Sudden loss of all input peripherals including keyboard and mouse

[CSW_Tommy544]

For the last 6 months or so, me and some of my squad mates are experiencing an issue where we suddenly lose all of our controls - joystick, pedals, button boxes and even mouse and keyboard and the only option that remains is to kill the game through Task Manager. This issue seems to only happen to people flying in VR and is not tied to a specific headset model. We have experienced it using Oculus Rift S, Oculus Quest 2 and Reverb G2. When the game gets to this broken state, the simulation and rendering keeps on working as expected and it is still possible to turn the camera around and observe your plane fall to the ground while not being able to control it in any way. Even though looking around works (rotating the camera), we lose 6 DOF (moving your head inside the cockpit area).

 

We have experienced it multiple times in multiple aircraft and I know that there are other community members who also experienced the same issue. We are unfortunately unable to reproduce it at will, but all instances of the problem happened online on a full real server, that has the cockpit head movement boundaries enabled (Combat Box, TAW, ...). It also seems to happen only when your head is in some corner area of the allowed head movement box. All, but one instance of this issue happened while looking at or looking for a target at some extreme angle, like looking behind your shoulder and up, while having your head in the corner of the cockpit pressed against the canopy. One instance occurred on the ground while taking the VR headset off and putting in back on the head.

 

When trying to reproduce it just by squeezing my head into the corner of my cockpit it does not seem to work, which makes me believe that there is some secondary factor to it. Something like a heavy mission load or heavily populated multiplayer server that could somehow trigger this erroneous state or something else altogether, which we weren't able to identify.

 

Here are some video recordings of the issue. In all of these instances we lost all of our controls, including keyboard and mouse, as mentioned above:

 

1. Full controls freeze at around 0:45 while looking up over the right shoulder in a Mosquito.
2. Full controls freeze at around 0:30 while looking up over the left shoulder while leaning to the right side of the canopy in a Tempest.
3. Full controls freeze at around 0:58 while pushing the headset to the front left edge of the head movement area while taking the headset off and back on. Some English commentary on what buttons and keys @CSW_Hot_Dog was trying to press when in the frozen state is at 2:34

Note: I have also noticed that when I tried to kill the il2.exe process while in this frozen state (using Alt + F4), for a couple minutes I could still see the process in the Task Manager allocating RAM like crazy and in the end allocating over 25 GB of my 32 GB total RAM before the process disappeared completely. I will try to monitor this more closely the next time this happens.

 

Needless to say, this is a serious and annoying issue for us, since just between me and Hot Dog, we had to kill the game frozen in this state at least 10 times now. If there is anything that we can provide to help find the cause of the issue (some heap dumps, crash logs or anything else), please let us know.

[BigGinger]

I have experienced this issue as well, going back as long as I have been playing the game (since late 2018).  Just like @CSW_Tommy544, it has only occurred for me in VR, and I've had it happen on every headset I've owned (Rift, Reverb, Quest 2, Reverb G2).  In that time, I've had 3 different computers as well, so I'm confident that it's not specific to a certain hardware configuration.

 

In my experience, this seems to happen when looking over my shoulder and simultaneously pulling full (or nearly full) back stick.  I have not been able to make it repeatable though.

 

Once the bug occurs, as shown above, all my inputs to the game are frozen.  The ESC key will not bring up the menu, all game controller axes are stuck at their current position, and the only way to exit the game at all is to either ALT+F4 or kill it from the Windows task manager.  However, VR tracking still functions normally so I am able to look around while all my controls are frozen.  I am 100% sure that it is not a focus issue; ALT+TAB and/or clicking the mouse on the game window have no effect at all.  In some instances it has happened to me where I had enough altitude to troubleshoot for a couple minutes before my airplane inevitably hit the ground.  I've seen a few reports on the forum over the years that sound like the same issue, but I believe they frequently get confused with situations where Windows has shifted focus away from the game for some reason.

