Updated Compilation of Vista Issues/Fixes
By
Adar_ICT,
Posted on: 2007-03-12 11:34 in ALL ACCESS Gameplay Technical Issues Bugs
.... As previously mentioned, it actually has a 160 GB hard drive with 512 in addition to that; the total size is not 512 RAM.
*looks at spec sheet* confusing....
OK, you have a 512MB machine running Vista. Now the game itself uses somewhere in the vicinity of 400-700MB of memory itself (CoV, PvP and new Faultline zones are the worse). Vista takes up a bit more memory than XP so in all likelihood you are using 300+MB before you even start the game, so with the game running, alot of it in "memory" is actually on disk in the swap/page file.
Now when you zone, the game dumps 100-200 MB of resources of the old zone before it can load the resources of the new zone. If the data it is getting rid of is in the page file, it first must be loaded into real memory from disk and then discarded and since reading from the HD is a good 50-100 times slower than real memory, it isn't a quick process. When new data is loaded the reverse is true. The new data must be loaded first into real memory and then it ends up being swapped into the page file to open up more real memory to load more data. It also can be a long process.
You can get an idea of how long it takes because the freeing of the old zone data is done when the generic game splash screen is up, loading of the new data is done with the zone specific splash screen is up.
This is why people like saying everyone needs 1 to 2GB of memory, once you do this, the load times can be reduced to 10-20 seconds.
Father Xmas - Level 50 Ice/Ice Tanker - Victory
$725 and $1350 parts lists --- My guide to computer components
Tempus unum hominem manet
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She has 160 GB + 512MB that is more than enough to run Vista and/or any game out there-
It sounds like something is running in the background on top of CoV-
"I'm not scared of anyone or anything Angie. Isn't that the way life should be?"
Jack Hawksmoor, The Authority.
It doesn't matter if she has 160GB or a 1TB hard drive, if an application's working set, the amount of memory it's churning through while running, is a lot more than the amount of free "real" physical memory, the program will be slow. Period. 20-40MB/s read/write speed from a hard drive sounds fast until you compare it to the 6000-12000MB/s read/write speed of real memory.
Father Xmas - Level 50 Ice/Ice Tanker - Victory
$725 and $1350 parts lists --- My guide to computer components
Tempus unum hominem manet
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.... As previously mentioned, it actually has a 160 GB hard drive with 512 in addition to that; the total size is not 512 RAM.
*looks at spec sheet* confusing....
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<QR>
She has 160 GB + 512MB that is more than enough to run Vista and/or any game out there-
It sounds like something is running in the background on top of CoV-
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Unfortunately you've both misunderstood a very important aspect of how computer hardware works. Hard drive "memory" is a very different thing from "RAM memory". The two are effectively unrelated. Slightly more technical things things like paging files aside, the hard drive is used to store long-term data, the RAM is used to temporarily store stuff that's you are trying to use right there and then - like your operating system or any programs you run e.g. CoH.
You could have a 70 bajillion GB hard drive, it still wouldn't help you run a program that needs to expand out to 1GB or more in RAM when it is running.
As others have mentioned, ideally you want at least 2GB of RAM to run Vista & CoH and the size of your hard drive is completely irrelevant to that calculation.
-k
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.... my bad. This machine has a 160 GB hard drive; I think the 512 is in addition to that.
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You should keep the 160 Gig of Hard Drive storage space... just the way it is and that is fine. You also need to change the additonal 512 Megs of RAM... to 2 Gigs of RAM by adding more RAM into the machine. Then (assuming the computer is relatively new) your game play and everything else you do on that computer will load fast enough. 
.... unfortunately for me, all of the above makes a great deal of logical sense. The machine I am on right now only has 512 RAM, but it also has a *crappy* built-in video-card; its about half as graphically-intense as the new machine. So it can at least RUN, whereas the newbie gets pretty much overloaded with too many pretty graphics - and at low settings, no less.
