AMD64 3000+
PC3200 512meg x2 (dual channel)
6600GT 128meg - latest non-beta nVidia drivers
Audigy2 ZX sound
Turned off virus scanner and non-needed services
WinXP Pro SP2
huge map, 8 civs (including myself), noble level
The good after the patch:
- wonder movies now play much smoother, not choppy*
- dont crash to desktop in the start/middle of the game**
- several of the gameplay bugs resolved as noted in the patch read me
*except gets choppy near the latter stages of the game, see below
**Again, near the latter part of the game crashes are worse then pre-patch
The bad after the patch
- stablilty quickly decreases near the latter part of the game. By the time I hit the year 1900 or so (and the map fully reveiled) things started to take much longer. Not only the AI turns but during my turn scrolling across the map became a nightmare. At times takes 30+sec for the main screen to refresh and draw the units/terrain. At times the scrooling is smooth, othertimes tiakes quite some time. Animations/sound became choppy as well at this stage in the game. Seems like a memory leak when the units/civ size gets beyond a certain point.
The Ugly after the patch
- The crashes become quite common when you get to this stage of the game. early/mid 1900s. When the game crashes about 50% of the time its to the desktop, the other 50% of the time causes a blue screen of death with a reference to a nvidia driver .dll At this point I can only play 5-6 turns at a time before one of these crashes happen. In essence my game is unplayable.
I am very disappointed in this game and lack of quality. I realize and accept some amount of bugs. The world is not perfect nor is the s/w industry. But to release this with game stopping bugs is unacceptable. There was no way these bugs could not have been noticed before ship unless their QA dept is compleatly inept.
I shall think twice about buying another game from Sid or his company.
PC3200 512meg x2 (dual channel)
6600GT 128meg - latest non-beta nVidia drivers
Audigy2 ZX sound
Turned off virus scanner and non-needed services
WinXP Pro SP2
huge map, 8 civs (including myself), noble level
The good after the patch:
- wonder movies now play much smoother, not choppy*
- dont crash to desktop in the start/middle of the game**
- several of the gameplay bugs resolved as noted in the patch read me
*except gets choppy near the latter stages of the game, see below
**Again, near the latter part of the game crashes are worse then pre-patch
The bad after the patch
- stablilty quickly decreases near the latter part of the game. By the time I hit the year 1900 or so (and the map fully reveiled) things started to take much longer. Not only the AI turns but during my turn scrolling across the map became a nightmare. At times takes 30+sec for the main screen to refresh and draw the units/terrain. At times the scrooling is smooth, othertimes tiakes quite some time. Animations/sound became choppy as well at this stage in the game. Seems like a memory leak when the units/civ size gets beyond a certain point.
The Ugly after the patch
- The crashes become quite common when you get to this stage of the game. early/mid 1900s. When the game crashes about 50% of the time its to the desktop, the other 50% of the time causes a blue screen of death with a reference to a nvidia driver .dll At this point I can only play 5-6 turns at a time before one of these crashes happen. In essence my game is unplayable.
I am very disappointed in this game and lack of quality. I realize and accept some amount of bugs. The world is not perfect nor is the s/w industry. But to release this with game stopping bugs is unacceptable. There was no way these bugs could not have been noticed before ship unless their QA dept is compleatly inept.
I shall think twice about buying another game from Sid or his company.
computers for a living and have never seen that BSOD. But it only occurs with Civ4, no other game or program. It was funny as I remember the moment I put those ASUS drivers on the machine, the game ran a little smoother (not much difference) but after a few hours playing, I suddenly realised that I hadn't had a crash. Still haven't since then. Nice. 
