Misc Tech Support Issues III

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Carl Burning:

Is it me or are ATV's amphibious?

in IA10 you can drive your atv in the water and not have a problem - there also half way in and out of the ocean floor. I got screenshots to prove it if you want.

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Yes and it depends on the depth. In fact, some types of NPC units are also amphibious.

[ 01-04-2002: Message edited by: Supreme Cmdr ]

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Ben Zwycky:

as for #1, I have a screenshot of a PAS type 1 in space (using BCIA0010) (can’t give you a savegame, since it’s in IA) at

http://zwycky.webpark.cz/PAS_in_space.jpg

if that makes any difference.

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In IA0010 I specifically give a PAS1 as an asset so that you can move around faster. In a regular single-player game, SFMs do not have a choice of assets.

Since the PAS crafts are sealed, there is no reason why they can't be used in space and on planets (in the same way other crafts are). I don't allow assets choices for the SFM career because SFMs are not troops that should stray too far from their station or craft. As such, they don't need crafts. That script is an exception to the rule, since I make a lot of similar other things in IA/TA scenarios since they are designed to be played stand alone.

[Geldonyetich]

Have sent a save game regarding ships flying around under planet polygons ignoring planetfall.

I have found a means, at least on my system, to reproduce save game corruption followed by a system lockup:

1. Save game with Alt-Ctrl-S (I've done this both while in space and planet mode).

2. Go to "restore" option on main menu to restore that game.

3. Quit to menu with alt-q.

4. Restore that same game with Alt-Ctrl-S.

5. Game will now run for a few seconds and lock up computer.

6. Rebooting computer and re-starting BCM, then restoring/resuming that game will cause that lockup again; save is effectively corrupted beyond use.

I'm running Windows XP, Battlecruiser is installed to D:Program Files3000ADBattlecruiser Millennium. I'm using NTFS file mode.

[Thomas Siemens]

Geldonyetich:

Unable to reproduce (on Win2K Pro). Sorry. Game runs fine here.

Possibly memory problems on your side.

Edit: Try setting virtual memory to at least 766 MB with your 512 MB RAM. I have set it to 766 - 1029. OTOH, you have to set virtual memory to smaller caps for certain games like NFS 5, Porsche unleashed. At least for Win2K (Pro). Just my 2c.

Best regards.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Gudihl ]

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Geldonyetich:

Have sent a save game regarding ships flying around under planet polygons ignoring planetfall.

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Yes. I got it.

As I explained, they are NOT ignoring planetfall. Please read my explanation again (above) and let me know if you have any further questions.

The saved game you sent shows that they are inside the planetary sphere. Thats fine. As I explained, they should detect this and leave eventually. Unlike the player who can accidentally enter a planet, that code is disabled for NPCs. So, they can get closer to a planet than you and not be pulled in by its grav field. The only time NPCs will establish planetfall, is if they INTEND to (as seen when NPC ships are fleeing to a planet, going to land for repairs etc).

I'll just move the stations and ODS systems a bit further from the planet and then enable the planetfall breach for NPCs. The former will reduce the chance of them getting too close. The latter will cause them to enter the planet (you won't be able to find them if you chase them) and then leave again.

Its not a bug. Just something I need to tweak.

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Gudihl:

Geldonyetich:

Unable to reproduce (on Win2K Pro). Sorry. Game runs fine here.

Possibly memory problems on your side.

Edit: Try setting virtual memory to at least 766 MB with your 512 MB RAM. I have set it to 766 - 1029. OTOH, you have to set virtual memory to smaller caps for certain games like NFS 5, Porsche unleashed. At least for Win2K (Pro). Just my 2c.

Best regards.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Gudihl ]

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I can't reproduce it either.

The quick save does the SAME thing as the full save. The only difference being that the former does NOT invalidate the player object, thereby keeping the game persistent and still running. When you do a full save, the player object is invalidated and the game shut down.

In fact, since I am about to release the current patch today, I spent a considerable amount of time in that save code yesterday and found nothing wrong with it.

As for virtual memory. Do NOT mess with it unless you know what you're doing it!!! My advice is to let the OS handle it. BCM requires an insane amount of memory and especially under win2K and winXP, you do NOT want to mess with the VMM because if BCM chews up all the memory, regardless of VMM, the OS can and will croak.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Supreme Cmdr ]

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Geldonyetich:

I have found a means, at least on my system, to reproduce save game corruption followed by a system lockup:

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I can't reproduce it.

And since I can't use your saved game, wait for the next patch. And if you can reproduce it (without messing with your VMM settings), I'd be interested in the saved game.

