh, I dunno....beta testing?

How is this possible?

[Jennifer York]

Someone in their QA department needs to be fired. This type of mistake is simply unacceptable, and truly very difficult to believe.

What sort of test plan fails to catch BRICKING THE PC?

Re:Insanely sloppy... but not without precedent

[Anonymous Coward]

The deletion of the Boot.ini file will not cause any data loss. If you format your system to fix the issue then you will lose data. Anyone with the Windows XP CD can boot off of it and repair the OS. It is a simple procedure for the tech savvy folks and for those that are not tech savvy, most of them have friends that are.

This issue is going to leave CCP with a lot of egg on their face but realistically extended downtime would have been worse since the player base would have been screaming a 100x louder. This issue will peak higher in the media since it is a highly unusual problem but will die quicker then if the servers were down for 2-5 days.

The concern that I have is how did this get past the QA testers at CCP and into a production build?

Re:They both made errors.

[Goobermunch]

Sad that so many games require Administrator access to run.

--AC

Re:How is this possible?

[faloi]

The test plan where you throw it on your Vista box and test it, and it works fine (Vista doesn't use boot.ini), then you test your other OS clients. After all, it's just the installer, what could go wrong...*cough*

Not sure this is a QA problem...

[E. Edward Grey]

Things like this can easily happen when your patch doesn't have any CHANGE CONTROL. Imagine this - the patch is ready to go, everyone agrees on it, and then a small group of developers (or maybe even a single developer) decides to make a modification...and implements it badly. It doesn't even go through QA because QA isn't invoked ("oh, that would just delay the release, I'm sure I have it right anyway"). And now you have this.

I know it drives us crazy, I know not every organization implements change control that's sane and logical. But there's a reason it exists!

Re:They both made errors.

[00lmz]

It certainly is sad that some apps and games need admin privs to run, but this is an installation bug. Of course people are going to install programs as administrator...

Re:Bricking?

[geminidomino]

As I mentioned in my previous post:

People with one machine and w/o a Linux live CD (probably 90% of windows users) would have a bricked machine barring any outside assistance.

No, they wouldn't. The term "bricked" has very specific connotations. Specifically, that it is not repairable without professional intervention which will probably cost more than the unit itself, thus turning it into a "very expensive brick."

A crashed OS is not a bricking, unless that OS is on firmware or something. If popping in a CD can fix your computer, whether or not you are too stupid to do it yourself, then it's not bricked.

Re:How is this possible?

[MBGMorden]

I think it became annoying to me at the end of November. What's bad is it's usually not the geeks who fall in love with buzzwords.

Re:Bricking? BS! More FUD!

[beheaderaswp]

You and I are probably both competent technical people. For my part, I'm an IT director and have done this type of work for 22 years.

Let us assume the two of us, you and I, know more about the Windows registry, bash shell, or using gcc that 98% of the geeks out there. Just for argument's sake.

However, there's a 95% chance that any EVE online player will have the following qualities:

1. Own only one computer.

2. Not be technical.

3. Not read the forums where the information is posted.

4. Be unable to digest and properly utilize the fix information.

So let us re-asses:

It took us, you and I, about 15 seconds to re-write that boot.ini file and *poof* no problem.

That's 5% of the EVE userbase. Add another 20% of the userbase that figures out how to solve the problem. 25% of the people have the fix.

The rest of those poor schlubs are driving to Best Buy to have some incompetent charge them $100 (or whatever)- and that is NOT FUD!!

That my friend is a screwup of massive scope, with huge consequences, because for people who are not geeks- that computer is a "brick".

Re:Insanely sloppy... but not without precedent

[sm62704]

Don't these dumbasses actually test this shit before they shovel it out to you? It seems that a patch that would brick XP would be a bug that the first goddamned time it was tried would be discovered. I'm going to have to google to see what company makes Final Fantasy so I can be sure never to buy a game from them!

The love of money is the root of all bad software.

-mcgrew

Re:Bricking?

[Anonymous Coward]

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

Re:Bricking?

[MMC Monster]

Well, yes they do that, but not in any useful way. (At least on WinXP.)

The recovery console is shell-based. Which sucks, since MSWindows likes to keep most of it's recovery tools GUI-based. (Can you even edit the registry in a console?) Or you can allow the installation disc to "fix" the installation, in which case you don't have any control of what it does.

Re:Ppffftt!

[kv9]

Consumers==Unpaid Beta Testers

paying beta testers

Re:Bricking?