[CSW_Tommy544]

1 hour ago, BigGinger said:

I have experienced this issue as well, going back as long as I have been playing the game (since late 2018).  Just like @CSW_Tommy544, it has only occurred for me in VR, and I've had it happen on every headset I've owned (Rift, Reverb, Quest 2, Reverb G2).  In that time, I've had 3 different computers as well, so I'm confident that it's not specific to a certain hardware configuration.

 

In my experience, this seems to happen when looking over my shoulder and simultaneously pulling full (or nearly full) back stick.  I have not been able to make it repeatable though.

 

Once the bug occurs, as shown above, all my inputs to the game are frozen.  The ESC key will not bring up the menu, all game controller axes are stuck at their current position, and the only way to exit the game at all is to either ALT+F4 or kill it from the Windows task manager.  However, VR tracking still functions normally so I am able to look around while all my controls are frozen.  I am 100% sure that it is not a focus issue; ALT+TAB and/or clicking the mouse on the game window have no effect at all.  In some instances it has happened to me where I had enough altitude to troubleshoot for a couple minutes before my airplane inevitably hit the ground.  I've seen a few reports on the forum over the years that sound like the same issue, but I believe they frequently get confused with situations where Windows has shifted focus away from the game for some reason.

 

I agree with everything @BigGinger wrote. It also seems to happen to us most often when looking over a shoulder while maneuvering. I also want to confirm that this definitely is not a "lost focus in Windows" issue. I have also tried to ALT + TAB out of the game and tried to get it back into focus and it made no difference.

[JG1_Wittmann]

I had an intermittant usb problem for a year or so.  I thought it was tir headset,   or another device maybe. I got a powered usb hub, seemed to go away or less frequent.  It was my throttle. Replaced that and have not seen an issue since. Try. All diff usb devices.  May take time to solve.  Was not game related.

[BigGinger]

Negative, I don’t think this is USB-related.  I’ve had it occur with several different sets of peripherals, including multiple powered USB hubs.

[FlyingH]

Have you checked the usb power settings? Windows can put usbports to sleep from time to time and you need to go into the usbports one by one and untick the settings that allow w to do that!

[CSW_Tommy544]

12 hours ago, FlyingH said:

Have you checked the usb power settings? Windows can put usbports to sleep from time to time and you need to go into the usbports one by one and untick the settings that allow w to do that!

 

This cannot be a USB issue, as all of the controls still work in Windows. You can still use your keyboard and mouse to kill the game through Task Manager and other flight controls still work correctly in Windows game devices control panel. Moreover, you can just start IL-2 up right after you kill it and everything will work just fine. No need to restart your PC or do anything else. It's just the IL-2 process/window that stops responding to any user input.

 

Edit: just to be correct, I guess there is a chance that some issue with a USB driver can cause some sort of an error in the game, which will then stop responding to any input, but not in the way you suggested.

Edited August 26, 2022 by CSW_Tommy544

[CSW_Hot_Dog]

Another case of sudden complete lost of all control in VR:

Again same situation, looking over shoulder to my six, extreme possition in VR and othe planes around...
 

 

Edited September 16, 2022 by CSW_Hot_Dog

[Tanko]

this also happens to me in VR (q2) while looking over my shoulder and pulling on the stick

 

happened to me yesterday too, everything locked as soon as i looked over my shoulder and pulled up... Its almost expected now so i try not to do that anymore.

Edited September 19, 2022 by Tanko*VR*

[TheWarsimmer]

This used to be a very frequent issue for me, across multiple headsets. It would happen most often when looking over my shoulder during dogfights, as described here. I bought a powered USB hub and the issue hasn't happened since. It's been a recurring issue for years with many people having this problem. Can't be certain if a powered USB hub will help those affected, but it did work for me.

[CSW_Hot_Dog]

On 9/17/2022 at 4:53 PM, TheWarsimmer said:

This used to be a very frequent issue for me, across multiple headsets. It would happen most often when looking over my shoulder during dogfights, as described here. I bought a powered USB hub and the issue hasn't happened since. It's been a recurring issue for years with many people having this problem. Can't be certain if a powered USB hub will help those affected, but it did work for me.