[Guardian452]

quote:

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Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr:

As for virtual memory. Do NOT mess with it unless you know what you're doing it!!! My advice is to let the OS handle it. BCM requires an insane amount of memory and especially under win2K and winXP, you do NOT want to mess with the VMM because if BCM chews up all the memory, regardless of VMM, the OS can and will croak.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Supreme Cmdr ]

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Okiliy dokily....loosely define "insane amount of memory" for us.

I'm still learning the ropes somewhat regarding 2K. And as far as I can see, it does not let the OS handle the VMM size as Win9X does - you have to set the limits yourself.

Previously, I've had the pagefile set at a constant size of 384 MB on my 256 MB RAM system. Very recently I changed the maximum size of the pagefile to 512 MB and have not experienced one of the CTD's I was getting as yet.

[Geldonyetich]

Well, I upped my virtual memory from being "no paging file" to 766 - 1000 MB paging file, and it did not seem to solve the problem. Perhaps this is a system specific thing for me, but I generally don't experience lockups on this system.

I slightly fudged my steps to reproduce the bug, particularly step #4. Let me try that once again (inserting a step at step 0):

0. Start a new career (I do a Galcom Military launching from GalcomHQ)

1. Save game with Ctrl-Alt-S

2. Restore that same save game.

3. Quit out with Alt-Q

4. Restore the same saved game from step 1.

5. Game will now run for a few seconds and lock up.

The interesting thing about this is the game that I saved with Ctrl-Alt-S will restore fine ONCE. (My previous bug report regarding the planetary orbits was zipped from an unrestored game.) It's restoring that same saved game a second time that seems to cause the problem.

I notice the lockup seems to take up alot of processing power. I can't terminate with alt-f4. If I hit the start button, the task bar and start menu will *very slowly* come up and display. I can't open the Windows Task Manager. Right clicking on the BCM task bar icon, waiting for close to show up, and clicking close will bring up the windows "Windows cannot close" dialogue box. Clicking "end task" causes the BCM music to play for a bit, somewhat out of sync, but does not close the program.

Again, I'm running Windows XP Professional, Battlecruiser is installed to D:Program Files3000ADBattlecruiser Millennium.

Was Running these TSRs: ICQ, GetRight, Windows Messenger, and Norton Antivirus (enabled). I had tried terminating these before in order to try and salvage an already once restored save game that wasn't working, but no luck.

I'm using NTFS file mode. Cache is now set to 766-1000 on the D: drive, C: drive has no cache.

I had scheduled a chkdsk /f prior to reproducing the bug to repair some wrongly marked allocated memory. There were some indexing problems when I ran the chkdsk while writing this message. Wether this is caused by BCM or simply having to power cycle Windows XP is hard to say.

There are a couple files sitting around my BCM directory: 0000049.016 and 00000409.256, which are 151kb and 302kb respectibly.

[Guardian452]

"There are a couple files sitting around my BCM directory: 0000049.016 and 00000409.256, which are 151kb and 302kb respectibly."

They seem to be a result of patching BCM. Same on my system.

"Was Running these TSRs: ICQ, GetRight, Windows Messenger, and Norton Antivirus (enabled). I had tried terminating these before in order to try and salvage an already once restored save game that wasn't working, but no luck."

Betcha I already know the answer to this. DO NOT RUN THEM

[Guest]

If you wanna know what these files do, well at least one of them is changing the "SafeDisc" startup screen from the standard safedisc picture to the BCM startup picture *g*

[Edit] well both are changing them in different color settings as i know noted *g*

About VMM settings under Win2k and XP

Did you say that the VMM settign for c: is 0 ?????

if yes then there is your problem with these settings.

It should never be 0 on the system drive, if your HDD is fast enough leave the VMM on the system drive.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: T C McQueen ]

[Geldonyetich]

quote:

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Originally posted by T C McQueen:

About VMM settings under Win2k and XP

Did you say that the VMM settign for c: is 0 ?????

if yes then there is your problem with these settings.

It should never be 0 on the system drive, if your HDD is fast enough leave the VMM on the system drive.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: T C McQueen ][/QB]

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Actually, my system drive is D:

Windows XP actually runs quite well with no paging file whatsoever with my 512MB of RAM. However, I upped it to the 766-1000MB on the D: drive. Thus far, BCM runs identically for me with or without virtual memory.

Since I've ample hard drive space, I'm sticking with the recommended 766MB paging file anyway.

As for the TSR items in the sys tray, like I said, I tried it with and without them loaded with no noticable difference.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Geldonyetich ]

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Guardian452:

Okiliy dokily....loosely define "insane amount of memory" for us.

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A lot.

When in doubt, don't mess with the VMM settings for your system. PERIOD

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Geldonyetich:

I slightly fudged my steps to reproduce the bug, particularly step #4. Let me try that once again (inserting a step at step 0):

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Nope. Works fine here.

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Geldonyetich:

Was Running these TSRs: ICQ, GetRight, Windows Messenger, and Norton Antivirus (enabled). I had tried terminating these before in order to try and salvage an already once restored save game that wasn't working, but no luck.

