22-05-2005 13:24									#1
	insane freezing Put an end to popups!

okay, once again I am having a heck of a time trying to get SMACX working.

The game locks up my win 2k box so that I can't close it (virtually every single other application that I have ever run on Win2k I can close them and return to the desktop if they act funky) and have to restart the computer and waste a load of time with the consistancy check.

pulling my internet connection seems to help but only a little adding a few minutes to the 8-10 minutes/3 turns it usually goes before it crashes (don't know if it would crash if I just didn't make any moves at all.

I have all the patches and win 2000 compatibility file installed and I also fiddled around with the ini
file per many suggestions on this group to no avail.

Before the first time it started crashing it would do so even when looking through data files and at more variable lengths of time. I had tried things like playing from win98 boot and turning off the sound which helped but didn't completely eliminate the problem. I was able to keep the number of crashes down but I had stopped playing and now I don't remember exactly what I did.

I used to be able to play for hours without any crashing but now it can't go 10 mins without locking up my entire system!

	22-05-2005 14:22									#2
	Tired of ads?

Start->Run
Enter 'eventvwr'.

See if there's anything unusual in the event log.

	22-05-2005 23:29									#3
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

way ahead of you...nothing was in the app log except some routine housekeeping. Don't know what to look for in the system log except nothing seems to be unusual there either. I think its locking up before some error message can be put in.

	23-05-2005 04:04									#4
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

"Hard" lockups are often caused by video problems. Try setting your system video to fewer colors or a lower resolution and see if that helps.

If you haven't already done so, set ds3d=0 and/or eax=0 in your Alpha Centauri.ini file.

Use msconfig to selectively startup your system and see if the problem is caused by a specific driver or process.

Please post again if no luck.

	23-05-2005 11:56									#5
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

@Petek: You mean

code:
d3d=0

	23-05-2005 12:28									#6
	Increase the size of your Attachments

I turned down the res and color depth...no luck. I also had turned those two values to zero. Back before I had gone on hiatus from playing disabling the sound seemed to help although it didn't completely eliminate the problem. I'm now playing it under win98 and have yet to encounter a crash. Its still annoying though since I have to boot to do most of my work on Win2k.

Oh yeah and this weird %A symbol keeps garbling up the power ticker at the bottem center display. The one that tells me that I'm noble and my might is unsurpassed. Doesn't seem to show up when playing under Win98 boot. Related?

	23-05-2005 15:55									#7
	Get a bigger avatar today!

No. I get those As but I never had stability problems:

Alpha Centauri.ini
[Alpha Centauri]
ds3d=1
eax=1
DirectDraw=0
FastUnitAnim=0
SmoothUnitAnim=0
MainFontSize=16
InterludeFontSize=16
DisableOpeningMovie=1
Prefs Format=12
Difficulty=5
Map Type=4
Top Menu=0
Faction=7
Preferences=10111001111000011001111110001111
More Preferences=101110101111011111011100
Semaphore=00000000
Announce=111111111011111111
Rules=1100000001110
Customize=2
Custom World=2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1,
Time Controls=1
Faction 1=GAIANS
Faction 2=HIVE
Faction 3=UNIV
Faction 4=MORGAN
Faction 5=SPARTANS
Faction 6=BELIEVE
Faction 7=PEACE
Latest Save=
Latest Scenario=
Main Volume=127
Voice Volume=85
Music Volume=63
SFX Volume=95
WindowsFileBox=0
Latest Map=D:\SMAC\maps\hmopdd2
Vehicle Groups=2047

[PREFERENCES]
ForceOldVoxelAlgorithm=1
Video Mode=1024

That's mine. See if there's anything interesting in there.

	23-05-2005 19:09									#8
	Remove this text

quote: Originally posted by #endgame @Petek: You mean code: d3d=0 ?

#endgame,

Nope, meant ds3d=0. (BTW, have you noticed that your avatar looks like an EGA version of mine!)

Grump,

The oddball characters might be caused by using a non-English version of SMAC/X, or by having activated non-English characters somewhere in Windows.

Have you tried uninstalling/reinstalling the game (which includes manually deleting any files that are left after the automated uninstall)? If not, try that.

You also might want to look at the troubleshooting tips in this link:

http://www.civgaming.net/forums/showthread.php?t=5217

HTH

	24-05-2005 09:38									#9
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Petek: Right you are, both that the option is ds3d=0 and that our avatars are strikingly similar.

	24-05-2005 09:55									#10
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

I've tried deletion and reinstallation...in fact I just got rid of two other installations which were on different locations on my harddrive. I'll try some other stuff

In the meantime...

Do you guys know of a patch or mod which will stop what I consider to be one of the most annoying behavior in the computer? Is there anything which would prevent them from starving my best bases by running deep into my territory and founding cities all around my own? Maybe a simple AI check to make sure a new base's squares does't overlap a preexisting base.

	24-05-2005 15:09									#11
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Just kill their colony pods?

	04-06-2005 08:28									#12
	Update on insane freezing Tired of ads?

Well I've been playing a bit more now and I've started getting freezing on Win 98 boot as well. A new type of crash is now occurring something involving Ddhelp doing an illegal operation. This crash boots me back to the desktop where the screen will get all fuzzy if I try to start up SMAC again. It happens on both Win98 and 2000 but the fuzzy screen is only on win98. Thankfully the appearance of this crash seems to have slightly lessened the hard lockup. Or maybe it just doesn't have a chance to occur as often. I installed the newest DirectX and drivers for my Radeon 7000. Seems to have eliminated the fuzzy screen problem but didn't do anything about the actual crash though.