Ok, and what did you connect to this powered USB HUB, headset? Joysticks and keybord? Both?

Anyway, here is another example:

 

 

[TheWarsimmer]

29 minutes ago, CSW_Hot_Dog said:

Ok, and what did you connect to this powered USB HUB, headset? Joysticks and keybord? Both?

Anyway, here is another example:

 

 

 

Yes, exactly what would happen to me, though it often happened more in the vertical. There are threads on it. I connected everything I could to the powered usb- with the hotas and stick being the main thing. Here is a link to the exact one I purchased:

 

https://www.amazon.com/USB-Hub-Charging-Individual-Switches/dp/B00VK9C24M/ref=sr_1_3?crid=128QB4ACD787I&keywords=USB+3.0+Hub%2C+Tendak+USB+Hub+with+4+USB+3.0+Data+Ports+%2B+1+USB+Smart+Charging+Port+and+Power+Supply+Adapter+with+Individual+On%2FOff+Port+Switches+for+PS4+Pro+PS4+Slim+Xbox+One&qid=1663628796&sprefix=usb+3.0+hub%2C+tendak+usb+hub+with+4+usb+3.0+data+ports+%2B+1+usb+smart+charging+port+and+power+supply+adapter+with+individual+on%2Foff+port+switches+for+ps4+pro+ps4+slim+xbox+one%2Caps%2C634&sr=8-3

Old thread on it. It drove me nuts.

 

[CapnFlint]

I am having this issue also.

Reported it in my own thread (with link to track) before I found this one existed already. Same symptoms - happens mid dogfight, control inputs lost, keyboard won't  bring up Esc menu  once I crash.

 

My USB devices are already on a powered USB hub, and they show fine in a joystick tester app. And the keyboard is working fine to alt-tab to kill the game.

 

For how great IL2 performs in VR, if this a VR only issue, it is definitely a detractor from the experience.

 

 

 

[CapnFlint]

@Wardog5711Any chance of getting this looked at? Lots of reports from many users over the years and recently too, all with a common thread of lots of VR, mid-dogfight, pulling hard, looking back over the shoulder or at six. Then all joystick input and even keyboard/mouse input stops. 

 

I have the track file attached from my latest recording. What else do you and the team need to help diagnose it?

 

Other threads i found related:

 

 

 

Edited November 28, 2022 by [FF]CapnFlint

[Wardog5711]

Done. I just sent Regingrave the link to this thread.

Be prepared to provide more details if he comes asking.

[Wilhelm_Heidkamp]

I'm going to write something that probably doesn't make sense, but I'm sharing it because in my case it seems to be the cause of my problem: I too have had three different occasions when HOTAS stopped responding while flying online. It had never happened to me before, so I analyzed what had changed lately. I remembered that I had disabled Forcefeedback for HOTAS. So I turned it back on and have not had this problem since. I should clarify that my HOTAS does not have FFB and that is why I disabled it, thinking that I didn't need it. After activating it, I have not had any HOTAS failure again.

 

[KEY = force_feedback]
    amplitude = 1.00000
    enabled = 1
    force = 1.00000

Edited November 28, 2022 by PA_Willy

[firdimigdi]

I've had that too in one occasion while playing vs AI. Got in a corkscrew while watching my six and this happened. Keyboard unresponsive and the mouse could only navigate to the upper half of the UI.

 

Controls are on a powered hub, keyboard and mouse are plugged directly on the motherboard. All USB power saving options are disablec.

 

When it happened I alt-tabbed and checked my controls in the control panel, all of them functioned as expected and there was no odd error in the event log. Alt-tabbed back in to the game and the situation persisted; no response to keyboard input (Esc, Enter, space) and the mouse still could not access the bottom half of the UI. Restarting IL2 was the only way to regain functionality.

