Hi, I am having problems with getting the game to work. Is anyone else having problems that are using nVidia Cards? All I am seeing is people with ATI problems.

Everything installed correctly, and I did install the Direct X requirement at the beginning of the install.

When I go to start it up, I get the little loading box first, then it goes to a blue screen where I can here the videos in the background. I can click to go through at least the first video, but I never actually get to see any of them.

Then it goes to what I assume is the start up screen where there is supposed to be a menu. All I can see is the Earth with a cloudcover spinning over it and things appearing on the earth (I assume they are settlements growing, or bacteria) and the Title Civilization 4.

It seems there might be some kind of menu there, I just can't see it. I can click on some things it seems, but it always just comes back to this blank screen.

I have a 2.8ghz AMD with a Gforce 5200 256mb Asylum card. I have 512mb 3200 (400 mhz) RAM. I run Windows XP Pro SP2 updated 100%. I also have the very newest video drivers.

Any help is much appreciated!

Hi, I am having problems with getting the game to work. Is anyone else having problems that are using nVidia Cards? All I am seeing is people with ATI problems.

Everything installed correctly, and I did install the Direct X requirement at the beginning of the install.

When I go to start it up, I get the little loading box first, then it goes to a blue screen where I can here the videos in the background. I can click to go through at least the first video, but I never actually get to see any of them.

Then it goes to what I assume is the start up screen where there is supposed to be a menu. All I can see is the Earth with a cloudcover spinning over it and things appearing on the earth (I assume they are settlements growing, or bacteria) and the Title Civilization 4.

It seems there might be some kind of menu there, I just can't see it. I can click on some things it seems, but it always just comes back to this blank screen.

I have a 2.8ghz AMD with a Gforce 5200 256mb Asylum card. I have 512mb 3200 (400 mhz) RAM. I run Windows XP Pro SP2 updated 100%. I also have the very newest video drivers.

Any help is much appreciated!


Dennis I have Nvidia Gforce 2 - I kept my old driver (version 4.5.2.3) and moved my desktop to 1024*768 and that works - beware tho, Wonder movies are crashing the game.

oh, ok, I'll give that a shot real quick, thank you for the info! Lets see if anyone can help keep the game from crashing with the wonder movies. Or I wonder if they can be turned off if that would help until a patch fixes it. Thanksa again!

oh, ok, I'll give that a shot real quick, thank you for the info! Lets see if anyone can help keep the game from crashing with the wonder movies. Or I wonder if they can be turned off if that would help until a patch fixes it. Thanksa again!


no problem - good luck man

Damn, well that didn't work. Exact same thing. I could only roll back to 5.6.5.6 though. I am really angry with Firaxis, Take Two, and Sid over the very poor testing of this game. They may loose a die hard fan over this.

Damn, well that didn't work. Exact same thing. I could only roll back to 5.6.5.6 though. I am really angry with Firaxis, Take Two, and Sid over the very poor testing of this game. They may loose a die hard fan over this.

I'm sorry to hear that - lets hope Firaxis is all over this.

im in the same ball park on this one too. Pent 4, near top of the line system w/ geforece 6800OC. wonder movies are choppy(not crashing though). I do have the latest drivers. the game also slows down when I'm zoomed out. the earth globe view gives me blues lines when im zoomed out to that level(anyone else getting this?).

seems there are some compatability issues with the Geforce cards. Lets hope someone finds a solution to this one soon or firaxis. I didn't pay 1600 on aocmputer to have a game like this lag. This isn't exactly state of the art graphics here....

Here is a picture of the only screen I can get. Is this the main menu screen? What else is supposed to be on this page? Thanks again folks.

http://www.inlandretech.com/civ4main.gif

We have verified that this EXACT same thing is happening to another gentleman that has the exact same 256mb nVidia GeForce 5200 card. What other problems are you GeForce users having? Any of you not having problems?

I have GeForce 440. Black terrain. Very frustrating. Old computer plays it just fine.

S.

i have a GF 6600 card and the game is installed but when i try to play my computer says that the correct cd needs to be inserted, during the loading screen.
i think your lucky that you at least get the game kind of going.:cry:

btw. i put in the first cd to play the game the second cd does nothing. the second cd just pulls up a window that has a single file in it called data, but that doesn't open anything.

I have Geforce 6600 256mb and I was playing fine but now get black terrain and stuff.

I also experience video chopiness.

I've also had 2 crash to desktops.

PC Specs:
AMD 64 Athlon 3200+ (2.2ghz)
512mb ram
PCI-E Geforce 6600 256mb

I have a Geforce 6200 256 MB. It has been playing fine during game play - I have not seen a wonder movie yet, but the play during the opening scene has been a little choppy. No crashes yet though.

PC Spec:
Pentium D 830 (3.0GHz)
2.0 GB RAM
Geforce 6200 256 MB

good info to know, please let us know if it works. I'd really like to know which cards do work well with civ4 and I'll likely buy one in the morning if I don't have one in the shop.

Why buy a new card? You shouldn't have to waste money because a major bug was missed. Just wait a week or two and see if we get a patch, if not we'll all be asking for refunds I'm sure.

Here's what I have:

NVIDIA GeForce4 MX Integrated GPU
Microsoft XP Pro
AMD Athlon 1.7 GHz
448 MB Ram
Direct X 9

I was getting the failed to initialize renderer error, but now it goes to something XML then shuts down and doesn't say why?

I don't know hardly anything about computers, any help would be much appreciated.

WONDER MOVIES ARE CRASHING GAME.

AMD Athlon XP 2000+
1 GB RAM
GeForce4 Ti4200 64MB AGP8X
using DetonatorXP driver (files show ver.# 6.14.10.5216 in Display Settings)
Windows 2000 SP4
DVD-ROM and DVD+/-RW installed
Installed DirectX 9.0c from the game disc.
Software installed (major titles):
Pinnacle Studio 8 software with PCTV
Easy CD Creator 6
WinDVD and PowerDVD
Stars Wars Galaxies & Star Wars Jedi Knight II
Unreal Tournament 2004
Civilization III:PTW (Not Conquests)
Guild Wars
Microsoft Office 97 & 2003

Wonder movies are crashing the game.

All intro movies work until the main menu. At main menu I get error pop-up box:
"TXT_KEY_INVALID_PLAYBACK_TITLE" with an "Invalid Device" text shown in the box. Nothing but an OK button.

Once I press OK, I can play the game fine (I get the error again when starting the game).

When a wonder movie comes up, the game locks. If I hit ESC, I go to desktop and the game is gone.

I REALLY hope they get this fixed soon.

THIS MAY OR MAY NOT HELP SOME PEOPLE - I finally solved at least some of my problems.

If you do not have the 10/10/05 version of the nvidia driver, you need to get it now.

I can now see the menus and beginning movies but I have not played yet. I wanted to post this information here first.

Thanks to all for your help, and I hope this helps you. Again, do not just use Windows Update or the auto update feature in the driver section.

look up NVIDIA DRIVERS on google to find the right place, but be ready as the drivers are 20mb.

its dated 10/20 btw downloading now will report when its done and I test the game

Here's what I have:

NVIDIA GeForce4 MX Integrated GPU
Microsoft XP Pro
AMD Athlon 1.7 GHz
448 MB Ram
Direct X 9

I was getting the failed to initialize renderer error, but now it goes to something XML then shuts down and doesn't say why?

I don't know hardly anything about computers, any help would be much appreciated.

You are the first person I have seen report that got the "Failed to initialize" error with an Nvidia card. You may want to post in the sticked thread so they dont' think it is an exclusively ATI issue.

So far, it's running pretty well on my system (other than the 64 MB video card lower setting graphics)

I'm seeing swamp terrain that shows through in the undiscovered map areas (not a game killer though)

Nvidia GeForce4 MX 440 (using the Forceware 56.72 Driver)
Athlon 1800+
512 RAM
SB Live! (5.12.0001.0244 Driver)
Windows XP SP1

Hopefully, the driver information might give some help to those having problems. 80)
I am using older and SP1... so... who knows.

I had the black terrain problem right after I installed the game too. But after I went online and downloaded the latest driver, the game works fine.

My video card is nvidia geforce 4 MX 440

Posted this last night somewhere else, but am posting hear as this is aGeForce problems thread.

I have a P4 2.4Gig system, with Nvidia GeForce 4 MX 440 card with 64 M, and DirectX 9.

I'm having the Cheshire cat, black terrain problem.

My laptop Gateway AMD 64, 3200+,1M RAM, unfortunately has an ATI card. I cannot run the game on either of my computers, this is getting really frustrating.

I have the nVidia GeForce 5700. I used the nVidia utility to change the graphics preferences from "high quality" all the way to "high performance" and everything in between. I got the most consistent results with "quality" or "high quality." If I used the performance settings, I'd have problems when I returned to the desktop; it would not refresh correctly at the right resolution and color depth. I did update my drivers to the latest available. That seems to help somewhat.

In game problems included no city names or data on-screen and at one point the world disappeared (went black) in the global view. Changing drivers seems to help...so far. Need to test more but have to go to work!

I cannot get the choppy movies to go away, however...the intro movie chops and stutters and so do the wonder movies. What's up with that?

Oh yes...2.5 Ghz P4 with 1GB RAM, Audigy 2 SB card, nVidia GeForce 5700 with 256MB...a normally very stable system for all other purposes.

I've had 2 CTD's...save often!

have you guys flicked over to 1024*768 resolution? That, plus a reversion of my drivers - see above - worked for me.


Dennis, you should be getting a menu on that page to go single player, multi, etc.

Since this is a GeForce thread I'll post my problems here too as well.

Going to the varied advisor screens causes problems (especially F5 one..can't remember what that one is exactly at the moment).
Movies crasehd it (fixed by turning them off)
Most of the time a game larger than standard size reboots after the beginning movie is done.

