Cannot locate the C3C CD-ROM

[Nakoom]

I wasn't sure where to post this question, so I decided to put it here...

Whenever I try to play C3C, it brings up the message:
Cannot locate the Civilization III: Conquests CD-ROM
Please insert the Civilization III: Conquests CD-ROM, select OK and restart application.

I've looked at other webpages to see if I could fix this problem and they all told me that I should reinstall the game, or that it was a pirated copy. Well, I know it's not a pirated copy unless Best Buy has started to sell pirated software, and I've tried reinstalling it several times. I've tried putting it in both of my cd drives and I've also tried making an ISO and mounting it on a virtual drive. Nothing I do seems to work. Can anyone here help me?

 

[Mercade]

This type of questions are best directed at the ATARI support group directly. It could have to do with your CD-ROM player (age, etc) or the legal-consumer-annoyance-system on the CD itself could be defective. Did you try to install / run the program on a friend's computer?

If ATARI is serious about its support to legal consumers (don't forget to include a copy of the receipt for the game) then they will replace the CD for you if you ask them nicely, or otherwise they might send you an unprotected CD if it appears to be your CD-ROM drive.

 

[Nakoom]

Thanks.
I'll try that.

 

[zurichuk]

this happened to me when i installed civ, ptw and conquests, i applied the wrong 1.27 ptw patch (i applied the uk one thinking that's what you should do in the uk however it was the american patch which worked)

 

[jdurg]

I believe that C3C uses one of the new Safedisc protection schemes which black-lists many popular drive-mounting software programs. (Since mounting drives makes it much easier to pirate software). So what you may want to do is uninstall your "virtual drives" and the software used to create them, then try running C3C.

 

[Nakoom]

I would have tried what Mercade suggested but that seems like it would take too long and it might not have been a faulty disc or bad CD-ROM drive so I tried what jdurg suggested to get C3C to work and it's workin just fine now. Thanks alot jdurg. Thanks to Mercade and zurichuk for helping as well.

 

[E-Raser]

But nevertheless in my opinion it is too much to deny a user a virtual drive software at all. Even if you own the original CD you can't use it together with for example CD Clone. And as far as I know one copy for personal purpose is legal in most countries, isn't it?
I do agree to acting against piraty, but I think it is already a bit too much in this case. And if so, they could have at least maded an announcement, but it took my days to find out about this circumstances and to get C3C running on my PC. Of corse after deinstalling the virtual drive. Honestly I am quite annoyed about this facts an I guess I wouldn't have bought this expansion if I would have known in advance. For my tast they have any rights to protect their copyrights but NO RIGHTS to deny anyone the use of other software. That's my two cents

 

[Commander Bello]

E-Raser,

I totally agree with your points.
Since I recently bought some copies of digital library editions, I was thinking about copying the books to virtual drives for easier access and improved search times.
Now, when I have to learn that Civ doesn't allow me to do exactly this, I really start feeling angry.
Of course, any company has the right to try to protect their software against piracy - but not at the cost of the legal owner of their copies!

 

[jdurg]

Nakoom, glad I could help. Yeah the copy protection kind of bites w/ games nowadays, but really what can we expect? As the piraters get more advanced, they are causing the game developers to become more advanced as well. Sadly, this comes at a cost to all of us honest buyers who just want to play the games we bought. What we have to make sure is that if software on our computer is 'blacklisted," tell the manufacturer of that software. Let them know that their program which you use on a daily basis is causing your new software not to work. Most virtual-drive software manufacturers are aware of this blacklisting and will release patches which will put them one step ahead of the copy protection. So while you may not be able to use your virtual drives now, check for updates and in a short while you may be able to once more.

 

[Mercade]

Amen, E-Raser and Commander Bello. The only alternative is to use a No-CD patch in combination with your legally purchased copy of C3C. That doesn't interfere with your virtual drives.

 

[E-Raser]

NO CD would work fine, agree, but unfortunately not so easy to get one for C3C, right now impossible for me. And also there are some doubts about the legal use. It is just the way that the protecting as well as the piracy side are in a kind of war. Ok, shall they but I deny to be the victim. And right now I feel 'zif I am! I think there should be other ways possible to cope with piracy rather than giving a penalty to legal customers.
And nevertheless, I am really angry that they didn't inform about the incompability with virual drives. So it was up to ME to find out about it and I guess this can not be! Wasting customers time to research about this facts is just too much! At least a note should be done, imo.

 

[inoesomestuff]

the problem is sorta talked about here:
http://clone.cd/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=5868

the solution that i found is to creat another XP account just for civ3
i have e-mailed tech support but i dunno if that will do ne good

 

[Tom|420]

Once you have bought a legal copy, the copyright laws allow you to do whatever you like with your copy, except redistributing copies, or keep copies after you sold back the original.

That is there is nothing illegal in breaking the copy protection of your legally owned copy. That is using a 'no cd crack' cannot be considered illegal. However in most cases those are distributed as a modified copy of the executable, which *is* illegal. If they were distributed as 'patch' (a file which contains only what is changed from the original file) I don't see how they could be illegal. After all how could you use the patch if you don't have the original file in the first place?

Personnally I do use 'no cd cracks' because I hate having to put in the CD just to load the game, when you don't need it after the game is started.

And as I said I don't see how I could have used those cracks if I haven't the CD in the first place. And I hope those protections are effective againsts pirates which turn the final price on software on the rise.

Tom

 

[inoesomestuff]

for some reason after i updated my Plexor firmware C3C has stopped loading... can anyone tell me how to get past this?

 

[deo]

In my country all of the cd's are copied and one cd costs 2.5 Euro
or $3 but they work
The only thing that i don't like is that when i patch the game it says:
Cannot locate the Civilization III: Conquests CD-ROM
Please insert the Civilization III: Conquests CD-ROM, select OK and restart application.

 

[inoesomestuff]

thats tbe bad thing about no-cd cracks, i have stopped playing c3c because i must use a no-cd crack to play even though i bought both normal and conquers. sometimes the protection that they use just go too far...

 

[ainwood]

Originally posted by deo
In my country all of the cd's are copied and one cd costs 2.5 Euro
or $3 but they work
The only thing that i don't like is that when i patch the game it says:
Cannot locate the Civilization III: Conquests CD-ROM
Please insert the Civilization III: Conquests CD-ROM, select OK and restart application.

Well, you won't get any help for pirated CDs here.

 

[deo]

Well, you won't get any help for pirated CDs here.

But i found one here. This is a Civfanatics thread and i don know if i broked the rules now but i didn't opened this thread also this thread isn't closed or deleted. There is a link where you can find those... you know what...

 

[ainwood]

Thanks for pointing that out, it was obviously an overstight on the mods part (2 and a half years ago!! )

 

[10Seven]

Well, though the thread is old, and I've been playing C3C since it came out now I'm having the exact same problem...

Program installs no problem, then will not start - 'C3C CD not in drive, ect'

Apart from trawling through all the audio/video drivers and updating/backdating, and waiting weeks for help from Atari...

I wonder if anyone has a fix for this that doesn't involve downloading 200MB of data over a 33.6k modem I read the sticky fix at the top of the forum, and this didn't help.

EDIT also no drive mounting software