UPDATE: I am not experiencing any more crashes with TF2! Yay! (days of testing)
If anyone happens to encounter this problem in the future, or currently have sound loop crashes, I suggest to you to do the following (from simple fixes to last resorts). *
1) Defrag game cache files through game properties in Steam. (Right click TF2 > Properties > Local Files > Defragment cache files)
2) Defrag GCF files with GCFscape found
here. (When GCFScape is opened, make sure the following are checked in on
"Options":
Verbose,
File Mapping, and
Write Access.
3) Refer to
this post.
4) Increase paged pool memory. This is one of the reasons that causes TF2 to sound loop crash - because your system runs out of a special type of memory called
paged pool memory. PP memory is assigned by the OS kernel for use in applications such as Direct3D resources. (found this on Steam support,
here.
You can try increasing paged pool memory by doing this:
registry fix for sound loop crash said:
Start Menu > Run > regedit
Surf down to this key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlSession ManagerMemory Management
Double click on "PagedPoolSize". Hexadecimal is listed first. Change the "Value Data" to one of these below:
(Note: You only need to enter EITHER Hexadecimal or Decimal. They both are the same.)
Megabytes Hexadecimal Decimal
192Mb 0c000000 201326592
256Mb 10000000 268435456
384Mb 18000000 402653184
I went with the 384Mb option and it worked perfectly.
Once you are done, make sure you reboot your computer.
SOURCE:
By default, it's set to 0. I've set it to 384MB, and saw
no side effects other than my computer's performance being dramatically increased.
5) Try uninstalling your anti-virus.
6) Disable your Hardware Sound Acceleration Level. This is the fix that had worked for me where the above 5 fixes have failed.
To do this, go to Start > Run > dxdiag > Sound > DirectX features. Drag the bar to the left to
"No Acceleration"
If any of these won't work, then you can try reformatting your computer. I've reinstalled TF2 before doing any of this, and it didn't help one bit. **
* RESULTS MAY VARY
**LAST RESORT!