Sometimes these can be fixed by alt-tabbing out. Usually the computer reboots itself before then though.

Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2
AMD Athlon XP, 1600 MHz (12 x 133) 1900+
Abit KG7
1GB Ram
NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4600 (128 MB) (newest 81.85 drivers)
Audigy 2 Sound Card

I have a GT6800 and I'm having some issues as well.

When starting the game I get a bunch of garbage on the screen where some video appears to be playing, but I can click though them to get to the main menu. I get the same thing when a Wonder movie plays. However the other in game movies work.

Here are my specs

Microsoft Windows XP Professional 64 Bit Version
AMD 3200+
1 Gig Memory
GT 6800
ASUS KN8-E

Civ4 installs fine and runs in 1024 x 768.
Setting res at 1280 x 1024 results in "failed to initialize" error.
Changing res settings in civilization4.ini does not fix it.

Complete uninstall and reinstall enables game to run 1024 x 768.

Latest nVidia drivers 81.85 didn't even let machine boot but probably another issue there since I did not first uninstall the existing nVidia driver 78.01

Specs
P4 3.0
1 Gig
XP SP2
nVidia 6800, 128 megs

I am recieving a "Failed to initialize renderer-check directX version and graphics settings" error when I attempt to play.
I use a GeForce FX5600 card with version 6.14.10.6693.
I have not loaded the 10/05 drivers because it says to disable current drivers first. Guys, I'm really computer non savy and am reluctant to get rid of current drivers first. Is this safe? Sugestions? Thanks!

I had the black terrain problem right after I installed the game too. But after I went online and downloaded the latest driver, the game works fine.

My video card is nvidia geforce 4 MX 440



Thats very good to here I have the same card I dont have the game yet hopefully today but who knows. Was getting alittle worried about it but I had just downloaded the latest drivers as well early today so hopefully I'll be alright.

After updating my drivers I've had 0 graphics problems.

Only problem I have now is my game running slow I guess 512mb ram isn't enough will probably upgrade to 1gig soon

GeForce4 MX 420 card (64 MB RAM) with latest nvidia drivers. I uninstalled and installed them once more.

My system is a pentium 4 2.26 GHz with 768 MB RAM

All is working ok. The startup intro movie stops intermittently.

And the oddest thing is when you want to show the resources on the map, I only see bread and not hammers or commerce :eek:

There is another thread over here about this with screenshot

I haven't reached any wonder movies, so I am not sure how well they will work yet. I'll edit this post as soon as I do

The integrated geforce 4 gpu doesn't support T&L. I'm not sure the Titanium series does either.

The 5200 *should* work. My 5700 works flawlessly.

I was having problems with the wonder movies crashing the game, and I'm running a 64MB GeForce 4 Ti 4200. However, after I installed the new drivers that nVidia put out last week, all is well.

But there's quite a bit of lag. It takes 5 seconds or so to navigate between advisor screens using the function keys. This is with just one city and only a couple turns into the game.

The opening video is also very choppy. Visually it's not bad, but the sound skips every couple seconds like there's a CD scratch. Happens through the whole opening video though.

AMD64 3200+
1GB extra low latency dual channel RAM
24 bit SoundBlaster Audio
Nvidia GeForce 6600GT w/ 128MB Video RAM

Guess I'll check the Nvidia site for newer drivers...

I am recieving a "Failed to initialize renderer-check directX version and graphics settings" error when I attempt to play.
I use a GeForce FX5600 card with version 6.14.10.6693.
I have not loaded the 10/05 drivers because it says to disable current drivers first. Guys, I'm really computer non savy and am reluctant to get rid of current drivers first. Is this safe? Sugestions? Thanks!
Were the heck did you find updateds for the driver I'm still stuck with version 5.2.1.6 (Same Card) :cry:

Try Nvidia.com for updated drivers. The latest ones are version 81.15 for the Nvidia Geforce cards.

SirJoe: I assume you have an Nvidia GeForce videocard, and you are running Windows XP.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_81.85.html

SirJoe (and others), go to the Nvidia site here:
[URL="http://www.nvidia.com/content/drivers/drivers.asp"]

Nvidia is very good about packaging driver updates in an executable that should remove the old driver, restart, and install the new driver. You can always roll back the driver update with Windows XP if you don't like the results.

oxonian2001 true you so much it works. It happens to only driver I never updated.:D

I did some looking around in teh event viewer. Everytime I had a reboot, there is an entry similiar to this:

The computer has rebooted from a bugcheck. The bugcheck was: 0x10000050 (0x86c84000, 0x00000001, 0xbfc9413c, 0x00000000). A dump was saved in: C:\WINDOWS\Minidump\Mini102705-01.dmp.

I can't get much use out of that file, however.

I'm wondering if the rest of you that have rebooting issues have the same entry?

Here's what I have:

NVIDIA GeForce4 MX Integrated GPU
Microsoft XP Pro
AMD Athlon 1.7 GHz
448 MB Ram
Direct X 9

I was getting the failed to initialize renderer error, but now it goes to something XML then shuts down and doesn't say why?

I don't know hardly anything about computers, any help would be much appreciated.

Hello to all. I have a similar problem: The loading thingy just goes to "check XML" and then it closes and returns to Windows just as if nothing happened.
Specs: P4 630 3 GHz, nVidia GeForce 6600 GT, 1 GB RAM, XP Pro

Is there anybody else with this problem or doe someone know a fix? Thanks in advance.

Btw: I also have a Laptop (admittedly, is over two years old), which should run the game properly, but there I experience the now well-known "cheshire-cat grin" and bleck terrain. I'm really starting to get angry right now.

Well, I downloaded the newest nvida drivers and no luck. It still stops at "Failed to initialize renderer-check directx version and graphics settings". I have directx9 a GeForce5600 card new drivers.........?

I have a GeForce4 440 GO 64m, and after installing the video driver from omegadrivers.net, Civ4 is now running (though it is still a bit choppy at times). It is important to note that the omegadrivers are modified versions of the ones released from the actual companies and are therefore NOT official versions of the video driver. But hey at least Civ4 is playable now.

I'm wondering if anti spyware/anti virus/ firewall software could be impacting these issues? Either at install or when running the game?

I haven't got the game yet, but a message about XML?.. you could try downloading the XML packages from MS... MSXML 4.0 Service Pack 2 (Microsoft XML Core Services) and Microsoft XML Parser (MSXML) 3.0 Service Pack 4 (SP4)

The first 2 items in these search results:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/results.aspx?freetext=xml&productID=&DisplayLang=en
(http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/results.aspx?freetext=xml&productID=&DisplayLang=en)

I do tech support for a software package that requires those, they aren't always in WinXP.

Don't know if it will help, but it's worth a shot right?

I'm wondering if anti spyware/anti virus/ firewall software could be impacting these issues? Either at install or when running the game?

In my case, there is nothing else running but the game.

Hi, I am having problems with getting the game to work. Is anyone else having problems that are using nVidia Cards? All I am seeing is people with ATI problems.

Everything installed correctly, and I did install the Direct X requirement at the beginning of the install.

When I go to start it up, I get the little loading box first, then it goes to a blue screen where I can here the videos in the background. I can click to go through at least the first video, but I never actually get to see any of them.

Then it goes to what I assume is the start up screen where there is supposed to be a menu. All I can see is the Earth with a cloudcover spinning over it and things appearing on the earth (I assume they are settlements growing, or bacteria) and the Title Civilization 4.

It seems there might be some kind of menu there, I just can't see it. I can click on some things it seems, but it always just comes back to this blank screen.

I have a 2.8ghz AMD with a Gforce 5200 256mb Asylum card. I have 512mb 3200 (400 mhz) RAM. I run Windows XP Pro SP2 updated 100%. I also have the very newest video drivers.

Any help is much appreciated!
Exact same problem that you're experiencing Dennis, only on the nVidia GeForce FX5600 card instead. Will try to load the latest driver tonight and hope for the best.

In my case, there is nothing else running but the game.

Thats helpful, thank you. :)

Wonders now Crash to Desktop Today! ARGGH

Started up my computer today and loaded up a game from yesterday in which I was about 2 turns from a wonder. Completed the wonder and the movie box goes black, stalls and within 5 seconds, crash to desktop.
This is odd because yesterday they worked perfectly.
No new drivers or anything since yesterday have been installed or ran since playing the game last night.

The only thing that is different is that I shut down the computer and restarted it since yesterday.
Don't have the time now to test it, but, I'll try and uninstall and reinstall it tommorrow or the next day and see if the wonders movies work.... and if they do again, shut down the CPU and try it again after reboot.
If so, I'm not sure what that tells me.
Will also install/play with different drivers then too.

im in the same ball park on this one too. Pent 4, near top of the line system w/ geforece 6800OC. wonder movies are choppy(not crashing though). I do have the latest drivers. the game also slows down when I'm zoomed out. the earth globe view gives me blues lines when im zoomed out to that level(anyone else getting this?).

seems there are some compatability issues with the Geforce cards. Lets hope someone finds a solution to this one soon or firaxis. I didn't pay 1600 on aocmputer to have a game like this lag. This isn't exactly state of the art graphics here....
Got the same card it starts and plays fine(vids are kinda laggy though) but when I got to 2600BC it went all crazy and the screen was a kinda like white noise cept it was blue,black and green squares. It happened when I was on the city screen and I put my cursor over the citizen/priest things on the far-middle right and it went all crazy and crap.:( The game was awesome up 'till then though.:goodjob: I got the same thing when I zoomed all the way out.Just blue horizontal lines and some very low quality ground tiles.

I'm also getting graphic corruption at the globe map level. I can attach a screenshot if anyone is interested; developed tiles on the maps look fine but anything undeveloped (ocean tiles, clear land tiles, etc) are horizontal stripes of random color.

No other problems to report.

