Lasso doesn't list Punkbuster service yet restrains it

[gamesturbator]

PnkBstrA.exe is the name of the punkbuster service. It shows up fine in my task manager, but it does not appear in Lasso's list of processes. However, the log shows it being restrained which causes me to be kicked from any PB game I play.

Process priority temporarily lowered,The process may have been affecting system responsiveness.

and

Process terminated while restrained,This process terminated while its priority was lowered or CPU affinity changed in accordance with ProBalance parameters.

Thankfully, I just discovered I can click on it in the Log listing itself and exclude it from Probalance, but shouldn't it appear in the list of processes to begin with?

Thanks.

[Jeremy Collake]

I will investigate this, as you are right it should appear in the list if it is restrained. For now, you may want to make sure you check the menu item 'Main / Manage processes of all users' and (if Vista or above) 'Main / Run process with elevated rights'. I will update you about any information I discover. Thanks!

[gamesturbator]

I will test running pb with elevated rights (though since it is not listed in the actual processes list I will have to do it another way other than via Lasso). Something interesting is happening. Even after disabling Probalance via the right click option the same thing continues to happen.  I also tried disabling running in Game Mode, but still got kicked by PB.
But if I close Lasso completely I no longer got kicked by PB! I ran avir Pro which let me check the dll files running and found nothing related to Lasso hooked into the Punkbuster processes.

Thanks again.

[Jeremy Collake]

I believe it is most likely what you are seeing is a coincidence *or* perhaps you have some other feature of Process Lasso enabled at the time (such as foreground boosting, which is disabled by default). As you found, Process Lasso does *NO* hooking of other processes. I am pretty sure that if you do more testing you will find the same problem does occur without Process Lasso, or you will find that use of a certain non-default function or setting of Process Lasso is causing it (something you turned on or a setting to the process you made).

I am still investigating the cause to the missing process. I have some ideas, and believe I saw it in a test bed. However, I don't want to speculate yet. I expect to have some progress on that soon.

[gamesturbator]

And that is why I like you guys. You remind me of Futuremark, which has some really good people, too. I am a little baffled over what setting I could have changed to cause this. Just the other day I played BC2 without these issues. Perhaps PB sees Lasso as some kind of threat, though the message I get is "losing key packets 9005" which is a far too common message people (hundreds) get if they run any thing remotely similar to Lasso (including [some application], Fullproc,  etc). So the fault is with PB, apparently, but what is Lasso possibly doing that PB doesn't like, even with Gaming mode and Foreground Boost turned off?

[Jeremy Collake]

I apologize, somehow I missed your reply - way back on May 30th. Don't be afraid to bump a thread, I am notorious for missing things on the forum - though in this case I believe it was surely due to all the server migration that was going on at the time. I had my hands full and the notification emails likely weren't being sent or received for a day. Emails are harder to miss, as they are 'in my face' .

I really don't know what could be going on here to be honest. If nothing is in the log, then it surely took no actions, which means it shouldn't have affected anything. Now, if something is in the log, perhaps a change made a while back that is still persisting, or if you have adjusted process rules, then you may need to undo a rule or exclude a process from ProBalance restraint. Applications are often dependent on multiple system processes, so be sure that none of them were adjusted in any way. Process Lasso tries very hard to be excessively safe in all situations, always taking the conservative route. However, sometimes it still needs tuning in the case of really timing sensitive applications.

Very sorry for the trouble and for the delay. As for the other issue, the missing service, a potential fix is scheduled for the next minor update or two. The fix requires some decent testing after being made, so I put it off while I tended to more minor issues.