I'm going to see what I can do as far as twisting the other half's arm into adding more RAM, because in my short amount of play-time the added graphics add up to an AMAZING gaming-experience. Metallic things are actually metallic; capes move into a whole new dimension of movement-detail, ambient light shades my character..!!! That probably sounds really stupid to you guys, but it's new to me And since I've seen it, I now have to have it.
Thank you for the responses and apologies for my know-nothing questions. I'm really not a techie at all, as you can probably deduce. lol
Hello everyone.
I am using a laptop running Vista home premium. I am experiencing brighter than usual colors when I log in and texture flashing problems as well. The textures will flash at times and appear to be missing at other times. I was wondering if anyone has experienced this before.
Everything else works well in cox, but the graphics issues are annoying.
My current system specifications:
Core 2 Duo 2.16 ghz
mobility radeon x1900
2 GB ram
1920x1200 resolution
100 GB hard drive
Driver Packaging Version 8.332-070108a1-039663E-FIC
Thanks for any help
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Hello everyone.
I am using a laptop running Vista home premium. I am experiencing brighter than usual colors when I log in and texture flashing problems as well. The textures will flash at times and appear to be missing at other times. I was wondering if anyone has experienced this before.
Everything else works well in cox, but the graphics issues are annoying.
My current system specifications:
Core 2 Duo 2.16 ghz
mobility radeon x1900
2 GB ram
1920x1200 resolution
100 GB hard drive
Driver Packaging Version 8.332-070108a1-039663E-FIC
Thanks for any help
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Pretty sure this is an ATI driver problem. Dunno if there is a driver you can use to fix this problem considering you have a laptop. Perhaps one of the ATI gurus can chime in?
With laptops, it's best to go to the laptop manufacturer's website to see if they have new versions of the latest drivers. Sometimes the latest and greatest from the ATI/nVidia don't work very well in laptops.
bad_influence: Given that you already have half a gig, you *might* be able to upgrade with just one more gigabyte instead of throwing out the half gig you have now and getting two gig. Check with your manufacturer. Two gig would really be better but 1.5 might make for a good fallback position in negotiations.
Speaking of memory.... what's with that flash drive extension thing? I got a cheap'o 2 gig one to help move things from my old PC to my new one. The memory in that flash drive seemed to be moving a lot slower than my hard drive. If flash drives are slower than hard drives, what's the point of adding them to the memory pool?
Ok, first I'm going to list my system specs and hopefully this will help that we can diagnose my problem:
Windows Vista Business
AMD Athlon64 3700+ San Diego Core
MSI nForce 4 M/B
2GB CAS 2 DDR RAM in dual-channel
nVidia/XFX 7900GT Xtreme Edition (using 158.18 drivers)
My problem lies in really low framerates, running around 25fps in outdoor zones. My XP drive (I'm dual booting until Vista stabilizes) runs CoX at around 35-60fps outdoors. My resolution for both desktop and game on both OS's is 1280x1024.
Here is what I've tried so far:
-compatiblecursors 1 - Check!
Compatibility mode in XP SP2 and 'Disable desktop composition' - Check!
FSAAx4 through nVidia control panel and disabled FSAA in game - Check!
Disabled Bloom and DoF effects - Check!
I am concerned as to whether or not this is normal performance running through Vista as opposed to XP. I see a lot of people excited using the new OS once using the tweaks, so far I'm not seeing anything better than what I get with XP though. Should my framerates be this low with the new OS? Not sure what to do here, any recommendations would be greatly appreciated however.
There could still be some odd setting different between the two.
Can you actually print out your registry settings or something so you can compare them between the two OS's? They are under Current User\Software\Cryptic.
I have a issue with vista, but am not sure what to try next i've read all the threads and only found one that is similar to my problem and tried the fixes for that. And it doesn't work. K...heres the issue, Go to load CoH it brings up the updater, get through the updates (this is after a fresh install) and the screen goes black....once in awhile the city of heroes screen will flash breifly but then goes black again. Can't get to the login screen.....eventually have to hit the Cntrl+Alt+Del keys and it says that its not responding. Wondering if anyone know how to fix this. I've updated my Nvidia drivers to the latest.