Video card: Nvidia Geforce 6800GT

Upgraded to the latest Nvidia drivers available from www.nvidia.com.

Right as the main menu comes up, I'm getting a pop-up in Civ4 with a title of "TXT_KEY_INVALID_PLAYBACK_TITLE" and a body text of "Invalid Device".

(You can find my system specs in my earlier post in this thread)

I'm not sure what this means, but I was getting this same error before upgrading, and the wonder movies were causing the game to crash. I'm pretty sure I'll still have the same problem now as well.

Tomorrow evening (Friday) I will try and uninstall the game and re-install and see if that helps.

Is anyone else getting this error?

I have a GeForce4 440 GO 64m, and after installing the video driver from omegadrivers.net, Civ4 is now running (though it is still a bit choppy at times).

I succesfully used a beta/modified driver - Forceware 82.10 (x32) - from guru3d.com at:
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=1227

So far, the driver has not killed my Inspiron 8200 with a GeForce4 440 Go.

This is likely very risky but the terrain is visible now although there are still some artifacts on river tiles in the fog of war. I was told that it is a bug.

good info to know, please let us know if it works. I'd really like to know which cards do work well with civ4 and I'll likely buy one in the morning if I don't have one in the shop.

there's a thread in the tech support forum that lists various cards that do/do not work with the TnL (and that seems to be a major bug with regards to the hovering eyes and teeth aka chesire cat). i DID go buy a new card b/c i had wimpy intel chip set that would not ever work with the game (wtf??) like you, that pissed me off enough. but now with the new card, i still have an unplayable game since it's so choppy and slow. ridiculous. worst game ever.

Pentium 2.8
1 gig ram
GeForce 5900 Ultra 256m video card

The only problem I've come across so far is the Intro Movie. I can hear the opening music but the screen is covered in multi colored hash. I am able to click through it and the main menu then appears and everything works fine from that point.

I just completed the Stonehenge wonder a while ago and I got the same "hash" on the screen when what I presume to be the wonder video started to play.

I fiddled al little with screen resolution but that has not made any difference. I haven't updated my drivers in a while so I may try that tomorrow.

The game play itself has been great so far. Not a hint of any lag

I have an nVidia GeForce 420MX, 64MB on it - with the latest driver I have had zero problems running the game. prior to that I crashed out on random Great Wonder videos.

I was having problems similar to many...choppy video, CTD's, graphics glitches. I found they all went away when I updated both my Soundblaster Audigy 2 and nVidia GeForce 5700 drivers to the latest available. Game plays fine now, no problems that I can see at all now...whew!

Update your drivers to 81.85 (Oct 2005)-- I had the same EXACT issues and now they are fixed and been gaming fine.

Updating drivers should be the first thing done...

I posted this in the ATI thread but it's just as relevant to this. Google for 'Omega Drivers' and try using the nVidia ones instead. They are unofficial modifications of official drivers and often tend to be much faster and more stable. Example: I'm running a Geforce Go Fx5600 (laptop card) with a 3.2Ghz P4 and 512 RAM but I couldn't get Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory to run. Uninstalled my drivers, installed the Omega drivers and got the game running on maximum detail.

Well, I've since discovered that the driver updates don't help with the stuttering movie video/audio, but they do help during regular play it seems.

I have Gforce 6800 with latest drivers no problems getting the game going here.

Got through the renderer issue by getting the latest video drivers and enabeling all the new abilities in the display section, the direct draw, 3D and AGP texture accelerators.
Now I can select a tribe, world etc., but when I attempt to play when it gets to the place I assume it is to start, I just get a partial view of the Earth, black space and it alternates to a sort of brown universe window. Have to let it play to this point (can't click to next step) while listening to slightly choppy narritive about seed of life, dinosours etc. Then, thats it. Can't play, go forward, use ctl alt del, nothing. Just locks.

Using an NVidia GeForce 5600, new 8185 drivers. 128mb.
XP home SP2
Pent4 2.8 GHz (2cpus)
DirectX 9.0c
1024 mb ram
SB Audigy audio 9000 (sound seems adequate though)

How can I get this dam* game to play??? REWARD! If you can do it, I have my own personal tank, a Daimler Ferret, and will give you a ride if you come to Idaho!

Computer specs:
AMD 2600+
nForce2 Motherboard
Geil PC3200 Dual Channel RAM (1 gig)
nVidia 6600 256mb (Official 81.85 drivers)
Soundblaster Audigy Gamer (Official Beta drivers dated Jan 05)
Windows XP Pro SP2

I can play the game for an hour to two hours max, then I get a loud buzz, and the system reboots. The latest autosave, or manual save right before the hard crash causes either another hard crash, or CTD. When it comes back up, I get a "Windows has recovered from a serious error" message, and points to a driver faliure generally, or graphics driver faliure specifically. I can (and do) play both World of Warcrack and Day of Defeat: Source for hours on end with absolutely no errors, hard locks, or CTD's.

Thinking it may be a driver or DirectX conflict, I went as far to do a fresh install of everything, on a freshly formatted HD. Again, WoW and DoD:S perform solidly, and C4 blows my computer up (pun intended!). I would think both WoW and DoD:S would be both more graphically and memory intensive, and frankly, they are. I have done everything on my end, including formatting my drive, so the problem lies with C4.


How can I get this dam* game to play??? REWARD! If you can do it, I have my own personal tank, a Daimler Ferret, and will give you a ride if you come to Idaho!

According to Jane's, the Ferret is classified as an armored car...but I still wouldn't want to cut you off! :lol:

According to Jane's, the Ferret is classified as an armored car...but I still wouldn't want to cut you off!
__________________
Ok, fair enough! It is an Armored Scout Car. Resists 30cal. MG fire, has a turret with a Browning 1919, and 6 grenade launchers. Bill :) The reward stands.

I turned the graphic options to medium or low and i restarted the game.In the menu everything was ok but in the game the graphic didnt change and the frame rate was same.
amd athlon 1800+
gforce fx5200
768mbram (400mhz)
PLS who knows whats the problem help me

Just an update. Was experiencing the blue screen with sound at bootup, but couldn't see intro movie or menu. Installed latest nVidia driver for GeForce FX 5600 (81.85_forceware_winxp2k_english_whql.exe) downloaded from nVidia's site. Maintained the resolution at 1024x768. So far, it's worked flawlessly, but haven't progressed far enough to test the Wonder movies yet. Still crossing my fingers nothing else materializes that I've read about elsewhere here.

Specs: AMD Athlon 64, 3200+, MMX, 2.0 GHz, 1022 MB RAM

I have a
pentium 4 3.0 ghz
nvidia fx 5200 128mb
and 768 mb of ram (either DDR 333 of DDR 400)

And the game has not caused a single problem so far. I think the main problems that people have are because of not enough ram.

Wonder movies work fine too.

We have verified that this EXACT same thing is happening to another gentleman that has the exact same 256mb nVidia GeForce 5200 card. What other problems are you GeForce users having? Any of you not having problems?


I have a new Dell i9300,

1.73Ghz Centrino
768MB PC4200 RAM
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 256MB card

I am having no problems at all. Game runs smooth, wonder movies are flawless. Personally, I think the graphics are a LITTLE rough (ie, not lifelike crisp) but I see this as a coding problem, not a display one. Command & Conquer Generals which is about 3 years old has sharp, crisp lines so I know it's not the display.

I got a Nvidia Geforce 6800 OC. After I put the graphics on medium the game played fine:goodjob:. The vids are kinda choppy still.

Can anyone show me a low graphic detail picture and a high detail pictur?

Has anyone tried the game on an nVidia Go card (the Geforce range for laptops)? I'm in the UK so I have another week or two to wait before my copy of the game arrives and I'd be interested to know how laptop cards handle it.

I have a
pentium 4 3.0 ghz
nvidia fx 5200 128mb
and 768 mb of ram (either DDR 333 of DDR 400)

And the game has not caused a single problem so far. I think the main problems that people have are because of not enough ram.

Wonder movies work fine too.
Glad it's working for you. RAM can't be the problem; I have 1GB and 256mb of video RAM and my movies stutter.
My audio and video drivers are the latest posted by nVidia and Creative/Sound Blaster.
There's something else at work here...:confused:

i have nvidia geforce4 mx440 64mb athlon 2400+ winxp sp2
512 ddr ram onboard realtek audio
anyhow i got my game came in a beautifill box the tech chart is in english
i installed the disc and yes the play disc is mislabeled installed whatever was on the disc including firaxian version of dx9 (even though i already had dx9c)
it playes normally and i am so happy my only problem is i belive there is a memory leak somewhere and that the game uses more system resources than they tell you

let me say be4 i start playing i turn off pretty much all my anti spyware/firewall/virus/adware software and the game automaticly reconfigures the settings to a lower setting so i can play and yes the wonder videos and sound stutter but only usually after playing for a while

I have problems with my geforce 2. Tried the latest drivers that apply to my card (so they're not that recent), both omega and official.

My problem is that every few turns graphics get messed up really bad and the units, interface and screens start "flashing" (continuously disappearing and reappearing). It looks different from time to time, but involves things like trees becoming white, culture colors all over the place, scrambled text and wrong icons being displayed. What triggers it is also variable, but mostly seems to be things that take you away from the playing field like wonder movies and diplomacy.

Perikles- If you have a GeForce 2, the latest drivers should work for you...I have a G2/5700 and they do.

Driver version 7.1.2.5
Driver Date 1/10/2005

P4 2.4 ghz
1gb RAM DDR400 (dual channel)
GeForce 6600GT OC MSI 128mb DDR3
Sound Blaster Audigy
Windows XP Pro SP2

I have the game at maximum setting and it plays flawlessly even late game on a big map. The wonder movies and the opening work just fine for me. It actually runs faster then Civ III???? I just used the drivers that came with the card without any updates.