[Apathy451]

In which case my parents "brick" their computer two or three times a year by forgetting they turned the monitor off and can't figure out why their computer doesn't work when they press the power button on the computer itself.

No, I think bricking means something more than "the people who own it don't know what to do now."

Re:How is this possible?

[garbletext]

I have mod points to give you but you're already at +5. Thank you for giving voice to my frustration over this usage. Imprecise language helps no one. A device is called a brick because it is no more useful than one. If you can fix it, it's just 'broken.'

Re:How is this possible?

[garbletext]

No. Bricking doesn't refer to the user's ability to operate a given technology, otherwise my grandma could call her new microwave "bricked," which isn't the case. Just because you are too incompetent to use something doesn't mean it isn't useful. A brick is a device that is irreparably broken.

Re:Insanely sloppy... but not without precedent

[d0rp]

Don't these dumbasses actually test this shit before they shovel it out to you? It seems that a patch that would brick XP would be a bug that the first goddamned time it was tried would be discovered.

That was my first thought too, but I'm guessing that they didn't reboot their test machines after applying the patch...

Re:How is this possible?

[rfunches]

No, the term "brick" does not change based on your technical experience and "considering" something to be bricked does not make the use of the term correct. Joe Average may refer to his hard drive as "memory" but his use of the term is still inaccurate. If the flash chip on an iPhone is FUBAR'd to the state where you can't even reflash it by any means, it's bricked, whether it's in Joe Average's hands, Steve Job's hands, or Sally Tech's hands. Anything less than rendering a piece of hardware completely inoperable (hardware with the usefulness of a physical brick) is *not* bricked. Now, if the boot.ini removal rendered a hard drive inoperable...

Re:Insanely sloppy... but not without precedent

[TheThiefMaster]

It's not, because the summary is wrong.

The patch actually deleted the system boot.ini, it doesn't over-write it or replace it with a game config file.

I don't know where that "fact" came from.

Trust me, I was one of the people who had their boot.ini deleted by the patch, followed by (on next boot) my machine displaying some warning about boot.ini being missing, and then proceeding to boot anyway.

Re:Bricking? BS! More FUD!

[Anonymous Coward]

How this post got "Informative", I'll never know.

Just because it didn't happen to you doesn't mean it didn't happen. For example, man has walked on the moon. Yes, I know you didn't do it, but it happened. Did it occur to you that they realized this issue and fixed it BEFORE you updated? Did it occur to you that your drive setup may be different? Thanks for the MS link... but if your OS isn't bootable, what good does it do? Oh, I know... you have multiple computers and so assume others have multiple computers. You even assume others installed their OS to begin with. Bundled computers typically have rescue disks, but not all, and I would bet a significant amount have NO idea where that "rescue disk" is. Anyone that has done a house move would know that.

Yes, it has been noted previously (to the point of redundancy) that "bricking" is used incorrectly, so no points there.

QA not catching it... well, that is a tough one. Even though I would HOPE they try for every configuration, there is no way that will happen _ever_. Your assumption that nobody reboots is lame. You expect us to believe that nobody in the QA department rebooted their machine and you have the Godlike ability to know this? _Nobody_? Oh... I forgot, you don't reboot yours so nobody else must reboot theirs.

With all your "I do this so everyone else does too" logic, I am betting the skillset you exhibit is the underlying reason it wasn't caught by QA. GO TEAM VENTURE!

Re:Bricking?

[feed_me_cereal]

Most of these people should have a "recovery disc" with their machine that returns it to its initial state of instalation. They'll lose their data, but the machine is far from 'bricked', and they'll need no intervention from pretty much anyone to do this.

Re:Bricking? BS! More FUD!

[Maximos]

If you think this is fud you don't belong near technical support. I work in IT support and have for over 10 years. Even fairly competent users wouldn't be able to know how to fix a machine boot.ini problem now days. Sure, if you have an XP disk you can perform steps easy. however, if you don't, and most won't, then you got to start getting creative. Still not a big issue for the tech guys like myself. But for a user that doesn't touch normal system files nor know how to do it after there only pc has become unbootable. Most prebuilt systems like dell and such come with, as its been said, a reimage disk that basically puts the build to out of box status. that's removing data. For a user who doesn't know how to fix this on their own, its going to be a call to their tech support, and face it more prebuilt tech support shops, being over seas with bad accents, are going to tell them to get that nice CD. For a non-tech savvy user this is either loss of data or a repair bill for bringing it in to the local computer shop that does know how to fix this. That is a big issue for common user. Aside from that, a user should never have to replace the damn boot.ini for patching a game. bottom line someone should be fired for this.