Game still crashes or goes black

[SsgtMatthews]

Help me some one. My game will still cause my computer to crash and if it does not crash, it will make my screen go black, unless you move the mouse around and it will clear up (kind of like a broom) the screen.

can anyone help me?


Running XP, 2 gig of ram, really fast processor...What can I do??

[FlashfyreSP]

Turn off the background processes, like your virus scanners and any automatic updats, especially if you are 'Net connected. The trouble you are seeing is that the SPWAW game takes up a lot of memory, and when one of these background processes demand "processor time", it overloads the system and the game either "blacks out" the video or crashes completely. Reducing the number of other processes helps a great deal; I know I have to disable my email checker and my Norton System sometimes, because they try to operate while the game is running, and the screen goes black.

[SsgtMatthews]

Thanks, I have Mcaffee virus, how do you turn such stuff off?  Should I just turn off my modem?  A step by step would really help.
 
Also, I have just gotten back on line here, what or where do you find the upgraded versions of this game?  and how do you load them?
 
Thanks

[FlashfyreSP]

Well, basic steps are disconnect from the modem (should be able to do that in the Networking section of Windows, no need to physically remove the cable), go into the McAfee program and look for an Option to disable virus scanning or something like that. You'll need to re-enable everything once you are done playing, of course.

As for upgrades, which version are you currently operating? The Enhanced Mod (which can be used with any version of the game after 8.2) contains the latest mech.exe (8.403) and a host of updated grpahics, sounds, and OOBs. It can be found at the SPWAW Depot here: http://www.spwaw.com 

[SsgtMatthews]

Downloaded v2, could not find v1.  I extracted it to my SPWAW folder and nothing happened.  it extracted fine but that was it.

[Alby]

Go here and read the instructions.
http://spwaw.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=9565

[SsgtMatthews]

Ok, got it installed, thanks.
 
Of course I got like 3 copies of the file scattered through out the computer, any way it works....BUT
 
The game screen still goes black.....I diabled the internet connection and virus scan/////Help
 
 
BTW do I need to install V1 of the enhanced?

[Alby]

no you dont need V1
I used to have the black screen thing, until I rolled back to an earlier Video driver.

[SsgtMatthews]

Trying to avoid that, my son has some really hi end games that really need the driver I got now.

[BruceAZ_MatrixForum]

I have heard that the new video cards that are out today will not work with SPWAW. Any truth to this story?

Recon
Semper Fi

[Alby]

the newer the PC, seems the harder is it to get the ole Gal to run correctly

[KG Erwin]

Unfortunately, Bruce, it IS true, but I don't know the exact reasons for it.  If one has a card that uses NVidia drivers, several older games have problems with their newer drivers -- you have to rollback until you get a positive result.

I'm not enough of a tech geek to be able to explain it, though. 

[azraelck]

Odd. My brand new, 7600GT has no issues with SPWaW at all, less in fact than the 6100 integrated. Both Nvidia. And it's far more powerful, with 4 times the memory and many times the bus rate. With the most up to date drivers there are avaliable for it right now. 

[KG Erwin]

ORIGINAL: azraelck

Odd. My brand new, 7600GT has no issues with SPWaW at all, less in fact than the 6100 integrated. Both Nvidia. And it's far more powerful, with 4 times the memory and many times the bus rate. With the most up to date drivers there are avaliable for it right now. 

Hmm --well, hopefully, NVidia has finally addressed the backwards-compatibility issue it had for quite a while. That's good news.

My Dell doesn't use those drivers, but my old PC did, and those issues with newer drivers did exist.

These days, I see complaints from laptop users on certain games, but that's another story.

[KG Erwin]

To BruceAZ:
 
Are you considering upgrading?  Is that why you asked?

[BruceAZ_MatrixForum]

I have a new Dell XPS700 on back order with a Conroe chip and a Nvidia 7900 GTX 512MB video card. The system will have 4MB of cache and 4GB of RAM.

If this game (my favorite) crashes there will be hell to pay at Dell. They assured me I will "have no problems."

I may keep my old one up just for this game if it does not work.

Recon
Semper Fi

[KG Erwin]

ORIGINAL: BruceAZ

I have a new Dell XPS700 on back order with a Conroe chip and a Nvidia 7900 GTX 512MB video card. The system will have 4MB of cache and 4GB of RAM.

If this game (my favorite) crashes there will be hell to pay at Dell. They assured me I will "have no problems."

I may keep my old one up just for this game if it does not work.

Recon
Semper Fi

That's the thing to do, Bruce. Keep that old PC on standby, just in case.