25-07-2002 18:58									#1
	WinXP Issues Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

I hope someone can help.

I have SMAC, SMAC/AC and the Planetary Pack.
I've just gotten a new WinXP system, and
I can't seem to get SMAC and/or SMACX to
work reliably under XP. Since there are
so many folks who have it working, I suspect
a driver issue, so I'll throw in some
likely suspects.

I'm using a new system: XP with current
updates, nVidia TI 4600 (ASUS with ASUS
drivers) and an SB Audigy Gamer card.
I'm running under DirectX 8.1. The
system has an Intel 2.26GHz cpu and
512mb RAM. The 4600 drivers are the
latest ASUS ones, I think they are 28.32.

I first tried the Planetary pack. The
start file from the cdrom failed, so I
put the the game in Win98 compat mode
and started with the Terran/TerranX
programs. Terran worked, TerranX did
not. I then updated each program and
added the SMAC startup fix. Neither
worked, failing with the the cpu type
warning, so I fixed that.

Now SMAC worked, but SMACX did not.
I continued to try to get SMACX to work,
and in the process of reloading and
such, got to the point where neither
one will work! I'm at a loss. I've
tried reloading and repatching; setting
compat mode to Win 95 and Win2k.
Nothing seems to help.

Anyone have any insights? I'm not an
inexperienced troubleshooter, but I'm
new to XP, so I figured I'd ask the
experts.

Thanks for any info,

Robear

	26-07-2002 02:29									#2
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

Well, what I did was to reinstall clean, then unset all
the compatibility options back to XP standard. Then
I installed the ini file and tweaked it. This worked for
both games. Then I updated SMAC and put in the
exe fix, and this worked also.

I got the ini file from the one posted this week, but
it had a typo in it in the screen size setting. The
value was 1084, but should be 1024. Here is the
file I ended up using.

Note that I've turned off Direct Draw, since my
video card is 16/32 bit color. I suspect that did
the trick, but I'm not sure.

Robear

[Alpha Centauri]
ds3d=1
eax=1
FastUnitAnim=0
SmoothUnitAnim=0
MainFontSize=16
InterludeFontSize=16
DisableOpeningMovie=1
Prefs Format=12
Difficulty=5
Map Type=3
Top Menu=0
Faction=1
Direct Draw=0
Video Mode=1024
WindowsFileBox=0
Preferences=10011011111000111101001010000111
More Preferences=101111101011111100101100
Semaphore=00000000
Announce=111100110010101111
Rules=101100000011110
Customize=2
Time Controls=1
Custom Map X=128
Custom Map Y=128
Faction 1=GAIANS
Faction 2=HIVE
Faction 3=UNIV
Faction 4=MORGAN
Faction 5=SPARTANS
Faction 6=BELIEVE
Faction 7=PEACE
Latest Scenario=
Main Volume=79
Voice Volume=80
Music Volume=63
SFX Volume=107
Base Sort=0
Gamma Correction=100
[PREFERENCES]
ForceOldVoxelAlgorithm=1

	26-07-2002 03:10									#3
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

(applauds)

Well done Robear, no one answered your thread, but you managed the thing anyway

	26-07-2002 11:21									#4
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

OOPS - I'm the culprit who posted the .ini file details on the other thread

I actually run VideoMode=1200, but edited that and got it wrong (I'll edit the actual thread so that others won't copy that mistake)

I also run the classic windows type boxes rather than tyhe custom Firaxis ones - the line to edit should then be:

WindowsFileBox=1

If you want no-cd capability, then replace the exiting .exe files with the 2 no-cd files. get them at:

http://googlie2.tripod.com/rynnsgallery/id8.html

G.

	26-07-2002 18:31									#5
	Get a bigger avatar today!

Well, to be honest, the really weird
assumption I made was that if it was not
working reliably in compat mode, maybe I
screwed things up with the order of the
patch installs or something. But that
did not explain why it failed on the
initial startups.

With XP, if you uninstall, then re-install,
it keeps the same compat settings that you
had before uninstalling, so I had to change
them all back to standard, no compat mode.
Then test, then build ini, then add the
patch, then the startup patch because it's
the Planetary Pack.

