strange error (directX ???)

[Marksman77]

Hey folks,
I get CtD on loading FfH, before the start screen appears.
The same with oher mods, coming in package with BtS. I tried starting from Civ main menu / advanced / load a mod and with Mod Chooser (very useful little program). Strangely enough I can start a FfH game by clicking on a savegame file.
Vanilla BtS and Civ start smoothly.


This is the error msg I get (the hwnd number differs every time):

Spoiler :

Does anybody have any idea what causes the problem? I already tried reinstalling DirectX 9c, coming with Civ and with BtS, no change.

Edit: heh, I just realized that I didn't go to Civ4 technical problems forum, but here

 

[Blakmane]

try ticking the 'no movies' box in the options menu and seeing if that makes any difference. I'd bet what's stuffing up there is the FFH opening movie.

 

[Vanion]

You can also try updating your graphics driver, if you're comfortable with that. Older drivers have problems creating textures with certain sizes (non-power of 2, to be exact).

You probably got either an nVidia, ATi oder Intel graphics adapter (you can check that in Windows' display settings). Here's a few quick links to their driver pages:

nVidia: http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us
ATi: http://ati.amd.com/support/driver.html
Intel: http://www.intel.com/support/index.htm?iid=homepage+hdr_nav1_support

 

[Marksman77]

It works with 'no movies'.

I got ATI X1600 in a laptop. Using the link from Vanion I downloaded the last version (from Dec 2007, so newer than I got now) but it says it wouldn't install on my comp.
I guess I'll be living with no movies then.

Thanks for help guys

 

[Vanion]

Ah, yes... the infamous ATi Mobility drivers ;-)

For some reason ATi doesn't offer official drivers for their mobile graphics adapters (at least they didn't when I was looking for them, and I didn't find a download now either), so some clever people hack the desktop GPU drivers for use on a mobile chipset. Works for my old 9700 Mobility in my notebook, else I'd be stuck with 2 or 3 year old drivers from my notebook manufacturer.

If you wanna give them a try (as a bonus, you might see some performance gains, too!), here's some additional linkage:

Win XP / 2000: http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=1817

If you're running Vista, you're out of luck at the moment - Omega Drivers for Vista aren't ready at the moment.

 

[Marksman77]

This driver seems to work (luckily I got XP, as I dislike Vista) , thanks again

But I wonder what caused the problem. There were no changes in my system, at least none that I was aware of...

 

[Vanion]

Well, it's an old driver problem, really. Videos are drawn as (animated) textures in DirectX, and the FfH Videos have custom resolutions (at least the few I checked). Old drivers don't support drawing textures with custom resolutions and are limited to width/height in powers of 2.

Then again, it could be any other bug in the old drivers as well. Glad to see your problem fixed!