Official Tech Support Response to patch 1.74 install problems.

[Jaster83]

I've been having problems with my Civ4 game, and nothing on the internet resolves to my satisfaction, so I guess I'll be the schmuck who spends five hours with them on the phone fixing what shouldn't be broken. (Why is it that Civ games, and I had some problems with Pirates also are always buggy as hell?)


Note: I am running
Windows Vista Home Premium, 32bit SP1
ATI Radeon HD 2400 with the Catalyst 8.8 drivers that came out on August 20th, 2008
Pentium D 2.6GHz
1 Gig Ram (512x2)



Error 1507 response: Some of the original game files were not installed properly. Re-install the game.

"I can't, windows uninstaller can't see it."

They then sent me this e-mail:

Open My Computer then open the Local Disk (C
Open the program files folder.
Click on the tools menu then choose folder options
Click on the view tab and tick the box labelled "show hidden files and folders". Press OK
Open the installshield installation information folder
Search for a folder named {CFBCE791-2D53-4FCE-B3BF-D6E01F4112E8}
Right click on the folder and choose rename. Press the End key on the keyboard and type the word OLD. Press the enter key
Insert the Civilization IV install CD and open My Computer. Right click on the CD drive and choose explore,
Locate the setup.exe file and double click.

This will replace and overwrite any missing components that were preventing the game from being uninstalled normally
To uninstall the game, go to Control Panel>> Add/Remove programs and highlight the game in the list. Choose change/remove and follow the onscreen prompts



So then I'm supposed to follow all this, installing it, then uninstalling it through the Programs and Features.

Only after I do all this I still can't see it in my Programs and Features list.

About to get back on the phone with them.


Call #2:

They had me apply the patch, it popped up with error 1708 at the end, but allowed me to finish. (Did this while on the phone.)
He had me check the version number and since it said that the patch was 1.72 that the patch was successfully installed. They have a really thick NE England accent, sounds almost Irish (and no offense, I'm of Irish descent myself) and that's really difficult for me to understand.

Anyway, he sent me another e-mail.

Response (Matthew)14/09/2008 10.47 AM
Before we look into your problem we require more information on the system you are running the game on. The best way to gives us this information is to attach your Direct X information to an e-mail.
To do this - Start menu > Run > type DXDIAG > click Ok, this will then load the Direct X diagnostic tool. Once this has been done click on Save information and save the Text file on your PC.

Now reply to this e-mail with the file attached and we will look into the problem and be back in touch as soon as possible.
Customer (Entered by Matthew)14/09/2008 10.47 AM
Caller has tried uninstall reinstall advised try to get the patch again.

When trying to install the patch caller getting no valid source code found.
Caller has the GOTY edition so is already v1.74.
Game has crashed again when trying to trade.
Requested DXDIAG.

****Note: My GOTY came with 1.61, not 1.74. He's wrong. I'm right. It happens.****


Call #3

This was my favorite call so far, because Hannah has the cutest accent (still can't understand half of it, but damn...)
anyway, she told me to uncheck every box in msconfig's startup list, restart, ignore the warnings (don't close) and then... you guessed it... reinstall. If problem persists give them the msinfo file.

Here's the e-mail she sent me (Sadly no pics):

Response (Hannah)14/09/2008 11.35 AM
Hello,

Please fully disable your background applications and antivirus software by using msconfig (please see below)

Msconfig.

- Press the "Windows" key and the "R" key on your keyboard simultaneously.
- Type in the following MSCONFIG
- Click on the startup tab
- Deselect all the tick boxes
- Click on apply and then close
- Restart your computer
- When your computer starts up again, please ignore any messages from msconfig (do not close these)
- Please uninstall the game and reinstall
- Run the game

To return to the original startup sequence follow below instructions

- Click start menu
- Click run
- Type in the following MSCONFIG
- Click on normal startup
- Click on apply and then close
- Restart your computer

-

One possible solution may be to delete your temporary files on the hard drive as they may be creating a conflict. To do this:

Click on Start, then select Run
In the box you have opened type "%Temp%" with out the "" this will open your Temporary folder
You may need to turn on the ability to view hidden files and folders to do this. To do so, double click My Computer, then click Tools and Options. Then click View and select the option to view all hidden files.
Then reboot and try the game again.

-

We will also require an MSINFO report as well. To do this:

- Put the game or program CD into the cd-rom drive then do the following below:
- If you're using Windows 95/98/NT/ME/XP, click Start on your computers desktop, then click the Run icon. If you're using Windows Vista Press the "R" and "Windows logo" keys on you keyboard.
- Type the word "msinfo32" (without the ") into the text box and press OK. This will bring up the Microsoft System Information window.
- Click on File then EXPORT (not save).
- Save the file as "msinfo32" (without the ") and save it to your desktop.
- Attach the file to your reply to this email.

Kind Regards
2K Games Technical Support
Customer (Entered by Hannah)14/09/2008 11.35 AM
problem persists - advised msconfig
also requested msinfo to escalate

 

[ori]

and does it help?
also what exactly is the problem if it did not? is it that the installer still sees civ4?

 

[Jaster83]

Sorry, I went to bed after this post and forgot I was posting it till I looked at subscribed threads...


Okay, the reason I started trying to updated to 1.74 was because in a hot-seat game for some reason every time that I (in the player 1 slot) would try and trade with Elizabeth, and sometimes others would also cause the game to crash. (By sometimes others I mean it was hit or miss, not sure what parameters was causing it, but I think it had to do with something in my relations with them, or if I had a current trade going with them or something, but it was consistant with Beth.)

I could contact her, but when I clicked was trying to tell her how pretty her crimson locks would look on a stick, it wouldn't do anything, and when I entered her territory or went to the trade table it would flat crash. I could ask her what she felt about people though.

I tried debugging Python, was getting some kind of error in function HandleUserResponse, but could never figure out what caused it.

So that's what caused me to call them, and they wouldn't f***ing help me unless it was patched to 1.74. (And I'd already tried and had to manually uninstall the damn thing before and just kept playing in 1.61 and figured I'd deal with only playing single player.)

So after all these uninstalls and reinstalls I'm back to version 1.61 that was on the GotY version of the CD-ROM.

I followed the instructions on the final e-mail to the letter. Shut down all my start-up progs on msconfig (there really weren't that many), restarted, manually uninstalled, reinstalled, restarted.
Deleted temporary files.
Put my startup back the way it was, restarted.

Tried the game, WTH, it's still doing it. Same thing. Poke around on the forums, poke through my .ini file. Mess with some of the settings to no avail.

Deleted the cache files and the CivIV.ini file, started it up, works. WTH?

Still have the same error when applying the patch, but was able to DL the HoF mod (nice, btw, anyone who doesn't have it, it's stellar) and use it, and have it not give me any "Will not accept this game." errors, so apparently I've got the new patch.

No problems as of yet. (Except Montezuma... he declared on me when he was like +7 or something. WTH? Teach me to keep him like a pet in my back yard eh?)


So yeah, basically, when you're getting errors, go into your cache and delete it (it doesn't get deleted when you reinstall).
Path is
C:\Users\[USER_ACCOUNT]\AppData\Local\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\cache

I *think* I just straight deleted the whole folder out of exasperation, so yeah... but don't do it unless your game just straight isn't working and you're facing a fresh install anyway if it doesn't work.

So, that concludes my encounter with tech support. Now if I could just stop having dreams about Hannah and her NE English accent...