Hardware and software prerequisites

[Zorachus99]

Excellent question as XP has been officially discontinued with all the major OEMs.  In a few years people will look back at XP similarly to how they look back at Windows 98SE now...

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: petracelli

Steve

A very quick question for you as am considering invseting in a new laptop and have noticed the requirements you've outlined, take it that as it will come with vista it has an emulation mode builti nto it-sorry still using an old pc.

Thanks for your help and really looking forward to seeing the game.

thanks

Phil

Vista has an XP emulation mode. When you execute any program, you have the option of running it under XP emulation instead of 'native' Vista.

[micheljq]

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99

Excellent question as XP has been officially discontinued with all the major OEMs.  In a few years people will look back at XP similarly to how they look back at Windows 98SE now...

Windows 98 was one of the most unstable and easy to chrash operating systems of all time. When Windows 2000 and XP were created, they were far superior to Win98 or Win98SE undiscutably. For Vista compared to XP this is another matter, Microsoft has retarded the date of discontinuation of XP due to the community pressure. They have also accelerated the development of their next O.S. - Windows seven, because of the mixed popularity of Vista.

[micheljq]

Update on Windows XP as of december 23th.

An article posted over on ZDNet.com reported that Microsoft is allowing system builders--the smaller "white box" builders other than Dell and HP--to obtain copies of Windows XP for preloading on PCs until May 30, 2009.

source : http://www.tomsguide.com/us/Windows-XP- ... -3204.html

[Petracelli69]

Steve

A quick question for you. Have been lucky enough to get a widescreen laptop in readiness for MWIF will MWIF make the most of the widescreen monitor?

cheers

Phil

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Petracelli69

Steve

A quick question for you. Have been lucky enough to get a widescreen laptop in readiness for MWIF will MWIF make the most of the widescreen monitor?

cheers

Phil

Yes.

I have seen some distortion if I change the resolution on my wide screen laptop. With some aspect ratios I get elongated images. I haven't investigated this in detail - and things appear to be fine if I don't try force a 4:3 resolution on a wide screen monitor.

[lomyrin]

I am running MWiF screens on a 26 inch 1920 x 1280 monitor and it looks beautiful.
 
Lars

[brian brian]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: petracelli

Steve

A very quick question for you as am considering invseting in a new laptop and have noticed the requirements you've outlined, take it that as it will come with vista it has an emulation mode builti nto it-sorry still using an old pc.

Thanks for your help and really looking forward to seeing the game.

thanks

Phil

Vista has an XP emulation mode. When you execute any program, you have the option of running it under XP emulation instead of 'native' Vista.

OK I really hate to ask this question here, and I don't want an answer from Steve, but if anyone knows how to make this happen I would love to hear about it. I know a bare minimum about Windows but I do use it to run QuickBooks. And QuickBooks is not getting along with Vista very well at all. Just enough that the program works, but frequently after clicking "ReTry" for ten minutes or so. I've looked into it on the internet and so far haven't found anyone posting with my same problem having found a solution. So if you know how to get an XP emulation mode working I would like to hear about it in a PM. Sorry to go so off-topic.

[Anendrue]

ORIGINAL: brian brian
OK I really hate to ask this question here, and I don't want an answer from Steve, but if anyone knows how to make this happen I would love to hear about it. I know a bare minimum about Windows but I do use it to run QuickBooks. And QuickBooks is not getting along with Vista very well at all. Just enough that the program works, but frequently after clicking "ReTry" for ten minutes or so. I've looked into it on the internet and so far haven't found anyone posting with my same problem having found a solution. So if you know how to get an XP emulation mode working I would like to hear about it in a PM. Sorry to go so off-topic.

I assusme you are using Vista

right click on the quick books executable file and select properties
select the compatibility tab
make sure Windows XP is selected
put a check on the box for compatibility mode
left click ok

if you still expierence problems reverse this and call Intuit

if a didfferent version of windows which one?

[brian brian]

thanks a lot abj! I'll give that a try. sure enough, Vista and QuickBooks got along perfectly today while I was at my CPA's office getting ready for tax season, like two squabbling children suddenly in the presence of Grandma and her purse full of treats, but I doubt that will last.



now in an attempt to get this thread back on track, it would seem approriate to start running MWiF through the beta version of Windows 7 to see what happens.


[a Microsoft guy possibly hinted in an interview today that they might give Vista purchasers some help on upgrading to 7, which would be nice]

[Zorachus99]

ORIGINAL: lomyrin

I am running MWiF screens on a 26 inch 1920 x 1280 monitor and it looks beautiful.

Lars

Back on topic, Steve has gotten at least one screenshot of MWIF running at 2560x1600 (16x10 widescreen) from me, and looking mighty pretty too if I don't mind saying myself.

[Petracelli69]

Excellent news about widescreen monitors.

Abj thanks for that tip as well for running xp programmes in vista.

regards

Phil

[Caquineur]

For NetPlay mode, is there a minimum connexion rate ?
(for example, would 128 Kbits/s be enough ?)

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Caquineur

For NetPlay mode, is there a minimum connexion rate ?
(for example, would 128 Kbits/s be enough ?)

Communications speed shouldn't be a problem. All the transmissions will be small.

That's because teh design is for each compute to maintain its own copy of the game (simulation files, if you will). What is transmitted are the individual decisions by the players. Then each computer brings its copy of the game up-to-date based on the decisions made by the other players. The worst case scenario is when one player has been absent for a while and needs to have a bunch of decisions transmitted and processed.

An entire copy of the game is never transmitted.

I guess the absolute worst case would be if you brought a new player into the middle of a game as a replacement for someone who dropped out. Then perhaps it would be worthwhile to transmit a saved game file (.GAM) but that would occur rarely and just be a one time thing.

[Caquineur]

Thank you for your detailed answer

[Paerhc]

How about Windows 7? It's still new on the market - if you don't count the beta or RC1 - but is this system taken into consideration in future testing?

[Paerhc]

I now see how stupid my question was. Of course you will test it on Windows 7!

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Paerhc

I now see how stupid my question was. Of course you will test it on Windows 7!

[:-] Please, never consider a question stupid. I don't. If the question pops into your head, it almost certainly has popped into the heads of others too. Not all questions come from kernels of wisdom, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be answered.

As I related to another forum member who sent me an email today, my new system (due for delivery today) runs under Win 7. But the target operating system for MWIF is Win XP. That's because XP programs can be run under Vista and Win 7 without problems, if you use XP emulation. That's something the beta testers have tested. I will be testing it some more myself once I get the new system up and running. I also have a Vista machine (portable) I use for testing purposes. It might be possible to run MWIF on a MAC using XP emulation. My wife uses a MAC so I'll probably get around to testing that some day too.

The new system I am putting together includes Delphi 2010 which should enable me to generate an executable for Win 7 (if I am not mistaken). I need to play around with that though. Marketing material is such a poor indicator of a software's capabilities. I'll see what Delphi 2010 can do with MWIF code and then go from there. Hopefully, the MWIF.exe will be able to take advantage of dual and quad core machines to run multiple threads efficiently. For example, the AIO will run as a separate thread while the player is fiddling around with the mouse and keyboard.

But as an obsolute minimum, MWIF will run on XP and Window systems that can run XP emulation.

[Neilster]

But as an obsolute minimum...

or an obsolete minimum [:'(]

Cheers, Neilster