Issues, Please Read (interesting)

[Golf3r]

I have been experiencing random freezes whenever an empires leaderhead pops up or when an in-game video plays. The first and second time the game freezes i can tap the windows key and it pops back to the desktop, and then when I click on the game in the taskbar it pops up again, working great (Weird, huh?). However, the third time it freezes the whole computer locks up, and I have to do a hard reset.
When the game freezes and I return to the desktop, an ATI error message pops up, and says it had to reset the graphics settings (or something similiar) as it was not responding. This tells me it is a graphical issue, considering that if a leaderhead or in-game movie never pops up I can play as long as I want, but when those dreaded faces appear I know whats going to happen . So, I have tride a full reinstall, resetting my drivers, installing the Omega drivers, and tweaking with the hardware acceleration, but to no avail. Hopwfully this can be fixed because many are having this problem, so please help me.

EDIT: Could it be the onboard audio? (AC'97)

 

[Zydor]

Just in case .... have you loaded Patch V1.52? Its a must have Patch that fixed many memory management issues.

Nice thought re the Audio - too many forget that bad sound drivers can cause graphics issues... I dont think so here as the AC97 is rocksolid. Many of these you may have been through - as you are aware difficult to pin one like this, so throwing out ideas to think over ....

Ultimately of course turn the movies off, not a fix, but saves the Wall Plaster & Headaches ....
C:\Documents and Settings\New User\My Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\CivilizationIV.ini
Set the following entry as shown below
; Set to 1 for no in-game movies
NoMovies = 1

The worrying thing is the ATI error message - thats unusual to say the least. Few things to think on / mull over - you may already been down this road ...
- Power supply, stable, fans work, dedicated power lead to card not shared
- Card seated properly
- Card / Case Overheating ?
- Been OC ... may need stepping back a bit/reset to default

Drivers/Tweeks/Checks
By now doubtless you have had many trys at sorting it. I strongly suggest you do a clean deinstall/install - see
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=152620

- You loaded Omega 3.8.205, try these - older set, V4.12,but rock solid with a good rep, has all the feature sets you need run them on my other beastie with a 9800 Pro, newer ones just have newer features and can cause issues with older cards, bit of an outside curve, but worth a shot
http://www.omegadrivers.net/ (Radeon XP Archive section)
Radeon Omega Drivers 2.5.97a (Catalyst 4.12)
- Run game with low textures, that'll help the movies, less work (next Patch may have low texture movies - they been done, just waiting to know if they releasing them)

Ini File - set to
; Don't skip frames if falling behind
BinkNoSkip = 0

; Copy entire image each frame, not just dirty pixels
BinkCopyAll = 0

; Show movies using hi-color, not true-color (may be faster)
Bink16Bit = 1 (Set DeskTop to 16Bit to get best out of this one, with vertical refresh at 60Hz - games default to 60Hz vertical refresh internally)

Again not a fix, but the next Patch is due in around 7-10 days given no hassles from final testing.

Regards
Zy

 

[Golf3r]

I do share a power cord to my graphics card (the cd-rom one), as my power supply didnt have enough availiable cable, also the v1.52 patch does not change anything either. Thankyou though, however, I need to figure this out desperately (I...crave...civilization...)


EDIT: I'm on support and they told me to disable all startup programs then try again, and it did not work either.

 

[Zydor]

I think its worth you getting a separate lead. The 9800 Pro has a dedicated power connector on it to connect to the power supply. Its possible that using a shared connector is making the supply to the card inconsistent/unstable. Cant guarantee it will fix it - but it is designed to have a separate power lead. They are "fit one way only" sockets, so shouldnt be too much hassle, but obviously need to triple/ verify you got the right lead/cable type. - I dont know the formal spec for that lead, but should not be too hard to track down, likely be able to order it from an online site

I got one in my other beastie - I'll have a look at the cable - back in 10

EDIT: Mine has its own dedicated lead - I am not a power supply guru, so couldnt say whether in the 9800 case its significant, but a fair number of cards do pout if they have shared supply leads. Worth looking into.

Regards
Zy

 

[Golf3r]

Thankyou very much for your help. I found a driver for the sound card (dont know if its the problem) from hp and im gonna try it out. Unfortunately, right now the only solution for getting a direct feed to the video card is a new power supply, of which I cant get. If this doesnt work I'm taking it back for tiger woods 06. Also, I have much more graphically intesive games than civilization, such as Battlefield 2, which I have on max settings and works flawlessly for hours on end. Could there be a memory leak or something?

 

[Zydor]

For sure, could be - classic game type problem - whether it is in this case ... who knows as they say

The next Patch is due in 7-10 days given no hassles in the final testing - so if no further forward by then, worth nipping in and trying it when released ....


Regards
Zy

 

[StuartC]

Golf3r, I've had exact same problem with my system too.
(Hercules All In Wonder Radeon 9800 SE graphics)

This occurred with the demo and with the full version, which I immediately patched to 1.52 before playing.

I also get similar problems in The Movies, which were unpredictable and frustrating.

After much tweaking etc, the fix I found was to
1) switch off the movies
2) turn off the SMARTGART settings in the AGP section of the ATI drivers (have since got the AGP fast write one back on and still stable).

I've not yet tried the Omega drivers or checked power supply, but did have a similar issue with KOTORII that was resolved by putting the OpenGL files for an older version of the Catalyst drivers in the game directory. This enabled latest drivers for everything else, but forced the game to use the older version within its own folder.

I don't know if this is possible with Civ 4 but it may be a solution for exploration.

It's a PITA that I don't get the movie clips for wonders etc, but at least it's rock-solid stable now with the SMARTGART changes I made and no movies.

I will be trying the older Catalyst drivers to see if they resolve the issue, but whilst it's now stable, I'm not too keen on making changes....

 

[Golf3r]

Cool, Stuart. I'll try that out. Ill get back to you on whether it works or not, and if it does i'll try to mess with it some more to get the movies to be able to play. Thanks again .

 

[Golf3r]

EDIT: Still does not work

 

[Zydor]

Nice One

Happy World Domination

Regards
Zy

 

[Golf3r]

DAMNIT. It starts to crash now again, it works for about a half an hour now, then when a leader screen pops up it locks, but the sound still plays. Also, this happend today and i popped my back to my desktop to find my background and all the icons distorted and using the wrong colors, then there is a error message saying the atidavg driver (or something similiar) failed, and my computer crashed. This si the final straw, I don't know whats going on but 2k and firaxis made a $hitty a$$ game.

 

[Golf3r]

Crashed after an hour tday with medium quality on when I was on top, but I didnt save it . I'll try the SMARTGART thing, so im gonna download the offical drivers from ATI. Any other suggestions?