With this in place, I could figure out
what had happened. I had actually used
*both* patches at one point - that's not
needed and probably messed things up.
But I think it was turning the Direct
Draw off that really did make the
difference. When that was done, and
the cpu tweak was put in, it ran fine
before and after patching. this is
probably important because my video
card won't do 8 bit, and if that was
requested, it might choke. I don't
know this for sure but it's my working
hypothesis.

The other WinXP oddity is that creating
a text file with the name "alphacentaur.ini"
did not prevent a file with the same name
but a different type from being created
by the patch installation process.
I had to copy the contents into that new
one to get the game to notice.

I'm just putting this stuff up in case
anyone else finds themselves in the same
mess at some point. :-) Ultimately, it
was reading the past messages and the
Win2K troubleshooting thread that put it
together for me, and I commend those
to anyone following in this path.

Thanks!

Robear

	02-08-2002 03:59									#6
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

I'm a newbie of newbies with a xp machine that crashes on "terran exe" in smac. After lurking ( also my first time) today I found one reference that mentioned it as if everyone knew of it. Anyhelp for you all ?? or references where I could find help ? EA's help support's suggestions didn't work. The darn thing crashes just as it's getting interesting around yr2400.

	02-08-2002 19:00									#7
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

If you've reached 2400 in gameplay, it sounds like one of the gameplay bug crashes.

Offhand I can recall three:

The interceptor scramble crash (you have an interceptor on alert or on hold, and it scrambles to meet an incoming enemy threat - game freezes) - solution is to always hit "spacebar" with your interceptors - that way you control the scrambles.

this seems to happen less frequently with WinXP, but can happen

The North Pole bug (you move a unit to the topmost row of tiles, and next turn to move it, game freezes) - solution is to reload that turn, and put that unit on "automatic" - the computer will move it off for you

The design workshop overload bug (you enter the design workshop thru the "change build orders" option in the base screen and try to manage the obsolescence feature from there - the screen at times will just freeze, and exit and reload is the only option) Solution is always to manage obsolescence thru the "menu" and "HQ" and "workshop" route.

this seems to be unique to WinXP

Might it have been any of these?

G.

	03-08-2002 02:34									#8
	Increase Your PM Length

G. Thanks for the good try.
But I guess I should have been a little more specific on the problem ( I assummed it might be some common mistake by beginners) So I'll try again.
1. The screen does not freeze, it dumps me completely out of the program back to the desktop with a message that " terran.exe" was nonresponsive. and do I want to send the details to microsoft. I didn't bother.
2. It may be related to the "change" build you mentioned, as the major tech advances were coming very fast, though I was not trying to obsolete anything.
3. I t also seems to happen when the actions of the AI is running a lot of movement of its pieces. Sometimes in very repetitive motions. Today three of the factions were all ganging up on my poor little Univ. guys when it went crash on yr2398. Is there perhaps something limiting the number of balls in the air either ac or more to the point xp can handle ? ( I vaguely recall that back in the early 60's we were allowed only three balls
in the air at one time (registers, I think I remember it was. Sorry about the senior moment here. But also remember in the 80's there was a strange 15 limit on things that I never understood in late dos or early windows.)
4. In some cases where the audio was "talking" it would actually stutter 5-10 times before the crash.
5. I had no interceptors.

Last edited by Kajak on 03-08-2002 at 03:01

	03-08-2002 06:20									#9
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

K:

I should have been more specific too.

On my desktop, (WinXP) I get booted out of the game with the "Do you want to notify Microsoft?" message, and when I choose "No", the screen then resizes from it's smac/x resolution back to my normal desktop resolution.

On my laptop (WinME) I do get an utter game freeze - just have to reboot the laptop.

On my desktop I'm running a P4 1.8, with 512 MB ram and nVidia Riva TNT2 model 64 pro. I have heard that some other graphics cards work with no problems at all, while others seem to sieze up more frequently than I experience.

Not sure if the # units being moved around by the AI has any bearing - I frequently play on 256 x 256 maps, and with game end set to 2800 (tech stagnation) and have had several games where the #units for me has been over 1000 and combined for the AI in excess of 3000, with no problems

G.