My video card is nvidia geforce 5200 with these most current (at least on nvidia's site) of 9.6.8.5
Running Windows Vista 32bit
With 2 Gigs of RAM
Hope someone can shed some light on to this very frustrating problem
Soon�
I am also getting a crash when I quit out of CoH. It was not doing this originally, but started doing it shortly after I got my video settings tweaked etc.
I have to ctrl alt delete to get to the error message and thus close down the game.
It says its an error with a third party dll file "PhysXLoader" Or was it PhysXcore either way its that dll.
I just installed the latest nvidia drivers for vista x64. It was doing this prior to that update as well.
Other specs:
AMD athlon 3000+
3G Ram
Asus A8N-SLI Dekuxe
EVGA gforce 8800 GTX
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the city of heroes screen will flash breifly but then goes black again.
My video card is nvidia geforce 5200
Hope someone can shed some light on to this very frustrating problem
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The light has been shed.
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Ok, first I'm going to list my system specs and hopefully this will help that we can diagnose my problem:
Windows Vista Business
AMD Athlon64 3700+ San Diego Core
MSI nForce 4 M/B
2GB CAS 2 DDR RAM in dual-channel
nVidia/XFX 7900GT Xtreme Edition (using 158.18 drivers)
My problem lies in really low framerates, running around 25fps in outdoor zones. My XP drive (I'm dual booting until Vista stabilizes) runs CoX at around 35-60fps outdoors. My resolution for both desktop and game on both OS's is 1280x1024.
Here is what I've tried so far:
-compatiblecursors 1 - Check!
Compatibility mode in XP SP2 and 'Disable desktop composition' - Check!
FSAAx4 through nVidia control panel and disabled FSAA in game - Check!
Disabled Bloom and DoF effects - Check!
I am concerned as to whether or not this is normal performance running through Vista as opposed to XP. I see a lot of people excited using the new OS once using the tweaks, so far I'm not seeing anything better than what I get with XP though. Should my framerates be this low with the new OS? Not sure what to do here, any recommendations would be greatly appreciated however.
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Unfortunately, yes, this is normal for your rig. Upgrading to a dual-core processor would help immensely.
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I have a issue with vista, but am not sure what to try next i've read all the threads and only found one that is similar to my problem and tried the fixes for that. And it doesn't work. K...heres the issue, Go to load CoH it brings up the updater, get through the updates (this is after a fresh install) and the screen goes black....once in awhile the city of heroes screen will flash breifly but then goes black again. Can't get to the login screen.....eventually have to hit the Cntrl+Alt+Del keys and it says that its not responding. Wondering if anyone know how to fix this. I've updated my Nvidia drivers to the latest.
My video card is nvidia geforce 5200 with these most current (at least on nvidia's site) of 9.6.8.5
Running Windows Vista 32bit
With 2 Gigs of RAM
Hope someone can shed some light on to this very frustrating problem
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You need to use the nVidia beta drivers. There are many.
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I am also getting a crash when I quit out of CoH. It was not doing this originally, but started doing it shortly after I got my video settings tweaked etc.
I have to ctrl alt delete to get to the error message and thus close down the game.
It says its an error with a third party dll file "PhysXLoader" Or was it PhysXcore either way its that dll.
I just installed the latest nvidia drivers for vista x64. It was doing this prior to that update as well.
Other specs:
AMD athlon 3000+
3G Ram
Asus A8N-SLI Dekuxe
EVGA gforce 8800 GTX
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Someone else had this issue which I don't believe was ever solved.
I'm wondering if it has anything to do with the I9 pre-download. The pre-download would fire up just as you left the game, right before you hit the desktop, and this seems to be where this crashing happens.
This might be something you want to discuss with support.
Right, and I was thinking that too. But that error message seems to indicate its something else. Is there a way to stop that pre-download from running?