Edited November 28, 2022 by firdimigdi

[CapnFlint]

2 hours ago, PA_Willy said:

I'm going to write something that probably doesn't make sense, but I'm sharing it because in my case it seems to be the cause of my problem: I too have had three different occasions when HOTAS stopped responding while flying online. It had never happened to me before, so I analyzed what had changed lately. I remembered that I had disabled Forcefeedback for HOTAS. So I turned it back on and have not had this problem since. I should clarify that my HOTAS does not have FFB and that is why I disabled it, thinking that I didn't need it. After activating it, I have not had any HOTAS failure again.

 

[KEY = force_feedback]
    amplitude = 1.00000
    enabled = 1
    force = 1.00000

Well, I have an actual Force Feedback stick (they are great, btw). I used to have an issue where the "feedback" part wasn't working on a second or third flight even though the actual axis actions were working, but I could still use all my other HOTAS stuff. So I think that's unrelated in my case.

 

[CSW_Tommy544]

This most definitely does not have anything to do with force feedback functionality. It happens to people who have flight sticks with and without it.

[firdimigdi]

16 hours ago, PA_Willy said:

[KEY = force_feedback]
    amplitude = 1.00000
    enabled = 1
    force = 1.00000

 

IMO that's just a red herring/coincidence. Enabling this tells the game when initializing DirectInput to attempt also to do FFB initialization for any controller that supports it; however if your controller is not FFB-enabled DirectInput will simply tell the game "FFB not supported" and move on.

[Wilhelm_Heidkamp]

I know what that means. But I share my experiencia. You dont lose anything trying it.

[Vortice]

Happened again to me this morning while I was dogfighting over Normandy. In VR using SteamVR and WMR in a Reverb G2 headset.

 

I have noticed that there are two kinds of lockup which can occur. The first and most common lockup type involves the loss of all input devices, but can be easily fixed by pressing the Win + Y keys to restore full input control. Once this has happened in a flying session of one or more missions it does not re-occur.

 

The second type of lockup as described by CSW_Tommy544 occurs less frequently, but is completely fatal as I have found no way of recovering from it and I have to use Task Manager to kill off the game as it will not respond to controller inputs of any kind whatsoever, including keyboard and mouse. This is what happened to me this morning.

 

I have a powered USB hub and have tweaked the Windows USB devices settings to always power on, never sleep, but this has made no difference to the outcome.

 

I would love to try playing a career in Iron Man mode, but I do not have any confidence in the reliability of the game, as it will inevitably smash me helplessly into the ground at some point through total loss of control of my plane, so I have never felt able to choose that option.

 

It would be wonderful if the Devs could fix this bug as it has been causing problems for me ever since I started flying in VR two years ago, but I won't be holding out for a fix any time soon because they have done nothing about it so far.

[AKA_Ramstein]

wow, I am experiencing some of the same issues while flying on our dedicated server in dedicated mission that we have flown for a long time, different maps and missions over time.. my computer was running really well, high fps,, VR, etc. and then it started doing all this crazy stuff. I also fly DCS, and by far DCS is much harder on my computer, but not any of the issues I am having in IL-2 recently. The stuff and issues mentioned in this thread sound like some of what is happening to me as well. I think also a bad memory leak causes all of us having to leave the server and log back into the mission to continue flying because everything slows to a crawl. But it appears that is not the same or just added problems. Losing control for no reason at all... removed button issues, resolved.. but the lists goes on and on... just weird stuff going on and causing a lot of issues with lots of people having to leave severs and come back,, too many of us having these issues.. 

Edited December 5, 2022 by AKA_Ramstein

[firdimigdi]

19 hours ago, Vortice said:

I have noticed that there are two kinds of lockup which can occur. The first and most common lockup type involves the loss of all input devices, but can be easily fixed by pressing the Win + Y keys to restore full input control. Once this has happened in a flying session of one or more missions it does not re-occur.

 

If you have it set so the input is automatically switched when you put on your headset then you might want to look at this setting, logically it should help with what you describe above:

[Vortice]

I have Input Switching set to manual as my standard setting, so automatic switching it is not the cause of the problem. It would be an easy fix if it was.