	04-06-2005 14:07									#13
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

Okay, now I've run into the dreaded interceptor bug for the first time. Terran.exe crashes when I move my interceptor to attack an enemy needlejet. I've tried updating my intellimouse drivers and deleting alpha centauri.ini to no avail. I guess the game just doesn't like me today. I'm going to watch a movie

	04-06-2005 17:06									#14
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Try killing your intellimouse driver (with ctrl-alt-del) before starting Alpha Centauri. That fixed the interceptor bug for me, though my wheel didn't work.

	06-06-2005 09:15									#15
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Okay how would I do that?

opening up driver details shows

i8042prt.sys
mouclass.sys
point32.sys
ipcoin4.dll

out of these only point32 seems to be on the process list and ending it doesn't affect the mousewheel or the crashing...

	06-06-2005 10:13									#16
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

Point32.sys is the process usually suspected in the interceptor bug crash, but it can be caused by other (unknown) factors. I have point32 running on my system, but haven't seen an interceptor crash for several years.

You can disable the mouse wheel via the Mouse menu in Control Panel. That might be worth a try.

If you could post a save file of the game just prior to the crash, we could see if it reproduces on other systems.

EDIT: The wheel still works in SMAC even after disabling it in Control Panel. Guess that means that SMAC provides its own wheel support.

Last edited by Petek on 06-06-2005 at 11:06

	06-06-2005 15:17									#17
	Inflate your Upload Space

Tried disabling the mouse wheel from the control panel didn't disable the wheel or affect the crashing. Here's the sav file



link





hope I linked that up correctly...
The interceptor is in University Base and attacks the needlejet hanging around nearby.

	06-06-2005 16:45									#18
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

quote: Originally posted by Petek The wheel still works in SMAC even after disabling it in Control Panel. Guess that means that SMAC provides its own wheel support.

Actually, now that you mention it, the scrolling function of my wheel did work even after I killed point32.sys, but the click function of the wheel didn't.

	07-06-2005 05:43									#19
	Full PM-box? Change here!

quote: Originally posted by Grump Tried disabling the mouse wheel from the control panel didn't disable the wheel or affect the crashing. Here's the sav file link hope I linked that up correctly... The interceptor is in University Base and attacks the needlejet hanging around nearby.

I loaded the game, activated the interceptor in University Base and attacked the NJ. A Uni interceptor scrambled from the adjacent base and engaged my interceptor. No crash, so the save file isn't corrupt.

If you boot into Safe mode, can you start SMACX and load the save? If so, what happens then?

	07-06-2005 08:16									#20
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

terranx and terran.exe won't even start under safe mode win2000. Just your run of the mill error message

	07-06-2005 09:02									#21
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Hmm - I, too downloaded the save, and sent the interceptor from HQ to attack that noodle. game crashed (on winXP)

I'm assuming that the interceptor scramble bug took effect

I'll change mice to a non-wheel one, as well as try it on my laptop (running ME2K)

Edit: Crashed on my desktop winXP with a regular mouse, and also crashed on my laptop Me2K both with a wheelmouse and regular mouse attached and also just using the sensor pad

Last edited by Googlie on 07-06-2005 at 09:26

	07-06-2005 09:42									#22
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

Crashed here too.

	08-06-2005 03:44									#23
	Full PM-box? Change here!

So it looks like we have an instance of the interceptor bug that isn't caused by point32.dll. In this recent thread:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthre...interceptor+bug

Blackcat also reported a similar problem.

Mart7x5 didn't mention what OS he's using, but presumably it's either Win2k or WinXP. I, on the other hand, don't get the crash and am running Win ME (well, at least it runs SMAX OK!).

Grump -- You have several options:

* In the game you posted, don't attack the NJ this turn (or do anything else that would cause the Uni interceptor to scramble). That may allow you to bypass the crash.

* If that doesn't work, use the scenario editor to eliminate the Uni interceptor that's causing the crash. You should be able to continue the game, but you won't get a score.

These options won't affect the basic problem. If you want to keep troubleshooting, post again.

	08-06-2005 10:11									#24
	Support Apolyton

okay, I just wish Firaxis would get around one of these years to issue a patch for such a common problem. One of the main purposes of an expansion is to polish out the last few bugs. Not introduce a whole bunch of new ones. We shouldn't have to be going though all these stupid work arounds in the first place...

	08-06-2005 10:19									#25
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: Originally posted by Grump okay, I just wish Firaxis would get around one of these years to issue a patch for such a common problem. One of the main purposes of an expansion is to polish out the last few bugs. Not introduce a whole bunch of new ones. We shouldn't have to be going though all these stupid work arounds in the first place...

Quite true. However, see the following quote, circa 2000, from Jeffrey Morris of Firaxis regarding the interceptor bug:

"We have never been able to duplicate this bug here, which is why it remains unaddressed. The saves we've got (over 100 a least) never did it here. I've heard a way to fix this is to disable intellipoint mouse software, though how that's related I don't know. I'd be curious though if that worked for you.

jkm
firaxis games"