Civ4 Vanilla, WL and BTS crashes during Init Engine Step

[Loisl]

Hi folks,
I don't know what to do next, maybe someone of you can help me. I installed Civ4 and both addons on my new PC and no matter whisch version I wanna launch, my computer crashes during the "Initializing Engine" step. All I get is a black screen and I have to restart my computer. At first a Listing of my components:

CPU: Intel Core duo E8400 3GHz
Ram: 4GB
OS: Windows Vista Home Premium 64 Bit
GraphicCard: ATI Sapphire HD4850 512MB DDR3 (latest drivers)
MotherBoard: Asus P5Q Pro with onboard Soundchip: Realtek ALC1200
DVD-ROM: Asus DVD-616A 16x
DirectX: 10
Installed directory:C:\Programm Files (X86)\Fireaxis Games\.... (default)

CIV4-Versions:
Vanilla: PC-DVD 2kGames, Store, German
Addons: Warlords-BTS doublepack, green pepper, German

What I did so far:
* Installing the game to diffrent partions.
* Patching to the actual versions before and after applying the next addon.(Vanilla:1.74; WL: 2.13; BTS:3.17e)
* Reinstalling DirectX after Installing the game.
* Copy the d3dx9_26.dll in the Civ 4 main folder.
* Installing in German and English
* Installing and Running the game as admin
* Installing and Running the game in "XP SP2" and "NT2000"- compatibiliy mode
* Getting upset,angry and frustrated (maybe in diffrent order), because nothing worked.
* Starting to drink beer.

No that the beer is running low, may be someone of you may helb me out. I would like to try the "Rise of mankind" mod.

Greetz from Germany

Loisl

 

[ori]

welcome to cfc

is there any error message when it crashes - what exactly happens (does the computer restart, does it crash to desktop)?

 

[Loisl]

I get no error message and the display crashes to a black screen and the computer doesn't respond to anything (ALT+TAB, mouse clicks....). The computer does not restart. After reseting, I get to the Windows Boot Menu.

I could circumvent the problem a little bit by making 2 changes in the 'Civilization4.ini':

1. Turning of the fullscreen modus:
; Specify whether to play in fullscreen mode 0/1/ask
FullScreen = 0

2. Setting the resolution manually:

; Custom Screen Height, ex: 768 - Normal resolutions can be set in-game and will be used when both values are set to 0
ScreenHeight = 1024

; Custom Screen Width, ex: 1024 - Normal resolutions can be set in-game and will be used when both values are set to 0
ScreenWidth = 2080


At least the game starts now. But in the Options menu the 'Audio' and 'Other' register card appaers empty.
That a minor problem, but if someone knows a solutions for that it would be great.

I think it's a conflict between the Soundchip and the GraphicC.

P.s. Sound works normally.

 

[ori]

in the .ini set all items with log in their name from 0 to 1 - then start the game and open all the offending screens as well as start a game.
close the game, and post all items of my games\<gamename>\logs\ as a zip file here

 

[Loisl]

Thanks ori. Here is the log file. Meanwhile I get a couple of XML errors loading the Rise of Mankind Mod and the game crashes when i start a new game. Do you know something about that?

 

[ori]

patch the game to 3.17 (download it from here).