Perikles- If you have a GeForce 2, the latest drivers should work for you...I have a G2/5700 and they do.
I tried forceware version 81.85 and got the message that there was no hardware found supported by the drivers when attempting to install :( I had to use version 71.89.

I have a geforce 2 titanium it seems btw.


edit: Tried the 45.23 drivers and they work great! :) Only one thing left to fix on this pc and then probably wait for a patch to get the game going on my own machine...

I tried forceware version 81.85 and got the message that there was no hardware found supported by the drivers when attempting to install :( I had to use version 71.89.

I have a geforce 2 titanium it seems btw.


edit: Tried the 45.23 drivers and they work great! :) Only one thing left to fix on this pc and then probably wait for a patch to get the game going on my own machine...

i d/l the foreware drivers and it works fine like i said only the movies stutter soemtimes

I tried that fix with the Geforce 2, but the food icons are the only things that show up, no hammers or commerce.

like i said only the movies stutter soemtimes

I have the same issue of wonder movies stuttering -- not a game breaker - although I still love the wonder movies of civ 2 :)

I wonder if we can switch them out...hmmm...

Vid Card:
256 Meg NVIDIA GeForce FX 5900 XT
Driver Version 80.85

I have many of the problems discussed here. Info:

AMD 2800+ (1.6 GHz)
512 MB RAM
nVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 LE

My problem: certain "layers" of graphics aren't shown. This is similar to the "Cheshire Cat" discussed in other threads. Sometimes all or most of the terrain is black and all I can see are blue outilines of the figures. Sometimes all of the graphics is ok except for I can't see some of the text. In order to fix this problem I alt-tab out and back into the program. Sometimes, that doesnt work so I then swith the "Anti-Aliasing Multisamples" to 2 (which makes the problem worse) and then back to 0. This usually works, but in network games usually crashes the game. I have udated my driver (to Forceware 81.85) and I still have the problem.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. However, note that I fully meet the recommended requirements and the solution shouldn't be: "get a new graphics card or get more RAM." I think the problem would be fixed by an eventual patch of the game, but if anybody has a solution I appreciate it.

I have a Nvidia GeForce4 MX 440 graphic card.

The game works fine, but videos crash the game. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. After having updated my graphic card specs, it gets actually worst, now when a video appears, the computer reboots !

It's a 64 Mb graphic card so it meets the minimal requirements for the game. videos shouldn't reboot my computer this way. Anyway, I've removed the video from the game and it works now. But a patch would be good.

NB : I also have the swamps at the shores of rivers appearing in undiscovered lands... I thought it was a feature of the game but apparently it's not !

I have many of the problems discussed here. Info:

AMD 2800+ (1.6 GHz)
512 MB RAM
nVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 LE

My problem: certain "layers" of graphics aren't shown. This is similar to the "Cheshire Cat" discussed in other threads. Sometimes all or most of the terrain is black and all I can see are blue outilines of the figures. Sometimes all of the graphics is ok except for I can't see some of the text. In order to fix this problem I alt-tab out and back into the program. Sometimes, that doesnt work so I then swith the "Anti-Aliasing Multisamples" to 2 (which makes the problem worse) and then back to 0. This usually works, but in network games usually crashes the game. I have udated my driver (to Forceware 81.85) and I still have the problem.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. However, note that I fully meet the recommended requirements and the solution shouldn't be: "get a new graphics card or get more RAM." I think the problem would be fixed by an eventual patch of the game, but if anybody has a solution I appreciate it.

Have you updated to the latest drivers - I beleive you should be running 81.85 - check out NDIVA's web site and go through their list of questions to hook you up w/ the latest.

I had old drivers, and I'm not ashamed to admit it, w/ a whole slew of problems - updating drivers was the key.

Hope this helps:)

ive just ordered a geforce 6600 agp8x will that be able to handle it?

Johnny Tsunami:

As I stated I updated to Forceware 81.85

Johnny Tsunami:

As I stated I updated to Forceware 81.85

Aloha - sorry I didn't see your statement - do you have these issues w/ any other game - probally not though.

Have you brought up the city screen and then close it down - does it still happen?

I ask this b/c in one game I had the screen would get all hazy but opening and closing another screen brought it back.

I don't know what else to say -- have you placed a bug report?

Aloha - sorry I didn't see your statement - do you have these issues w/ any other game - probally not though.

Have you brought up the city screen and then close it down - does it still happen?

I ask this b/c in one game I had the screen would get all hazy but opening and closing another screen brought it back.

I don't know what else to say -- have you placed a bug report?

Thanks for thoughts. This problem occurs sometimes. Sometimes everything is fine, other times (maybe 70% of the time) certain objects, figures, terrain, buildings, or other graphical objects are not visible. At its worst I cant see anything ecept for an ugly outline of the figures. Often I can get the graphics to fix themselves but not always. If the graphics do fix themselves they usually stay fine untill a wonder movie or something like that. I did send an email to support.

I reinstalled, now the problem is worse. The graphics are never stable. If I start a new game they are screwed up. If I load a game the graphics may or may not be fine but even if they are fine if I zoom-in, zoom-out, or even move the view, things start to get screwy

I have a 2.8ghz AMD with a Gforce 5200 256mb Asylum card. I have 512mb 3200 (400 mhz) RAM. I run Windows XP Pro SP2 updated 100%. I also have the very newest video drivers.

Any help is much appreciated!

I'm not having any video problems. Running a P4 2.8, 2GB RAM, 256 Nvidia GeForce 6800GT. Windows XP SP2 and all the latest drivers. Good Luck!

I reinstalled, now the problem is worse. The graphics are never stable. If I start a new game they are screwed up. If I load a game the graphics may or may not be fine but even if they are fine if I zoom-in, zoom-out, or even move the view, things start to get screwy

Aloha,
Just throwing out ideas here -- did you use the directX 9 that came w/ the game?

Do graphic glitches occur when you move your mouse?

Aloha,
Just throwing out ideas here -- did you use the directX 9 that came w/ the game?

Do graphic glitches occur when you move your mouse?
Yes used DirectX 9c or whatever came with disc, dont errors with mouse motion. I do have significantly less problems with low graphical quality setting.

Aloha,
Did try to get rid of animations and effects in the graphic option menu. Or play around w/ them to see if there is any difference

This may not be helpful, but I've got a 3 year old system with a P4 2.2MHz and a Geforce 4 4600 Ti. I installed the DirectX from the disc and the game worked perfectly straight away. Sometimes a bit slow on 1280x1024, but bearable. I have a recent driver 79.something, but not the latest.

Just an update. Was experiencing the blue screen with sound at bootup, but couldn't see intro movie or menu. Installed latest nVidia driver for GeForce FX 5600 (81.85_forceware_winxp2k_english_whql.exe) downloaded from nVidia's site. Maintained the resolution at 1024x768. So far, it's worked flawlessly, but haven't progressed far enough to test the Wonder movies yet. Still crossing my fingers nothing else materializes that I've read about elsewhere here.

Specs: AMD Athlon 64, 3200+, MMX, 2.0 GHz, 1022 MB RAM

NVIDA GForce2 100/200 w/old drivers (2004)
I had (almost) the same thing, problems I had:

- Stopped at “check XML” box, then bailed to Desktop, didn’t run.
- Updated drivers from NVIDIA website, reboot.
- Reran the game, had it run, then freeze up just after configuring a game. The game wouldn’t start. Had to hard boot the PC.
- Reset the video to around 1024 x 756 resolution, this has worked before in other games. - Civ3 comes to mind …
- Ran thru tutorial partially, so far no problems. Still get the choppiness, I think about 2GB memory will take care of that.

I think they know about this/these issue(s). This is an instruction for fixing these issues I read from teh Civ4 website:
http://www.2kgames.com/civ4/support_ati.htm

BTW, I'm a newbe, good to meet ya! :goodjob:

Ge Force FX 5200 128MB No problems at all in all modes and resolutions supported. I haven't tried the custom resolutions in the .ini yet.

Quick question:
I've got a nVidia GeForce FX Go5200 on my Pentium 1.6Ghz Centrino laptop. Can i update my video card driver from nVidia using the GeForce drivers?

My problem: certain "layers" of graphics aren't shown. This is similar to the "Cheshire Cat" discussed in other threads. Sometimes all or most of the terrain is black and all I can see are blue outilines of the figures. Sometimes all of the graphics is ok except for I can't see some of the text. In order to fix this problem I alt-tab out and back into the program. Sometimes, that doesnt work so I then swith the "Anti-Aliasing Multisamples" to 2 (which makes the problem worse) and then back to 0. This usually works, but in network games usually crashes the game. I have udated my driver (to Forceware 81.85) and I still have the problem.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. However, note that I fully meet the recommended requirements and the solution shouldn't be: "get a new graphics card or get more RAM." I think the problem would be fixed by an eventual patch of the game, but if anybody has a solution I appreciate it.

I have the exact same problem, and discovered the exact same "reset anti-aliasing" fix to repair it for a little bit. I also have a machine with great specs which I just reinstalled Windows on, so I think we're looking at a bug in the game code here. :/

@jofesh: I don't think your video card is the problem. I have:

Althon XP 3000+
Abit NF7-S mobo w/ AC97 sound
1 GB RAM
Nvidia 5700LE 256 MB w/ 81.87 driver
WinXP Home SP2

I don't have the graphical errors you describe. My only problems are the wonder-movie and finale-movie sound skipping and the random CTDs/reboots (both of which are well-documented on a variety of systems). I can't fix your problem :sad:, but at least you can probably rule out one cause.

If you have additional questions, you can PM me.

game is a joke.. and is seriously need of a patch

OS xp2, amd64 3000+, 6800GT, 1gb ram, drivers 81.87

game continually crashes, everytime requiring a hard reboot, and dont know how it managed to do it, even reset my bios on one occasion .. very annoying.. add to that the general slowness, turns, moving, ghosting of workers as they move automated

no point in zooming to global level, game goes to a crawl, and i get graphical errors. map in the bottom right hand corner is useless, becomes grey static after a few turns.

i have 0 problems with all the new Fps games.. yet Civ IV, utterly f**** with my system.. i wonder where the fault lies?