	03-08-2002 07:38									#10
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

G.
Went back to the game where I was booted out at y2398 ( I had saved at y2389) and tried to make sure all was calm ( no pounding on the key board when they sank my best ship) , least amount of automation on my part, and it still crashed at more or less the same point.

I picked up the name of the Fireaxis guy( re: xp patches) on another thread and sent a message to them offering to help on the patches ( little that i could probable do, ) . It looks as if you're right about the number of "registers" not being the problem, so there goes my only idea. In any case thank you for your help.

Probable should be a new thread, but stuff all the older stategies say works, just put me in worse trouble.
My real question is have "they" perhaps also tweaked the AI in the later editions???
Kajak.

	04-08-2002 23:02									#11
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Back to the "terran.exe" total crash problem, yaa, one more time.
I have now a game saved where only several more strokes on the key board adjusting short build lists during a game yr turn pause will do the crash. i.e. no planes were flying, no patrols, no formers during things or otherwise.
Probable opening too many doors for would be humerists, but any ideas on what if anything useful someone could do with this??? It's way over my pay grade.

	05-08-2002 04:02									#12
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Interestingly, this past week or so I've been getting a terran.exe crash every time i try to start a new game with random seven factions and random play faction.

It even spills over into regular games immediately thereafter, so that I get the crash before I load any game.

The solution (for me) is to start the game through the "start/programs/firaxis games/s..m..a..c../run s..m..a..c.."

Seems to work then (even random factions and random player)

G.

	05-08-2002 08:49									#13
	Suffering from ads?

quote: Originally posted by Kajak 4. In some cases where the audio was "talking" it would actually stutter 5-10 times before the crash.

I'm not exactly sure where, maybe the readme, but I came across a mention that SMAC might have have sound problems when running on an NT system. Since XP is sort of an extension of NT, the sound will no doubt stutter on it as well. But I don't think that's what's causing the crashes. I'm having problems as well, since I upgraded to XP, but it's never happened during a sound event.

It was interesting that you mentioned the AI movement. It seems to me that's when it crashes on me, though I can't really say if it's because of a lot of units being moved. I had one incident that I could repeat, and it seems to me that it only happens when a certain unit makes a move.

Just in case anyone isn't aware, Firaxis is working on a patch that will deal with XP issues. There's no release date yet though, and it sounds to me like it might be awhile before it's ready. Dan Magaha more or less mentioned that it's not their biggest priority at the moment.

	07-08-2002 20:02									#14
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

G. and W.
After three weeks at this game I finally won one with the Ascent. The interesting part was again the "terran.exe" crashes around the yr2400-2420 area of the game . I had the crashes, but I was tiptoeing through the time period, saving every 5 yrs or so. The main difference in getting through the crash gap (arg!) was changing a pact I had with the greens on the same big island and not agreeing to a pact. This stopped the AI from doing wheelies with every green piece it had all over my territory. Later in our war there was a lot of action but all response to my actions or straight out attacks by the AI.

Question or speculation, Is there something that happens around this stage of the game that actually gives the machine less to keep track of ? After about 2420 I had no more trouble, even with research, upgrades, and fast build completions pouring in like mad.

Do your crashes happen around the same place, difference places for differing players may just reflect differening styes of play?

	08-08-2002 04:54									#15
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

It seems likely that you are getting the interceptor crash in some form, perhaps between two AI dudes, so you don't see it happening. IIRC, I've noticed that the annoying antics of Yang's Million Drone Air Force (or its equivalent in other factions) seem to stop at some point. I think that I have also been gifted by large numbers of planes occasionally when pacted with the AI, perhaps indicating that it thinks they are not so useful at that time. I suppose that the AI's strategy is dependent on various things, like what techs have been discovered, so that it might suddenly change horses with the planes if its guidelines call for that.

	09-08-2002 06:36									#16
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

johnd.

Well I guess it could be out of sight problems between two or more AI factions, my own stubborn (maybe spelled stupid) problem is that if that's true I might as well give up and I am not ready to do that yet .

