Civilization 5 being rendered in black box

[Galatian]

Hey,

I received my new 13" retina MacBook Pro yesterday and I wanted to play some Civilization 5 in Windows 7 x64 (via Bootcamp). Obviously I won't get anywhere near some framrates running the game on the native 2560x1600 resolution, so I thought it would run best on 1280x800 as this would be exactly 4 times less pixels and wouldn't look too scaled. Now for some odd reason although I have the "Run in fullscreen" box checked Civilization5 is being rendered in a black box. It essentially renders the small game window in 1280x800 and the rest is being blacked out to 2560x1600. I really don't want to play in such a small window. Strangely enough the other resolutions are being blown up to take the entire screen real estate. I already disbaled DPI scaling on the CIV5.exe but that did't help the issue. Does anybody now what is wrong?

Thanks for your help in advance!

Update: It runs fine in DX9. The Problem only occurs on DX10/11 mode.

 

[The_J]

Does the windowed mode change anything?

 

[Galatian]

Does the windowed mode change anything?

No same problem.

 

[The_J]

No idea then . Since this doesn't happen on Windows machines -> Moderator Action: Moved to the Mac section.

And I thought Macs don't support DX10/11, theoretically it will not look better for you in that mode...but I'm not sure .

 

[AlanH]

OS X doesn't support DX10/11, but Windows does. When you are running in Bootcamp, you are running a PC with Windows in all its glory, and OS X is not part of the picture.

OS X has several tricks to handle scaling and resolution mapping for retina displays when you are running applications that are not retina-aware. I don't know whether Windows running in Bootcamp can take similar steps, but presumably Apple's Bootcamp display drivers for that system ought to be able to cope.

Just a guess from someone with no retina Mac - maybe you have to adjust the screen resolution in Windows to 1280 x 800. Otherwise you'll have to wait for someone with a similar rig to come by and give advice.

 

[Galatian]

No idea then . Since this doesn't happen on Windows machines -> Moderator Action: Moved to the Mac section.

And I thought Macs don't support DX10/11, theoretically it will not look better for you in that mode...but I'm not sure .

Argh...Why did you move it? I'm not running Civilization 5 in Mac OS X. This is a Windows problem. I'm running Civilization 5 in Windows 7.

 

[AlanH]

Yes, but you are running it on high-res Mac hardware that requires Apple drivers. It's highly likely that this is the cause of your problems, given that you appear to have resolution issues. The wider Windows community is probably not familiar with this issue, but there may be people in this forum who are.

 

[Galatian]

Yes, but you are running it on high-res Mac hardware that requires Apple drivers. It's highly likely that this is the cause of your problems, given that you appear to have resolution issues. The wider Windows community is probably not familiar with this issue, but there may be people in this forum who are.

Forgive my ignorance but Apple is just a hardware vendor that purchases off-the-shelf parts and puts them together. The HD4000 graphic card is the same as on every other Intel Ivy Bridge Core Processor and the driver comes directly from Intel. So the wider Windows community will actually be more helpful as there must be enough people out their running Civilization on big screens. On the other hand the Mac community cannot help me because they run a completely different Civilization 5 version on a completely different operating system. Not trying to rant here but the decision to move my thread does not make sense.

Back on topic: I filed a support ticket with 2k...let's see if they actually answer. I did try the recommendation with running Windows 7 in 1280x800 but with no effect. It still renders the game in a 2560x1600 box with the actual game interface only taking up 1280x800.

 

[AlanH]

Forgive my ignorance but Apple is just a hardware vendor that purchases off-the-shelf parts and puts them together. The HD4000 graphic card is the same as on every other Intel Ivy Bridge Core Processor and the driver comes directly from Intel. So the wider Windows community will actually be more helpful as there must be enough people out their running Civilization on big screens.

How many are running 4M pixel displays on an HD4000?

.... On the other hand the Mac community cannot help me because they run a completely different Civilization 5 version on a completely different operating system

Quite a few people here run Bootcamp or Windows VMs on their Macs, and several probably have retina displays.

Back on topic: I filed a support ticket with 2k...let's see if they actually answer. I did try the recommendation with running Windows 7 in 1280x800 but with no effect. It still renders the game in a 2560x1600 box with the actual game interface only taking up 1280x800.

Presumably that means the game software (at least in DX11 mode) is bypassing the Windows display driver and using the display's native resolution. Maybe it has decided that it cannot render 4M pixels through the HD4000 using DX11? I had a look around at HD4000 reviews, and I only found benchmark testing done at up to 1920 x 1080 (2M pixels).

Sorry if my feeble attempts to help have misfired. I'll try to get out of the habit.

 

[Galatian]

How many are running 4M pixel displays on an HD4000?


Quite a few people here run Bootcamp or Windows VMs on their Macs, and several probably have retina displays.

Presumably that means the game software (at least in DX11 mode) is bypassing the Windows display driver and using the display's native resolution. Maybe it has decided that it cannot render 4M pixels through the HD4000 using DX11? I had a look around at HD4000 reviews, and I only found benchmark testing done at up to 1920 x 1080 (2M pixels).

Sorry if my feeble attempts to help have misfired. I'll try to get out of the habit.

No, you've been very helpful! I didn't mean to suggest I don't appreciate your effort. For me this appears to be a software problem and not a real hardware problem. I'll try reinstalling it...sometimes the solution is so simple. BTW I'm not trying to run 4M pixels with the HD4000 (I like my games playable ), hence the questions how people set up their Civilization 5 to work correctly. My uneducated guess is, that it has something to do with the patch Firaxis filed for high DPI screen. I thought this was only for the Mac by maybe it was also included in the Windows version. as 1280x800 is an extrapolated resolution of 2560x1600 I guess something got mixed up when rendering the picture.

 

[The_J]

Argh...Why did you move it? I'm not running Civilization 5 in Mac OS X. This is a Windows problem. I'm running Civilization 5 in Windows 7.

Oops, sorry, was too fast skimming over your post .
Seems still to be right decision (even besides Alan's explanation), because it might be a problem with the ...."unusual" display device (-> which is Apple). Because I've just seen that somebody in the tech support area mentioned that he has the same problem, but with a HD monitor. think: or maybe it was wrong...don't know).
Sadly that doesn't really give any clue for a solution :/.

 

[Gyathaar]

Dont know about macs, but on normal pc laptops with higher resolution screens there is usually a bios setting for if you want to run full screen apps with lower than max screen resolution in stretched mode, or with black bars around them.. perhaps there is something similar on mac?