Same thing here - game crashes to desktop, and it struggles often in-game too.

P2.4 SP2
1 gig RAM
GeForce Ti4400 120 MB video RAM

Trying to install the 81.85 drivers, and I get this msg:

Error Code: -5005 : 0x80070002
Error Information:
>Kernel\KernelMedia.cpp (95)
>Kernel\KernelMedia.cpp (95)
>SetupDLL\SetupDLL.cpp (1619)
PAPP:NVIDIA Display Drivers
PVENDOR:NVIDIA Corporation (http://www.nvidia.com/)
PGUID:EFB7D050-CAD2-11D4-B34D-00105A1C23DD
$9.1.0.429
@Windows XP Service Pack 2 (2600) IE 6.0.2900.2180

Argh.

Boy, the more I fiddle fart with this game, the more weirdness occurs... I *did* have the movie stuttering and slow scroll problems, so I upgraded to 81.85... Then, not only did I have those two, but the globe view started "interlacing"... In both windowed and full-screen modes... So I decided to poke around for some possible solutions...

I found that my game graphic assets were still packed (.pak0 file), and said to myself "Self, I bet it would speed things up if you unpacked those!"... So I did...

NOW, in windowed mode, the first wonder movie per session plays flawlessly, but the second one either shows garbage or plays at 1fps, and the scrolling still stinks, though FRAPS swears that I'm getting between 15 and 30 fps in most places (though I've seen it ditch to 2 occasionally)...

In full screen mode, I now get "Failed to initialize renderer..." which I NEVER got before...

Crappier and crappier... At least I can play, but the more I play, the more I think I like Civ3, frankly... I'm still not used to the gameplay of 4.... Maybe it'll grow on me... Sort of like a fungus... :)

I have many of the problems discussed here. Info:

My problem: certain "layers" of graphics aren't shown. This is similar to the "Cheshire Cat" discussed in other threads. Sometimes all or most of the terrain is black and all I can see are blue outilines of the figures. Sometimes all of the graphics is ok except for I can't see some of the text.

.

I have the exact same problem, and also have the nVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 LE. When I updated to the 81.85 driver, the next game I started worked fine for a while, through at least one movie, but then completely crapped out in the same fashion when I hit Judiasm. This is ridiculous, I've got way more specs than the requirements, up-to-date drivers and Windows patches.

Let us know if you hear anything, eh, Josh?

I have fixed my problems with the following adjustments:

* I went back to an old nVidia driver (61.77) link:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_61.77

* I uninstalled Windows Media Player and then reinstalled it.

* Turned off in-game movies in .ini file.

I think the key was WMP, can't tell you why though. With these adjustments I haven't had any graphical problems even at high graphic detail. Hope this solution helps others.

I am an NVIDIA user, after a couple of hours playing, here are my problems so far:

- glitches on the map here and there but no heavy distortions
- no hammers and trade at all
- choppy intro movie, new game movie
- havent seen any wonder movies yet but expect them to be choppy too
- no cheshire cat or crashes at all

System:
P4 1,3Ghz
Fresh Win2k SP4 install Build 2195
NVIDIA Geforce 4 MX4000 128mb
392 MB internal memory
- all drivers up to date
- currently upped my virtual memory to 4 gig and defragged the hard drive
- running the game not in full window and screen res is 1024x786

I expect a patch will be delivered to fix the problems. People with much better systems suffer from worse bugs than the ones I encounter. I hope they can make the performance of this game better. As my systems can handle much heavier workloads (graphic and non-graphic).

Here's what I have:

NVIDIA GeForce4 MX Integrated GPU
Microsoft XP Pro
AMD Athlon 1.7 GHz
448 MB Ram
Direct X 9

I was getting the failed to initialize renderer error, but now it goes to something XML then shuts down and doesn't say why?

I don't know hardly anything about computers, any help would be much appreciated.

I had a similar xml problem. Since I could not find an unintall component with the program and since it wasn't fully installed, so the control panel uninstall could find it, I deleated the whole faraxis folder, rebooted my pc and reinstalled. And it worked fine after that. I assume it had something to do with not restart the pc after direct x was installed and going straight into the civ 4 installation, so that it didn't take affect. Hope this helps.

BTW, I also have choppy movies. GeForce 128mb something or other.

I have fixed my problems with the following adjustments:

* I went back to an old nVidia driver (61.77) link:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_61.77

* I uninstalled Windows Media Player and then reinstalled it.

* Turned off in-game movies in .ini file.

I think the key was WMP, can't tell you why though. With these adjustments I haven't had any graphical problems even at high graphic detail. Hope this solution helps others.

Regarding this fix I posted earlier, I still have massive display issues when playing multi-player, even though seems to work fine single-player

Another Laptop player here,

System : zd7010us
2.66 Ghz Pent 4
512 MB SDRAM 333Mhz
Screen Resolution 1440-900 -17 widescreen

Video card : GeForce4 448 Go
Bus AGP8x
64 MB
Driver Version 5.4.0.1
date 2/3/2004

Problems :

Choppy video and stuttering sound at opening and wonder videos.

Had the fog of war, till I deleted the cache folder.

Still only have no hammers or trade.

Crashes to desktop probably every 30 minutes, but can get it to come back up, without rebooting.

So my laptop is only upgradeable with ram, might have to go back to CIV III, till a patch comes out.

Still the game is playable, but only CTD's and missing content is stopping me from truly enjoying this game.

I have A Geforce FX5200. Where do I fine the currents drivers for this card? I have looked on nVidia site but I only see drivers for other cards.

I have A Geforce FX5200. Where do I fine the currents drivers for this card? I have looked on nVidia site but I only see drivers for other cards.

Hey Cowboy, if you look deeper on the nvidia site you'll notice that the newest drivers are for nearly all GF cards. Check out the models. I think you'll find yours listed for using the latest 81.85 driver. ;)

nVidea 5700/256 MB
P4 2.53 Ghz/1G RAM
Win XP Pro SP2
SB Audigy 2
All the latest drivers. Choppy sound/video in the wonder movies. Large games eventually slow to a crawl then CTD.
I suspect massive memory leaks and memory management issues need to be addressed.
Good thing Sid's name is on the product or else it could end up another MOO3 debacle. I don't think he'll let it languish.
Not enough beta testing? Could be. Or it could be that the problem is relatively rare and only shows up when thousands of people try the software. Nothing like the "real world" to test a product.
I'm banking upon patience and lots of bug reports like this thread, and they will eventually fix the problems.

nVidea 5700/256 MB
P4 2.53 Ghz/1G RAM
Win XP Pro SP2
SB Audigy 2
All the latest drivers. Choppy sound/video in the wonder movies. Large games eventually slow to a crawl then CTD.
I suspect massive memory leaks and memory management issues need to be addressed.
Good thing Sid's name is on the product or else it could end up another MOO3 debacle. I don't think he'll let it languish.
Not enough beta testing? Could be. Or it could be that the problem is relatively rare and only shows up when thousands of people try the software. Nothing like the "real world" to test a product.
I'm banking upon patience and lots of bug reports like this thread, and they will eventually fix the problems.
To be fair to the independent Beta testers - I am assuming they were not involved in the final testing; i.e the last 3 or 4 weeks. Most software in the final stages of development will go into a 'fast track' mode - and at that point only in-house testing is done, which is obviously not as diverse as that done by a larger group.

I am experiencing similar problems. After playing the game for about an hour the game becomes very slow. For example when I move units the frame rate drops and their movements and animation seems choppy. If I restart the game it runs smoothly again. The wonder screens are always very choppy. My hardware should be suitable for this game...

CPU: P4 3.4GHz
MEM: 2GB DDR2 533MHz
VID: 256MB GeForce 6800 Ultra OC
HDD: 10000rpm WD Raptor

Hopefully Nvidia will address this in their next driver release or Firaxis will release a patch.... :crazyeye:

[answer to "I just ordered a 6600 agp8x, will it be good?]


I'm playing with that card (well it's a 6600gt, so even better)
and I have lag problems... after some turn game slows down terribly; need to save and reload and it's ok. Then some other turn and so on...

No other problems, so if you can bear this... it's a good card.

I hadn't looked in the .ini file, but when I emailed Fraxis about the problems, they replied:

In the mean-time, open your civilizationiv.ini file and look for the following:

; Set to 1 for no in-game movies
NoMovies = 0

Change that to "1".

This will disable movies while in-game and will allow you to continue
playing until the problem is solved.

This lets me play for about half an hour before things start disappearing. Once it was all the trees on the map. Sometimes it's the 'dark terrain' problem. Sometimes it's weird bits of UI. Anyway, saving, quitting out of the game, and restarting works for now.

Because it's not the movies specifically, and it gets worse over time, it's gotta be some kind of memory leak, right?

And I thought I had problems!!!
The only problem with mine is a flicker on the graphics when zoomed out, and then only when the game is several hours in. Zoom in until the flicker goes.
I thought it was me so I've ordered a new graphics card, I should have read this forum or even better waited for the inevitable patch before buying the game.
When will we ever learn?

I have a p4 1.7GHz, 900MB RAM, Geforce FX5200 and a new Audigy SE sound card.
The only probs I have are the intro movie stutters slightly and some of the wonder movies are a bit stuttery. No crashes yet (15+ hrs gameplay) and none of the weird graphical glitches reported here.

Here's what I did...