I've read in the threads of the infamouse interceptor crash, but what in detail actually happens ( not what is going on in the game but the machine systems, i.e. do you get the same "terran.exe" message and then the return to desktop or complete freeze that needs rebooting or .....) ?
I'm probably nieve, but I think that the better we can pin point the terran.exe crashes with Win xp the better our chances of getting the powers that be to fix it.
For me, it's either that or go read how someone won the game with gazillions of points on the first turn...

Speaking of which, I did today win my first Supreme Leader win on the Yr2361, thus one way to avoid the dreaded xp terran.exe crash gap around 2410.

I think a fun thread might be on how dumb is the AI and the silly things it does in a fight.

	11-08-2002 18:49									#17
	Increase the size of your Attachments

I am still having trouble getting SMACX running on my new XP machine. SMAC runs fine, and SMACX will run if I select quickstart or a saved game. However if I try to start a new game it crashes right after I make my rules selection (ie just as it should be going to the Faction selection screen IIRC). Has anyone else had this particular problem? Does anyone have any idea why the game might be crashing in this particular place?

Btw, both SMAC and SMACX are patched (4.0 and 2.0 respectively), I have set the config file to get past the unknown processor crash, and the game crashes politely to the little apologetic box that asks whether I want to send a notice to microshaft.

Thanks...

	12-08-2002 06:43									#18
	Increase Your PM Length

What sort of crash is it?
If it's a "illegal op" crash then I have no idea...
If the choose faction screen doesn't display correctely (no buttons etc, you can't quit so it's effectively locked up) then it's due to bad alphax.txt and/or custom factions.

	12-08-2002 09:19									#19
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Sikander, is the faction list in AlphaCentauri.ini OK - are the indicted faction files all there?

	13-08-2002 05:15									#20
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quote: Originally posted by johndmuller Sikander, is the faction list in AlphaCentauri.ini OK - are the indicted faction files all there?

I assume so. I have used both the file created by saving a quickstart game and then trying to start a new game as well as the ini file located above, but neither one can get me past this point. As for the faction files themselves being all there, I haven't checked yet (I'm at work at the moment), but I assume so. I haven't done anything to the game but install it and install the patches, so there is no way a custom faction or the like could be to blame.

The crash message refers to an icd file IIRC, and I never get to the faction selection screen, once I choose the rules I want to use it gives me a crash message which asks whether I want to report the problem to microsoft, and deposits me back on the desktop. It definitely seems like the problem has to do with the faction selection module or some of the files it call like factions. The problem is that I haven't messed with them at all, they are straight from the disk or the latest patch. I'll take a close look at the error message and report back tonight.

Thanks

	13-08-2002 09:37									#21
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

Sikander:

I get that same situation from time to time, but in my case I know what the problem is:

I have the seven smac factions files, the 7 smax factions files and around 30 clone and other faction files all in my smac directory

However you are limited to 7 smac. 7 smax and 7 alternate factions in the alphax.txt file (actually you can put as many as you like, but the game faction choice window will only erad the first seven).

When I play a PBEM that needs one of the remaining 23 factions, I'm OK, as the gamefile can read the txt and graphics files from the smac directory.

However, next time I try to start a game, the .ini file goes looking in alphax.txt for that faction, and can't find it, so will boot me out.

I either get a complete freeze with a graphics picture of Deirdre or Aki, and nothing will make the PC work except a power button reboot, or it will collapse back to my desktop with the "do you want to report to microsoft" message.

I know you say you just have vanilla smac and smax loaded, but might you have downloaded any of the clone factions or aquatic factions for scenario challenges or multiplay games?

G.

	14-08-2002 02:43									#22
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quote: Originally posted by Googlie Sikander: I get that same situation from time to time, but in my case I know what the problem is: I have the seven smac factions files, the 7 smax factions files and around 30 clone and other faction files all in my smac directory However you are limited to 7 smac. 7 smax and 7 alternate factions in the alphax.txt file (actually you can put as many as you like, but the game faction choice window will only erad the first seven). When I play a PBEM that needs one of the remaining 23 factions, I'm OK, as the gamefile can read the txt and graphics files from the smac directory. However, next time I try to start a game, the .ini file goes looking in alphax.txt for that faction, and can't find it, so will boot me out. I either get a complete freeze with a graphics picture of Deirdre or Aki, and nothing will make the PC work except a power button reboot, or it will collapse back to my desktop with the "do you want to report to microsoft" message. I know you say you just have vanilla smac and smax loaded, but might you have downloaded any of the clone factions or aquatic factions for scenario challenges or multiplay games? G.