[AKA_Ramstein]

I don't have mixed reality

[Vortice]

On 11/28/2022 at 4:06 PM, Wardog5711 said:

Done. I just sent Regingrave the link to this thread.

Be prepared to provide more details if he comes asking.

 

Regingrave where are you please? Have you even read this thread yet?

[Shabonga]

On 8/23/2022 at 9:51 PM, CSW_Tommy544 said:

For the last 6 months or so, me and some of my squad mates are experiencing an issue where we suddenly lose all of our controls - joystick, pedals, button boxes and even mouse and keyboard and the only option that remains is to kill the game through Task Manager. This issue seems to only happen to people flying in VR and is not tied to a specific headset model. We have experienced it using Oculus Rift S, Oculus Quest 2 and Reverb G2. When the game gets to this broken state, the simulation and rendering keeps on working as expected and it is still possible to turn the camera around and observe your plane fall to the ground while not being able to control it in any way. Even though looking around works (rotating the camera), we lose 6 DOF (moving your head inside the cockpit area).

 

We have experienced it multiple times in multiple aircraft and I know that there are other community members who also experienced the same issue. We are unfortunately unable to reproduce it at will, but all instances of the problem happened online on a full real server, that has the cockpit head movement boundaries enabled (Combat Box, TAW, ...). It also seems to happen only when your head is in some corner area of the allowed head movement box. All, but one instance of this issue happened while looking at or looking for a target at some extreme angle, like looking behind your shoulder and up, while having your head in the corner of the cockpit pressed against the canopy. One instance occurred on the ground while taking the VR headset off and putting in back on the head.

 

When trying to reproduce it just by squeezing my head into the corner of my cockpit it does not seem to work, which makes me believe that there is some secondary factor to it. Something like a heavy mission load or heavily populated multiplayer server that could somehow trigger this erroneous state or something else altogether, which we weren't able to identify.

 

Here are some video recordings of the issue. In all of these instances we lost all of our controls, including keyboard and mouse, as mentioned above:

 

1. Full controls freeze at around 0:45 while looking up over the right shoulder in a Mosquito.
2. Full controls freeze at around 0:30 while looking up over the left shoulder while leaning to the right side of the canopy in a Tempest.
3. Full controls freeze at around 0:58 while pushing the headset to the front left edge of the head movement area while taking the headset off and back on. Some English commentary on what buttons and keys @CSW_Hot_Dog was trying to press when in the frozen state is at 2:34

Note: I have also noticed that when I tried to kill the il2.exe process while in this frozen state (using Alt + F4), for a couple minutes I could still see the process in the Task Manager allocating RAM like crazy and in the end allocating over 25 GB of my 32 GB total RAM before the process disappeared completely. I will try to monitor this more closely the next time this happens.

 

Needless to say, this is a serious and annoying issue for us, since just between me and Hot Dog, we had to kill the game frozen in this state at least 10 times now. If there is anything that we can provide to help find the cause of the issue (some heap dumps, crash logs or anything else), please let us know.

I have encountered this same issue twice today alone, also with memory usage at 95+% in IL2 when shutting down via the task manager. I was advised that it may be an issue with my boundary settings in VR, but I have never set a boundary. Using HP reverb G2 with open comp and open XR.

Edited December 17, 2022 by Shabonga

[RED-Icarez]

I had the same exact issue today. So it's a 2 years old bug, without any fix ? I don't have VR, I don't have mixed reality.

[CSW_Tommy544]

The bug is still present. The main issue is that it is very hard to reproduce, but it did happen to me even in the latest game version.

[VanVogt]

I also have the exact same issue: loss of all peripheral response (including mouse and keyboard), verified all still work outside of IL-2. Now happened to me 3 times this morning. Has been happening sporadically but regularly since using IL2 (years). It seems its a loss of focus from the IL-2 process. Alt-tab does not bring it back though. When I close it I also have to go into Processes and kill the IL-2 process there. Like others mentioned, it happens to me when looking back (I'm using VR, Meta Quest Pro) in a dogfight, never when looking forward cruising along. If I may, my hypothesis is that the loss of focus may be caused by the the fact of the pilot head leaning sharply against the cockpit limits, causing an invalid "out of cockpit" position?