1. Uninstalled old nVidia drivers and installed the 81.85 ones.
2. Downloaded and installed XP service pack 2
3. Defragged drive even though it was only 3% fragged.
4. Ran Spybot et. al. to make sure no trojans were lurking.
5. Turned off all unnecessary programs such as MSN and most of the things listed under my profile name.
6. Inserted disc.
7. Prayed. A lot.
8. Did the advised re-boot when directX had installed. (already had 9.0c)
9. Switched off all crappy programs that started up again when rebooted.
10. Installed Civ4 as the default installation. Didn't even touch the custom bit!
11. Rebooted
12. Turned off crappy progs again
13. Started playing. Got bored of tutorial and played on my own.

3 games later and everything seems ok.

I don't have the best hardware but it does meet recommended requirements.

I had all of the above problems initially with a 5200 nividia card. Then I downloaded the tweaker program that allows you to set the pixel shader back down to 1.1. I swear that fixed the problem and I was able to play the game without any major crashes. But I independently screwed up my hdd and had to reinstall windows and now of course civ IV is back to all the problems I once had. I can't find that nvidia tweaker program which allows you to adjust pixel shading. Does anyone know where it is and can you please link it here so the rest of us can try it?

PIII atheolon 1.67
256 ram
ge force 5200

Thanks,
rethinker

I have a 2.8ghz AMD with a Gforce 5200 256mb Asylum card. I have 512mb 3200 (400 mhz) RAM. I run Windows XP Pro SP2 updated 100%. I also have the very newest video drivers.

Any help is much appreciated!

I have the same card as yours and set up and I have not had your problem.
It is not your card.

I do however have the lagging bug, and the eventual game freeze and loading times bugs.

This is all linked to the serious, numerous, catastrophic bugs that are causing this whole fiasco of a game release.

Does anyone know where it is and can you please link it here so the rest of us can try it?



Look for RivaTuner.

All these Bugs and the Game sites continue to give rave reviews on this game?
How do they manage to play long enough to give an opinion?
And still no word from Firaxis!!!

My system is quite old, and a couple of months ago I upgraded the gfx card and memory (mostly for X3 and Oblivion). Mem went from 512mb to 1gb, card went from ti4400 to 6600gt. (Rest of system is athlon 2400+, soundblaster audigy, XP SP1, nothing special.)

Thought I'd benchtest new rig so downloaded 3dmark05 (2005 version!). This required DX9.0c so I downloaded and installed it. 3dmark05 rebooted my machine every time it switched to 3d mode. X2 (an old DX8 game) also crashed as soon as it went to 3d mode - had been fine before my upgrades.

First I thought it was the PSU as the 6600gt is VERY power hungry. Bought a new 480w Antec psu and still had the same problem.

Tried various gfx driver versions, mobo bios versions etc - eventually got system stable and working great - 3dmark05 works fine (as does aquamark which was also hanging my machine about 10 seconds in). I'm using the gfx driver that came with the card (77.72) NOT the latest nVidia ones.

Having got my machine stable with dx9.0c and 3dmark05, THEN I installed Civ4.

I can play huge terra maps for hours and hours (12+ without exiting game) (multiplayer with my wife who has a fairly similar machine 2200+ and a 6600 256mb not gt, 768mb mem) without significant slowdown (ie, end turn takes 2-3 secs instead of 0.5-1 sec that it does at the start.). The only "problem" i've got is the load time of saved games - these can take up to 30secs+ but given that I dont have other problems, I only load once a day so not really an issue.

The game is great and it very much includes the JOMT feeling :D

BTW I play windowed and my wife plays full screen. 1024x768x32

From my perspective, this is a very reliable, stable and enjoyable game - I think it was well tested before being release, even though 2kgame brought the release forward to counteract the delay to Oblivion.

Hopefully my experience helps or encourages others with their own problems.

card went from ti4400 to 6600gt. I'm using the gfx driver that came with the card (77.72) NOT the latest nVidia ones.



Hi Marzuk, We have a similar system, so I'll try 77.72.

What Motherboard do you have? Did you upgrade your chipset drivers?

My GeForce 6600gt couldn't play ANY video with ANY player, and I resolved upgrading my chipsed drivers (I was not the only one in world)... but now I'm experiencing OTHER issues, so I could revert to old drivers...

Thanks

Hi Marzuk, We have a similar system, so I'll try 77.72.

What Motherboard do you have? Did you upgrade your chipset drivers?

My GeForce 6600gt couldn't play ANY video with ANY player, and I resolved upgrading my chipsed drivers (I was not the only one in world)... but now I'm experiencing OTHER issues, so I could revert to old drivers...

Thanks

My mobo is an asus a7v333 and its (now) running the latest bios. No other chipset updates have been applied.

I don't know where to post this problem, but I cannot change the Options in the Option menu :( I always change the graphic setting to low because I have a GeForce 4MX, but then when I restart the game, everything seems to be resetted back to high and whatnot, causing the game to be almost unplayable due to its choppiness !

I don't know where to post this problem, but I cannot change the Options in the Option menu :( I always change the graphic setting to low because I have a GeForce 4MX, but then when I restart the game, everything seems to be resetted back to high and whatnot, causing the game to be almost unplayable due to its choppiness !

Try to delete the content of Civ4 Cache directory before each game start.
Also, don't expect performances to go so bettere with low details. I really didn't notice. Just a sea with less waves.

The cache is located in
c:\Documents and settings\%user name%\Applications data\My games

Be sure to enable your directory options to show you hidden files.

I'm not telling you nothing dangerous, as this is suggested even in sticky technical support post.

I am running an older GeForce4 MX 440 SE 64Meg card and am doing ok so far.

The only issues I am seeing are the "showing prduction in city view" issue and was having the "choppy in game movies" issue. Disabling in game movies in the .ini solved that though.

I have not experienced any of the other nVidia issues.

I have GeForce 440. Black terrain. Very frustrating. Old computer plays it just fine.

S.
I'm having the exact same problem and I have the same card.
I can see moutaintops and tile improvements etc. but nothing of the swamps or plains and what not.
Everything else is fine.

I have a GeForce4 440 GO 64m, and after installing the video driver from omegadrivers.net, Civ4 is now running (though it is still a bit choppy at times). It is important to note that the omegadrivers are modified versions of the ones released from the actual companies and are therefore NOT official versions of the video driver. But hey at least Civ4 is playable now.
I have this exact same setup and the omega drivers worked for me too.
The Nvidia site itself and guru site both gave me the same error saying that it couldn't fiind a compatible set of drivers to install to.
I'm so glad I can finally see everything.
I have to say I did pretty well, what with not being able to see any of the terrain...I played that way all the way to 13 century AD.

My system is quite old, and a couple of months ago I upgraded the gfx card and memory (mostly for X3 and Oblivion). Mem went from 512mb to 1gb, card went from ti4400 to 6600gt. (Rest of system is athlon 2400+, soundblaster audigy, XP SP1, nothing special.)

Thought I'd benchtest new rig so downloaded 3dmark05 (2005 version!). This required DX9.0c so I downloaded and installed it. 3dmark05 rebooted my machine every time it switched to 3d mode. X2 (an old DX8 game) also crashed as soon as it went to 3d mode - had been fine before my upgrades.

First I thought it was the PSU as the 6600gt is VERY power hungry. Bought a new 480w Antec psu and still had the same problem.

Tried various gfx driver versions, mobo bios versions etc - eventually got system stable and working great - 3dmark05 works fine (as does aquamark which was also hanging my machine about 10 seconds in). I'm using the gfx driver that came with the card (77.72) NOT the latest nVidia ones.

Having got my machine stable with dx9.0c and 3dmark05, THEN I installed Civ4.

I can play huge terra maps for hours and hours (12+ without exiting game) (multiplayer with my wife who has a fairly similar machine 2200+ and a 6600 256mb not gt, 768mb mem) without significant slowdown (ie, end turn takes 2-3 secs instead of 0.5-1 sec that it does at the start.). The only "problem" i've got is the load time of saved games - these can take up to 30secs+ but given that I dont have other problems, I only load once a day so not really an issue.

The game is great and it very much includes the JOMT feeling :D

BTW I play windowed and my wife plays full screen. 1024x768x32

From my perspective, this is a very reliable, stable and enjoyable game - I think it was well tested before being release, even though 2kgame brought the release forward to counteract the delay to Oblivion.

Hopefully my experience helps or encourages others with their own problems.


I particularly like the "wife" option. Do they sell that at PC world?

the omega drivers worked for me too.

Just want to report that the Omega drivers made the difference for me as well, so many thanks to whoever suggested it originally and to you for reporting your findings.

I installed an fx5500 as a secondary video card (can't disable integrated graphics in bios, just disabled in winXP). Updated to latest nVidia drivers and got big slowdown and CTD towards end of game. After uninstalling then installing omega drivers and selecting the "performance" option, game runs almost flawless. Only problem is the sound stutter on video that I had before as well.

Specs:
P4 2.0 ghz
1g RAM
GeForce FX5500 (secondary)

&DennisFord= I had this same problem with my Geforce FX 5600 Ultra- I fixed it (so far) by reinstalling the latest NVidia driver.

Heya all,

Well there is also problem with nvidia drivers...my was relatrively mild.
Some poping noise between wonder movies...slowdowns (10min or more) but biggest was when two nations ...one after the other wanted to contact me (opening leaderhead screen)...at that stage my game just freezed.