I know it was working at one point, because it had started a download that I canceled cause I was working on fixing my mouse pointers hehe
RiptorDawnson, your video card is supported but just barely. Couple that with Vista's increased need for graphics and I think you've pushed your card over the edge. nVidia has fleshed out the 8000 series now, you might want to go pick one up. (Still no DirectX 10 for ATI!)
MysticFox, you might want to grab the latest drivers from Ageia to see if they help. Also, when you run CoH, are you running as an admin?
Ok, I just got a new laptop with Vista and can almost get CoH to run, but not quite. It looks like it trys to reset the resolution of the display but gets stuck. I am left with the game running inside of box in the center of the screen. Note that this is not a Windows box. Around the box I can see my regular background. My mouse is also offset. The cursor is there and I can see it if I am in the box, but where it is and what buttons it is highlighting in CoH are out of sync. As a result I cannot hit Back, Next, etc. I can only get out of the game by ctrl-alt-del and close it in Task Manager.
Video card is NVIDIA GeForce Go 7950 GTX
Driver is version 7.15.10.9759
I've tried to get another driver from nVidia but they don't even list this card or show Vista for the 7000 series.
Help!
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Ok, I just got a new laptop with Vista and can almost get CoH to run, but not quite. It looks like it trys to reset the resolution of the display but gets stuck. I am left with the game running inside of box in the center of the screen. Note that this is not a Windows box. Around the box I can see my regular background. My mouse is also offset. The cursor is there and I can see it if I am in the box, but where it is and what buttons it is highlighting in CoH are out of sync. As a result I cannot hit Back, Next, etc. I can only get out of the game by ctrl-alt-del and close it in Task Manager.
Video card is NVIDIA GeForce Go 7950 GTX
Driver is version 7.15.10.9759
I've tried to get another driver from nVidia but they don't even list this card or show Vista for the 7000 series.
Help!
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You're right that it's a resolution issue. The game is trying to run in a resolution that your laptop doesn't like. You could try entering the game in safe mode so you can set a more appropriate resolution, manually edit resolution in the registry, or use a utility like TweakCoH.
And you're also right that nVidia is not offering up any Vista drivers for the Go 7-series. Your only option at the moment is to continue to use the drivers that shipped with your laptop or to find beta drivers that have been inf-modded to include your card.
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Ok, I just got a new laptop with Vista and can almost get CoH to run, but not quite. It looks like it trys to reset the resolution of the display but gets stuck. I am left with the game running inside of box in the center of the screen. Note that this is not a Windows box. Around the box I can see my regular background. My mouse is also offset. The cursor is there and I can see it if I am in the box, but where it is and what buttons it is highlighting in CoH are out of sync. As a result I cannot hit Back, Next, etc. I can only get out of the game by ctrl-alt-del and close it in Task Manager.
Video card is NVIDIA GeForce Go 7950 GTX
Driver is version 7.15.10.9759
I've tried to get another driver from nVidia but they don't even list this card or show Vista for the 7000 series.
Help!
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Take note of your display's current resolution. Change your display's resolution to 800x600. This should match the game's resolution in Safe Mode and you should be able to see then entire screen as well as the menu options. Once in game, change the game resolution to your preferred monitor resolution. Exit the game, change your monitor resolution back to normal, and restart the game. All should be well now.
-Wolf sends
I'm getting it to work now. I noticed that the Gadget sidebar was always there. When I disabled it the resolution box and cursor alignment problems went away so I can play now! The cursor itself is still a little off, but I can live with that since I can play and the main graphics are fine.
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This machine has 512 MB RAM
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DING!
Vista barely fits into 512 MB of RAM, forget about a game that optimally wants 1 GB of RAM all for itself. Adding another 512 MB of RAM will help a good deal, but honestly, despite what Microsoft and Cryptic tell you, you really need 2 GB of RAM, especially with Vista.
Unfortunately there are no workarounds or tweaks that are going to help. You must add more RAM.