I can confirm that many many users have experienced this issue (by asking on coms channel on Combat Box). It's obviously been many years, it would be very nice to please allocate resources to fixing this.

[=DW=_Dragon-Kid]

I’m Vr it does it once in a while ! game controllers, mouse and keyboard stop working and usually in a turn .. Test my controllers all Virpil system with thrustmaster pedals  . Everything working great only this game does it . Also bangat has this too he is Vr too

[TAIPAN_]

Still happening for me unfortunately as well.

Usually cause is getting a phone call or someone coming to the door so I have to pause or go AFK, then when I come back it's still running fine but won't accept inputs.

[=X51=TheLateBird7]

14 hours ago, VanVogt said:

I also have the exact same issue: loss of all peripheral response (including mouse and keyboard), verified all still work outside of IL-2. Now happened to me 3 times this morning. Has been happening sporadically but regularly since using IL2 (years). It seems its a loss of focus from the IL-2 process. Alt-tab does not bring it back though. When I close it I also have to go into Processes and kill the IL-2 process there. Like others mentioned, it happens to me when looking back (I'm using VR, Meta Quest Pro) in a dogfight, never when looking forward cruising along. If I may, my hypothesis is that the loss of focus may be caused by the the fact of the pilot head leaning sharply against the cockpit limits, causing an invalid "out of cockpit" position?

I can confirm that many many users have experienced this issue (by asking on coms channel on Combat Box). It's obviously been many years, it would be very nice to please allocate resources to fixing this.

This frequently happens to me, too, exactly as VanVogt describes. Combination of hard maneuvering and looking back in dogfights causes all control inputs to the game to stop. It's extremely frustrating when you're on a kill streak in a multiplayer server. Please fix!

[jollyjack]

Maybe this has been suggested before, at least once by me.

 

USB hardware data especially connected to a laptop most of the time are confined to run via one USB controller chip.

If you need use a hub that's mostly the case.

 

In a PC motherboard there are often more. I found with doing professional audio/video jobs that it made sense to buy a Sonnet pci-e card with 4 separate controllers to avoid hiccups, but it could be not the case here, only with added VR hardware?

 

Maybe there's some USB data usage monitoring tool for windows?

 

https://www2.mitutoyo.co.jp/eng/contact/products/usb-itpak/

 

and:

 

 

Edited April 26, 2024 by jollyjack

[Aapje]

It can also be a power issue. Perhaps the peripherals use too much power for the ports. A powered USB hub may fix it.

[TAIPAN_]

19 hours ago, Aapje said:

It can also be a power issue. Perhaps the peripherals use too much power for the ports. A powered USB hub may fix it.

I think this is a misunderstanding of the issue. 

 

Even keyboard and mouse clicks stop working.

 

Also the exact same hardware setup does not have any input freezes in any other flight sim or space sim. 

 

In any case I also have powered USB hubs, and get the same problem. 

[CSW_Tommy544]

Agreed, this is definitely not a USB power issue and still happens every now and then for me, too.

[ACG_Neo]

I am having this issue frequently as well. Kind of hard to believe this is a power issue since peripherals continue to work in all other applications except IL2. My hotas still triggers key binds in discord and SRS, mouse and keyboard still work fine outside the app. Seems to be exclusive to the game which does not suggest to me that there is a power issue. Everyone seems to also be having it in the exact same scenario in the game (looking over the shoulder in dogfight - same for me).

 

Calling this specific issue a power issue is also a red herring. For all users whose symptoms match the original post as well as some of the comments... This is not a power issue.

[spreckair]

I just recently had this happen to me for the first time, although I have been flying with my G2 for about three years.  I can't remember if I was looking over my shoulder or not, but given that so many are reporting that this is when it happens, it would be interesting to know if everyone is using Necksafer (which I use and love), and if this is part of the problem?