I tried many things...drivers, new bink dll, et.

but only thing that helped is...deleting cache folder...BEFOR EVERY START OF GAME (loading, fresh start).
Since then np for me..execpt occasional slowdowns. Hope this be helpfull for someone else.

my sys:

Athlon 64 3000+
Gigabyte NForce 4
Asus GForce 6600
512 ram

i dont know why this works, but ever since i've started leaving azureus (downloading something/anything), civ has stopped crashing

system 6800gt, 1gb ram Amd64 3000+. drivers 81.85 all the usual
prior to implementation i'd get hard reboots within an hour on large maps..
now nothing, played 3 sessions not a hitch

maybe itll help meh .. finally civ works :)

I've got
sempron 2800+ @2ghz
asus a7v8x-x bios 1014
256 ram
geforce fx5500 latest drivers(tho downloaded now from nvidia site, will look if it helps, because previous drivers were in beta I guess)
dx9.0c
win xp pro sp2 (no updates, because do not have internet connection at home)

problem:
my pc craches/reboots when trying to move my unit(thats the 1st move of my game :( it is very frustrating, because today I bought that game with hope of playing it, but I even dont get to get 1st move.
Intro movie went ok.
though had reboot when chose alternative american empire leader ;/
what is happening with the fine game? it's been a while since a game appeared on the shelves, and I see people having loads of problems around here.and game developers have no patch ready or smth ;/

P.S. if somethere someone already described the similar problem so I appologise for my lack of attention.And I hope there is a solution for this problem.
thx


P.P.S.
oh besides pc is rock solid in other apps, I fold 24/7(though while trying to play I switch folding off). It's good for some of U because U get to play for a while while me cannot even do the 1st move :(

I to had the XML problem here is the responce I got from take2.

"Dear Sir/Madam

Thank you for contacting Take 2 Technical Support.

Please click on the link below and download the file to solve the XML
problem.
If you receive an XML error message when starting Civilization IV please
download and install the Windows Update from the following link:
<http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=4a3ad088-a893-4f0b-
a932-5e024e74519f&DisplayLang=en>

Please be sure to delete all previous correspondence when replying. This
will help us to process your response in a more timely and efficient manner.

Kind Regards,
Take 2 Technical Support"


And it solved it. I still get weird screen after playing awhile,

AMD 3200+ 64bit proc
NVIDIA GeForce 5700 128 mb ram
1gig ram

I have a new computer, with a new video card, and the game crashes still. I have the game in 1028 pixels. When it crashes, the monitor goes black with the sound of the game going on. I have a new monitor too. Does anyone have any ideas or the same problems? I have tried calling them, but I am put on hold for an hour then nothing.

jerry

Hi all,

I had the same choppiness and drops to desk top.
I upgraded my drivers to the NVidia 8185 drivers.
Since the update, the choppiness is no longer seen and the game no longer crashes. (crosses fingers)
I got the driver AND the modded INF here
http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=8021

I was told that I needed the modded INF to make it work on my system's video card. I.e. Geforce 4 4200 GO

Anyway, thats what worked for me.

Andy

I'm trying to run Civ4 on my 1Gb Ram laptop, with nVidia GeForce FX Go5200but it always crashes. I tried every possible way but the game always crashes back to desktop. And recently, to a point where a blue screen comes up with some calculation (i don't even know what it is) but it crashes my computer completely. I had to restart and windows pops up: There was a serious error, do you wist to report?.

I've tried installing the nVidia new drivers: 81.85 but it wouldn't install. It states that graphic card could not find right driver. I tried the 81.87 and still the same thing. Is there no new drivers for nVidia GeForce FX Go5200?

Here' my recommended fix for NVidia users- I had numerous problems that just kept getting worse (crash to desktop, slow/choppy performance, fail to load, etc.), but looks like I got things working pretty good now. I know some others have used these steps also.

1. Download and install the latest Nvidia driver (v 81.85)
2. If you didn't allow the game to install DirectX, reinstall the game and do so, even if you already have the current version (9.0c). This is kind of odd, but it helped me.
3. Delete the cache folder located at C:\Documents and Settings\Your Username\Application Data\My Games\Civilization IV. You'll have to go into your folder options and check "show hidden files and folders".

Thanks to Thunderfall for this bit about the cache. Mine was loaded full of crap, and losing it seemed to really improve performance. I'll be keeping an eye on it.

Hello, im sort of a newbie here so I dont know if I should post this in this thread at all, but anyway, bought the game last week and have been playing a couple of times now and have never completed the game, the first crash where when the victory screen should have come up (so that time I got to play really long) the second time it crashed when I built the Pyramids and the last time (last night) when i built the Eiffeltower.

My graphic card: Nvidia GF 6600GT (128), DX 9.0c w. the latest nvidia drivers (81.85).
After I played the first time I re-installed the old drivers to see if it work but No,
Have read all the other threads here and it seems to be a "bigtime" graphic bug so hopefully it will come out a patch really soon so we can enjoy the game.

Hello, im sort of a newbie here so I dont know if I should post this in this thread at all, but anyway, bought the game last week and have been playing a couple of times now and have never completed the game, the first crash where when the victory screen should have come up (so that time I got to play really long) the second time it crashed when I built the Pyramids and the last time (last night) when i built the Eiffeltower.

My graphic card: Nvidia GF 6600GT (128), DX 9.0c w. the latest nvidia drivers (81.85).
After I played the first time I re-installed the old drivers to see if it work but No,
Have read all the other threads here and it seems to be a "bigtime" graphic bug so hopefully it will come out a patch really soon so we can enjoy the game.
I had no problem except for slow down and memory leak ( ? ) type problems until I changed to the 81.85 nvidia driver..then I got fragmentation about an hour into the game followed by a black screen . no way to recover from it , it seems ...I unistalled the driver and reinstalled ...got fragmentation again ...I restarted and unistalled the Nvidia driver ..I downloaded the omega driver..6693 ...I'll get back to ya ..got to run it a while to see what happens .

Six hours on a huge map ..islands and 7 civs left...I have one or two techs left to discover before I go into future tech...some slow down on turns but no where near as bad as before I installed the new driver ...not to mention the black screen nvidea one...so I would say its successfull so far.

Has anyone tried the game on an nVidia Go card (the Geforce range for laptops)? I'm in the UK so I have another week or two to wait before my copy of the game arrives and I'd be interested to know how laptop cards handle it.

I have an NVIDIA GeForce 4 448 GO (64MB) card running driver version 5.4.0.1 and am experiencing the same "Intro & Wonder movies stutter" and "Food only on City/Resource toggle Screen" bugs.

The game is playable, but not optimal. Im almost afraid to try and fix the bugs with drivers for fear of making it unstable and thus, unplayable. :sad:

Another Laptop player here,

System : zd7010us
2.66 Ghz Pent 4
512 MB SDRAM 333Mhz
Screen Resolution 1440-900 -17 widescreen

Video card : GeForce4 448 Go
Bus AGP8x
64 MB
Driver Version 5.4.0.1
date 2/3/2004

Problems :

Choppy video and stuttering sound at opening and wonder videos.

Had the fog of war, till I deleted the cache folder.

Still only have no hammers or trade.

Crashes to desktop probably every 30 minutes, but can get it to come back up, without rebooting.

So my laptop is only upgradeable with ram, might have to go back to CIV III, till a patch comes out.

Still the game is playable, but only CTD's and missing content is stopping me from truly enjoying this game.


Elu -
I have the same EXACT system as you zd7010 and are experiencing the SAME exact problems. Let me know if you come across anything that relieves the problems!
-TSteamer

I don't know what I did, but:
reinstalled nvidia drivers from 81.85 to 81.85
and hurray, I've just completed 1st game, being greek.
but decided not to play another game until I get 512mb ram, because playing with 256mb ram is self killing ;/
civ 4 takes 500mb of virtual memory aka page file.that is horrible waiting at the end of the game, then U meet every nation.
besides my gf fx 5500 has no problems at all with wonders movie playback.
only my hdd has loads of work to do :D
anyway great game, really.More options and control over your nation, and over rellationships with over nations.nice one [;

Most of you will probably sort your own problems soon enough, but for those who still find persistant problems, here are some simple fixes which may help;


DOWNLOADS

1. Nvidia drivers; Due to v81.85 not recognising the 5xxx series I was testing (unable to detect hardware), I belive they had a fault, I used v81.87 Beta instead. As of 14th Nov there is a new driver (v81.94), and although I still see little difference for anyone using a video card lower than a 6xxx series, I would recommend changing.

v81.85 (http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_81.85.html)

v81.87 (http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_downloads_winxp_2k_32bit_81.87.html)

v81.94 (http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_81.94.html)


2. DirectX 9c; I realise the CD came with dX9c updates, but I would HIGHLY recommend you scap those (July updates) and go for the Oct updates. The Oct updates seem to address a few issues which caused CTD (Crash to Desktop) in other games and could be just as effective with Civ4.

DirectX 9.0c Redistributable (October 2005) for Software Developers
filename: directx_9c_oct05sdk_redist.exe
dX9 Oct 2005 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=9930EFA6-9F7B-4C8A-AEA2-97DD6AB307A2&displaylang=en)


3. Codecs; There are two (2) I would recommend installing, Bink and WMP.

The Window Media Player 10 codecs can be found here...this link allows download without the "Windows Validation" process.
(filename: WM9Codecs.exe)
WMP Codecs (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/format/codecdownload.aspx)

Bink and Smacker v7.0 should be installed for the files, you wont use the programs unless you are a developer. You can also download and install Miles sound from this site (I see no need as the files installed do not effect Civ4).
Bink (http://www.radgametools.com/default.htm)


4. Chipsets; Update your chipset drivers!!! This is an absolute must for Nforce chipsets and extremley important for all others, especially in multi-player. Most motherboard companys support thier products with drivers but tend to stop updating these after 6 months or so. Most cases are that these drivers are just generic and can be found at there home sites.
ie. Your (Soltek) mainboard may use Nvidia Nforce 2 bridging chipset, onboard graphics, and Realtek Audio. So;
4in1 from Nvidia (http://www.nvidia.com/)
&
Audio from Realtek (http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloads.aspx)


TWEAKS

We have seen most of these already, but I will outlay some others.

1. CivilizationIV.ini; These are some changes which can be made. They are the "safe" changes which should allow most people to play with few problems. The most important would seem to be Screenshots: Having AllowScreenShots = 1 seemed to cause CTD on few of the machines I tested on.