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Fool.

[Geldonyetich]

quote:

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Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr:

Nope. Works fine here.

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Hmm, must be system specific to me then.

When I get the time, I think I might try running a CRC comparison on my save files before and after restoring them. If they differ, that might offer some explanation.

[Meldan]

Good bye all.

I have spent 3 weekends trying to get BCM working. It was working until just before 1.0.2 was released.

I have read and done everything in the FAQ (atleast twice) that would be applicable to my system. I have downloaded and reinstalled directx8.1, Windows Media Player 7.1, all sound and video drivers, VIA 4in1 drivers, motherboard BIOS, reinstalled Win98SE, everything remotely mentioned in the FAQ. Not to mention uninstall and reinstall BCM and reinstall BCM patches 22 times (there were times before that I didn't keep track of).

I will now go and troubleshoot my system that was rock solid stable and working perfectly before I started.

I realize that I will get banned.

[Geldonyetich]

quote:

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Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr:

Fool.[/QB]

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You're right, I'm a fool.

Killed all TSRs *BEFORE* making the save, and it worked.

Rebooted, killed Norton Antivirus 2002 Beta (Yes, dammit, a Beta even) and I'm able to save and restore an infinite number of times fine now.

Bah, simplest of computing sins and I fell for it: never trust your TSRs.

[Supreme Cmdr]

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Originally posted by Meldan:

I realize that I will get banned.

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uhm, why?

Not registering game and updating your profile would be one reason. But so far, nobody has been banned for that yet.

You've had the game for three weeks and have not registered it. I can't look at your profile to see what hardware you are running.

And for all we know, you're running a pirated version of my game.

quote:

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I will now go and troubleshoot my system that was rock solid stable and working perfectly before I started.

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Since BCM does NOT alter ANY system files used by the OS, you can't blame it for that. You evidently screwed up your system yourself.

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Supreme Cmdr ]

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Geldonyetich:

You're right, I'm a fool.

Killed all TSRs *BEFORE* making the save, and it worked.

Rebooted, killed Norton Antivirus 2002 Beta (Yes, dammit, a Beta even) and I'm able to save and restore an infinite number of times fine now.

Bah, simplest of computing sins and I fell for it: never trust your TSRs.

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There you go.

Now go get the final 1.0.04 patch

[coram]

quote:

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Originally posted by Meldan:

I have read and done everything in the FAQ (atleast twice) that would be applicable to my system. I have downloaded and reinstalled directx8.1, Windows Media Player 7.1, all sound and video drivers, VIA 4in1 drivers, motherboard BIOS, reinstalled Win98SE, everything remotely mentioned in the FAQ. Not to mention uninstall and reinstall BCM and reinstall BCM patches 22 times (there were times before that I didn't keep track of).

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Sorry to cut in here but I notice you have a Via chipset. They are notorious for thier instability. When I built this PC (also with Via chipset) I was pulling my hair out. You have to load the correct drivers, in the correct order.

This forum really helped me, check it out: Helpfull Via support forum

Hope this helps.

[Fractux]

Was just playing a game of BCM. I had made a jump from Centris->Pluto->Earth.

Upon approaching GalcomHQ I noticed the entire middle core was, well, missing. I took some shots. [You can see what it looked like in this post

Now my problem is this. Upon trying to load my save game again. I would receive "error, invalid .sav file".

I have not tampered with any of my files. And this just happened after I tried to start again.

This happened in Ver 1.0.0.3 and my savegames are here [load game Fractux ->> #7]

[Supreme Cmdr]

quote:

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Originally posted by Fractux:

Upon approaching GalcomHQ I noticed the entire middle core was, well, missing. I took some shots. [You can see what it looked like in

this post

Now my problem is this. Upon trying to load my save game again. I would receive "error, invalid .sav file".

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1. Get better video drivers. I've said it once before, the 2311 drivers are buggy. Also, make sure that the Mipmap Detail Level in the Direct3D section of the driver applet is set to the default (Best Image Quality). A LOT of people are messing with the default driver settings and not having a clue what the ramifications of that are.

2. You will only get that message if you are using older saved games

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Supreme Cmdr ]

[Fractux]

quote:

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Originally posted by Supreme Cmdr:

2. You will only get that message if you are using older saved games

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Sorry SC. I failed to mention that I am not using 1.0.0.4 and this game was started with ver 1.0.0.3

It also ONLY happens with my last save #7.

To correct what I said above the exact error is

"FATAL ERROR .sav file format error"

[ 01-05-2002: Message edited by: Fractux ]

[Guest Phantom3253]

Is this happening to anyone else? I just downloaded the latest patch and when I click new game or try to restore a game. BCM just seems to lock up and do nothing.