1stcontact2035
Great Scientist
I, like many many people, have been having problems with all versions of Civ 4 crashing, and while Civ 4 is pretty much the only recent game I play, I have taken note that some other games run into the same CTD/freeze bug and after doing some research the only common thread with myself and any given person on there is that I'm using the same sound card as these people, in the same config, basically a integrated RealTek hi-def soundcard with Windows drivers rather than RealTek drivers, and the fix is as simple as installing the actual updated RealTek drivers over the old Windows versions.
I should probably mention that my particular audio card from them is the ALC888S model, but the issues they have are with any of the following models ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC886, ALC887, ALC888, ALC889, ALC892, ALC899, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC665, ALC670, ALC672, ALC676, ALC680, ALC221, ALC231, ALC260, ALC262, ALC267, ALC268, ALC269, ALC270, ALC272, ALC273, ALC275, ALC276 (this being for Vista/Win 7)
For Win XP (if you do have CTD problem on Win XP give this a try anyway, I could be wrong about that) ALC880, ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC886, ALC887, ALC888, ALC889, ALC892, ALC899, ALC861VC, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC665, ALC670, ALC672, ALC676, ALC680 ALC221, ALC231, ALC260, ALC262, ALC267,ALC268, ALC269, ALC270, ALC272, ALC273, ALC275, ALC276
The first thing you want to do, because once you get the ball rolling on the following procedures its going to cause Windows to be a system hog, especially in Vista or a 32 bit system, is download your drivers. I'm placing a link to the main download page for RealTek.
RealTek Download Page
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=24&PFid=24&Level=4&Conn=3&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false
So, going into that, here's what's needed to be done. For starters, this shouldn't be an issue in Win XP, from what I gather (explains a lot). So, if you're in Vista or Win 7, go to the control panel, go under manage devices and go to sound, and where it shows RealTek (just for a disclaimer, if you mess up your system doing this, for one thing its not my fault... for two, you should only be having this problem with an integrated soundcard, so if you have a non-integrated soundcard you need another solution), click advanced and click uninstall device. You'll have to go without sound until you restart the computer, at which time Windows will automatically install some generic drivers.
Now, at this point you should have restarted your computer, have had Windows install some generic hi-def audio driver in place of RealTek, and are now set to finish this off. Go back to the device manager page and select that new audio driver, and click to update the driver, select to install manually from a source on the computer, browse to the RealTek drivers on your computer, and install. If that fails, run the .exe file. But, either way, you should have actual, real, and not-going-to-cause memory allocation failure because of buggy audio driver, audio drivers now.
Hope this helps.
OK, I also wanted to say that the main RealTek site is hit or miss whether you'll get a US download mirror, which is really the only way you'll download this in any reasonable amount of time. However, what I'm finding is that the CNET file is 5 mb smaller than the RealTek file, so I'm taking that link off of this post. So, hopefully you'll luck into downloading this thing in a reasonable amount of time otherwise you'll be waiting a half hour to download a 87 mb file.
I should probably mention that my particular audio card from them is the ALC888S model, but the issues they have are with any of the following models ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC886, ALC887, ALC888, ALC889, ALC892, ALC899, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC665, ALC670, ALC672, ALC676, ALC680, ALC221, ALC231, ALC260, ALC262, ALC267, ALC268, ALC269, ALC270, ALC272, ALC273, ALC275, ALC276 (this being for Vista/Win 7)
For Win XP (if you do have CTD problem on Win XP give this a try anyway, I could be wrong about that) ALC880, ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC886, ALC887, ALC888, ALC889, ALC892, ALC899, ALC861VC, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC665, ALC670, ALC672, ALC676, ALC680 ALC221, ALC231, ALC260, ALC262, ALC267,ALC268, ALC269, ALC270, ALC272, ALC273, ALC275, ALC276
The first thing you want to do, because once you get the ball rolling on the following procedures its going to cause Windows to be a system hog, especially in Vista or a 32 bit system, is download your drivers. I'm placing a link to the main download page for RealTek.
RealTek Download Page
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=24&PFid=24&Level=4&Conn=3&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false
So, going into that, here's what's needed to be done. For starters, this shouldn't be an issue in Win XP, from what I gather (explains a lot). So, if you're in Vista or Win 7, go to the control panel, go under manage devices and go to sound, and where it shows RealTek (just for a disclaimer, if you mess up your system doing this, for one thing its not my fault... for two, you should only be having this problem with an integrated soundcard, so if you have a non-integrated soundcard you need another solution), click advanced and click uninstall device. You'll have to go without sound until you restart the computer, at which time Windows will automatically install some generic drivers.
Now, at this point you should have restarted your computer, have had Windows install some generic hi-def audio driver in place of RealTek, and are now set to finish this off. Go back to the device manager page and select that new audio driver, and click to update the driver, select to install manually from a source on the computer, browse to the RealTek drivers on your computer, and install. If that fails, run the .exe file. But, either way, you should have actual, real, and not-going-to-cause memory allocation failure because of buggy audio driver, audio drivers now.
Hope this helps.
OK, I also wanted to say that the main RealTek site is hit or miss whether you'll get a US download mirror, which is really the only way you'll download this in any reasonable amount of time. However, what I'm finding is that the CNET file is 5 mb smaller than the RealTek file, so I'm taking that link off of this post. So, hopefully you'll luck into downloading this thing in a reasonable amount of time otherwise you'll be waiting a half hour to download a 87 mb file.