Googlie,

I wish I could say that I have, but I just got this new computer and the only things that have gone into that directory are SMAC, SMACX and the version 4 and version 2 patches respectively. The ini file has the original factions only in it, and the faction profiles include those plus the 7 SMACX factions.

The game will load a saved game and play normally, and quickstart works as well. But when I choose start game it reliably chokes immediately after I have selected the rules and gives the following message:

"TERRANX.ICD has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience."

So the faction files are there, the factions arel listed in the ini file, there are no files that are not directly from Firaxis. Wtf? I'm going to have another bash at it and see if I can figure it out.

	14-08-2002 04:11									#23
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

Well, I have it going finally. There does appear to be something about the order you do things. I noticed that the game ran fine unpatched. Unfortunately I can't settle for unpatched SMACX, too many things are broken. Here is the order that I used successfully.

1) Install SMAC
2) Install SMACX
3) modify the SMAC ini file = ForceOldVoxelAlgorithm=1 (be sure to save it)
4) start a game of smacx and save and quit
5) apply SMACXPV2

I haven't applied the SMAC v4 patch yet, as I hardly play SMAC and I don't want to tempt fate.

	16-08-2002 02:39									#24
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

Guys, all my crash problems have suddenly disappeared. I used to get both the North Pole crash and the interceptor crash. But now I get neither.

What I did was reduce my game size to "huge" from custom that was larger than huge.

I also set EAX=0.

As soon as I can, I will find out if either of these tweaks or the combination was the solution.

BTW, I have a Santa Cruz sound card that has EAX. This, IIRC, is a 3D Audio technology from a company that no longer is in business. If you are having start problems, it may be because the Splash screen for this old company's logo is attempting to display or make its noise. I too have disabled that on my machine by editing the Resistry. If any would like details on this, I will look it up and reply when I get home.

	17-08-2002 01:46									#25
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Well last night, I tried loaded a customer world game larger than Huge with eax=0. It continued to experience the interceptor crash.

I'll try a few more variations this weekend to see if I can confirm what triggers the crash.

	19-08-2002 14:31									#26
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

EAX is not dead. It's creative labs crappy sound api.

	19-08-2002 20:08									#27
	Inflate your Upload Space

I only got SMAC, patched to version 4, and it also crashes in WinXP with that question to send a report.
So far i've eonly seen solutions for SMACX, are there any just for SMAC?
I tried setting eax=0, that didn't work, compatibility mode with win98 also didn't work.

My system:
Athlon 1800+xp
256mb ddr
Asus v8170 DDR Gforce 4mx 64mb
No extra sound card, just one that's on the motherboard.

	19-08-2002 22:03									#28
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Some recent experiences with the xp problems.
1. Was getting kind of lucky as I had got through the game to several wins past the "terran.exe" gap around yr2400. Soooo! I decided to add the #4 patch. It then would come up with the fireaxis logo then crash back to the desktop with no message. Then I rooted out all the smac parts, reloaded it without the patch and it runs fine up to the "terran.exe" crash except they now happen yr2330 to yr2370.

I still think it has something to do with how much action is going on with all the pieces being moved at more or less than the sametime. Why is the gap moving up sooner the more I play, well that may be just my learning curve as I get things going sooner ???

The only way I've got past the "gap" was to eliminate all automatic actions ( patroling, auto formers, ect) as much as I coud near and during the "gap".

	20-08-2002 04:58									#29
	Remove this text

Also any advice for Ac on XP I get logo then TerranX exception Ive tried various approaches to no avail any help welcome.

	28-08-2002 22:10									#30
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kaigun;
You might try cleaning out your version in all respects, then reloading without the Patch 4. ( I'm assumming here you have the p4 installed.) In either case try it.

I just had a very aggrivating terran.exe crash at y2395 and swore I wouldn't touch this again until there was a solution if any. If and when there is one, someone please drop me a e-mail as I do love the game otherwise. Bye for now, have fun...