AllowScreenShots = 0
FullScreen = ask
AutoSaveInterval = 0
SyncInput = 0
LoggingEnabled = 1
OverwriteLogs = 1



While there are numerous other things which can improve the game and your chances of playing, most include changing or deleting files so I will not put these up. Logging is also important as the success and failure of loads will be recorded. If you can extract the info from a log, put it up so we can all help, other wise just describe the problem.

This is an awesome game which has been developed specifically for those who enjoy MOD's. It is frustrating to spend the money on anticipation of a great game only to find the hours wasted in screwing around without getting results, but hang in there, a patch will be out soon.

Pentium 4
3 GHz
1 Gb of RAM
NVIDIA GeForce 6600

First i want to thanks all peoples that send their fixes here.
I have seen some of the different forums about videocard problems (even these about ATI), but i still have problems. I mostly play on big map with max of civilizations, and my main problem is that the application crash to desktop at some part of the game, when i unzoom, when i scroll the map, or when i go from one city to another in the city screen. It happens more and more often now, since i conquest the new world (and so they are more and more cities). Less often the computer reboot and tell me after that the system come back from a serious error. Another is the wonder animations problem.The video is ok, and the sound is as the other players describe it here.
I had the 78.01 driver, i updated to 81.85, and then, sometimes it still crash, but less often, because sometimes it only froze, and show the map as it is before it froze, or with only the landscape, then after 20 seconds i can come back to the game.
Yesterday i read the post of Ebany, and updated to 81.94, updated to DirectX 9.0c Redistributable (October 2005) for Software Developers and changed CivilizationIV.ini except AutoSaveInterval, but the problems are still the same.

Running on
Nvidia GeForce4 MX 440 (DirectX 9.0c)
Athlon 1800+
768 RAM
SB Audigy Audio (5.12.0001.1162)
Windows XP SP2

I also see the swamps near rivers through the undiscovered blackness

Sometimes strange things happen showing vertical fields of some color shooting up from the terrain right towards you. I can even move to the sides of these fields and change my perspective on them. Clearly a videocard or driver problem.

CTD (Crash To Desktop) seems to be caused by either of two (2) problems;

1. Outdated, incorrect, or corrupted files.
(I KNOW Civ 4 kept deleting some of the .tga files on atleast one of my systems which, until I manually replaced them, was causing crashes. (ie. My city_titlearrows.tga was missing from Resoure/Civ4/HUD so the computer crashed every time I entered city view.)

*If this is the cause, you will normally experience constant problems with chunky graphics and crashes at the same time or a specific location

2. Civ4 settings.

*The signs here seem to be simple; The game will slow (normally when you are at an advanced stage with many units & workers) and every now and then pause. You may even find that during one of these pauses the map will go funny losing citys units and so on. You can force a crash at this stage by shaking the system (click & hold on minimap and move view around, or use world zoom going out and in).

FIXES for Prob 1.

1. Download & update as required. Re-install Civ4 (and alter .ini if needed).

FIXES for Prob 2.

1. Check logs for errors. These can be found in;
./Program Files/Civ4/*.txt & ./My Games/Civ4/Logs/*.txt

2. Change graphic and detail settings to lowest. (Once prob is fixed, you can always change them back)

3. Set Nvidia Image Settings to High Performance. (Test to your satisfaction) Anisotropic Filtering to "8x", Antialiasing to "max" or "off" (Having this on seemed to cause massive graphic problems during startup, nad in one case, could not even see the menu).

4. Change .ini file if required.

**As a note; Have not found solution for glitch in sound when playing "Wonder" movies. If anyone has any idea's, please post.

Pentium 4 3.0 Ghz
512 RAM
NVidia GeForce FX 5200
SoundMAX Digital Audio

Game completely crashed to a 10-minute, blue-screen re-boot on a standard map with 6 Civs. I was able to view a few wonder movies (but not w/o the stuttering) but about 200 turns from 2050 it crashed at Rock and Roll. I loaded the latest auto-save and it did the same thing again. I left the graphics quality setting at high.

Narration/sound was choppy from the start and general game movement was very slow compared to CIV 3. Sounds like the NVidia 81.85 driver update worked for some but not others. Should I d/l 81.85 or should I just wait for a patch? And will a patch be available before the end of the year?

Thanks everybody for posting on this thread.

Have tried altering the binkw32.dll file (as civ4 uses a very out dated version) and even installing latest Quicktime (since bink seems to piggyback some of its codecs) but have had no success. They only way I have found to stop the stuttering is this;

Set AllowScreenShots = 1 *which can cause CTD more often unless graphics are set to lower detail.

As for CTD, especially the blue screens, the only simple way is to download and install updates, then re-install Civ4, have not found any other fail safe way. Civ4 corrupts its own files causeing about 90% of the CTD I have seen, and most of this corruption is due to outdated files (DirectX and so on).

Patch is (hopefully) out on Monday, so dont think I need to leave any more dribble......Goodluck all.

**ps. Some people are setting a fixed framerate in the .ini file, and testing is all part of the fun :) , but I know anything below about 30 will give some (not much) stutter.

I have same problems(Blue screen on begin and i don't see eny words of the main menu) whit a radeon 9600\9700.But i'm on a notebook and i don't have patch for nvida ob a notebook...Hok can i resolve that trouble?

I have same problems(Blue screen on begin and i don't see eny words of the main menu) whit a radeon 9600\9700.But i'm on a notebook and i don't have patch for nvida ob a notebook...Hok can i resolve that trouble?

???? Radeon is an ATI card, not nVidia!

I have GeForce 440. Black terrain. Very frustrating. Old computer plays it just fine.

S.

I had the same thing. All I had to do was download and install the forceware drivers from the nvidia website(had forgotten to do so after a recent reformat).

Apologies if somebody else answered this - didn't feel like searching through 6 pages of stuff to find out.

Running on
Nvidia GeForce4 MX 440 (DirectX 9.0c)
Athlon 1800+
768 RAM
SB Audigy Audio (5.12.0001.1162)
Windows XP SP2

I also see the swamps near rivers through the undiscovered blackness

Sometimes strange things happen showing vertical fields of some color shooting up from the terrain right towards you. I can even move to the sides of these fields and change my perspective on them. Clearly a videocard or driver problem.

It must be a ram thing I had the same card and it was all black terrarian so i bought a new card (Needed one anyway). I have a P4 with 512mb Ram. XP with SP2, SB Audigy2 sound card so it's either a problem with RAM or the P4.
anyway I now have GF 6600 GT which was working great but now I cant play at all because it freezes every couple minutes so Im waiting for the patch and hoping it helps whatever is wrong.

- I had the latest Drivers for MX 440 still didnt help anything

Thanks for answer.
Please, where i can acceed to Nvidia Image Settings, and all that things ? I have searched it, but found nothing. Does it be installed, or do i have to download something?

I have been trying for ages to make Civ4 work. I have called their support line and had nothing but unhelpful people with very good manners recommend futile changes. I'm running a 6600 GT on a p4 with over a gig of ram and nothing works. If anyone can help me i'd be extremely grateful because to date i havent been able to play one game without the rendering being sporadically black or fuzzy and i havent been able to finish once because the crashing is constant.

What is worse is i have no idea how to even attempt some of the fixes people have suggested here because i am so NOT tech savy.

Any help?

Thanks
A

I have been trying for ages to make Civ4 work. I have called their support line and had nothing but unhelpful people with very good manners recommend futile changes. I'm running a 6600 GT on a p4 with over a gig of ram and nothing works. If anyone can help me i'd be extremely grateful because to date i havent been able to play one game without the rendering being sporadically black or fuzzy and i havent been able to finish once because the crashing is constant.

What is worse is i have no idea how to even attempt some of the fixes people have suggested here because i am so NOT tech savy.

Any help?

Thanks
A

Sent you a PM

Pentium 4 3.0 Ghz
512 RAM
NVidia GeForce FX 5200
SoundMAX Digital Audio

Game completely crashed to a 10-minute, blue-screen re-boot on a standard map with 6 Civs. I was able to view a few wonder movies (but not w/o the stuttering) but about 200 turns from 2050 it crashed at Rock and Roll. I loaded the latest auto-save and it did the same thing again. I left the graphics quality setting at high.

Narration/sound was choppy from the start and general game movement was very slow compared to CIV 3. Sounds like the NVidia 81.85 driver update worked for some but not others. Should I d/l 81.85 or should I just wait for a patch? And will a patch be available before the end of the year?

Thanks everybody for posting on this thread.


I tried switching graphics quality to medium, then low, still the same thing. I then downloaded the NVidia 81.85 update and it worked. Everything ran much more smoothly and efficiently and I was even able to watch the wonder movies (a couple were choppy, though). Gameplay was much faster.

Get blue screen and reboot here with windows xp and following system,,

A64 X2 4400+
Asus A8N SLI Premium
2GB of Corsair 3200PT Twinx
nvidia Geforce 7800GTX
Audigy 2 ZS

Its odd how I can play all the latest games fine, all but Civ4.. I love the Civilization series and if this isnt fixed soon they lost a fan.. :(

GeForce3 Ti 200 w/ 64 MB RAM
Pentium IV 2.2 GHZ
1 GB RAM

I initially had black blotches on the map and the movies would freeze but after upgrading the nvidia drivers to latest from October to support DX 9.0C I've had no serious problems since, other than real slow game play on the larger maps, and the memory leak, of course. I was thinking of upgrading the card as it only has 64 MB ram but after reading this thread I'll stick to what works and should consider myself lucky that it works as well as it does. :)

I'm having problem with my civ 4 graphics. i 've got a geforce fx5200 and 512 RAM and a P4 celeron

can anyone help me because i need to play this game.


I'm the lizard king
I can do anything

Play the game in "Window" mode as it will crash less, and if it does crash, will CTD instead of blue screen.

Please, and for my question? :)