CMBB on brand, spanking-new Win7 PC

[10harold66]

Several years back, I remember a "Stalingrad" scenario one could download from a repository somewhere. It was a HUGE battle in the tractor works and each turn took a very long time for the computer I had at the time to process the turn before it replayed the turn.

Now I am on the verge of building a new PC specifically for gaming and hopefully, it will be a different experience.

I've never had the hardware to play any of the CMx2 games. From what I read, it sounds like they play a little differently than the CMx1 games (I'll have to get a demo here and there and try for myself).

But specifically, has anyone experienced an issue with either Windows 7 x64 or even more specifically, a GeForce GTX-570 card with these "older" games?

[Erwin]

Win 7 has a 32 bit option that enables one to easily play CM1 (and CM2) games. I simply copied my CM1 games over from my old machine via a flash card.

[Nort]

I did the same thing. No problems.

[Skarg]

10harold66, I did the same thing with the tractor works scenario. It is now playable, except it takes forever to place and plot one's own turn, if you want to give any kind of good orders. Kind of fun for the sheer scale, but it's a crazy scenario. The designer includes a massive number of units and has the German player place them all on the map within close range of the assault target. There isn't enough map to properly disperse them or put long-range weapons at appropriate ranges. And the Soviets do have artillery and apparently air support too.

[10harold66]

Right -- this is indeed a massive battle. It's called "To The Volga."

I built a new Windows 7 64-bit PC with an Intel i7-960, 12 GB of memory, an SATA III SSD running (successfully!) at a 6 Gbps data rate, and a ridiculously sized GeForce GTX-580 video card (or video brick, more aptly) -- I am curious to see what the difference will be between my old retail Dell from 2004 (128 video card) and this new machine.

If I figured out what the optimal settings were on this new machine and loaded "To The Volga" (I need to purchase CMBB again... my download link has since expired), I wonder if I should expect a dramatic increase in performance -- setting all the orders for my troops is going to take real human time for me to plan, set waypoints, orders, etc. of course (which takes most of the time for each turn in this battle - err... operation - anyway). But then I wonder if

I just downloaded the old CMBB demo (v1.04) and played it in Win7x64 mode just to see the difference in performance, and I noticed that one of the demo battles "Citadel Schwerpunkt" (sp?) (a handful of German tanks rolling across rolling hills) had a big white blotch that wasn't textured with grass in a part of the lower-lying elevation areas between the hills.

Now, I am sure there are probably all sorts of reasons why this white splotch shows up -- top-of-the-line video card not playing nicely with older graphics elements, running CMBB in 64-bit vs. 32-bit mode, CMBB prefs need a refresh, etc.

I guess I am even wondering if I should see a dramatic increase in performance with this new video card -- (I am no expert in this stuff, if you haven't figured that out yet) seeing that the game is "older."

Problem is that I have an undeniable addiction to Battlefront's CMx1 series, so I'd really appreciate some starter suggestions for optimizing how each of the three plays within Windows 7 (or the XP compatibility mode).

The white splotch is a real head-scratcher, though.

Suggestions?

[Schrullenhaft]

Is the 'white splotch' a rectangle ? Are there several of them or just one ? It sounds as if a .BMP file is missing that corresponds with low level grassy terrain.

I had seen this with Windows 2000 when CMBB was first released with a particular video driver (not an Nvidia card to my knowledge).

With the 1.04 Demo I wouldn't imagine that anything is missing. However under Windows Vista and Windows 7 you will not have 'fog effects' with an Nvidia (can't remember if the same is true with ATI/AMD). The drivers for Vista and 7 don't support fog-tables, while the Windows XP drivers do.

[10harold66]

I guess it is sort of a rough rectangle made up of several tiles that are white, but it only covers a patch of low ground about 3/4 of way across from the German side of the map

I will admit that I turned on all the weather/fog/trees/ground cover settings to max when I ran the demo. However, I didn't think that particular demo battle had fog in it, anyway -- I think the weather is set to be clear and sunny.

I haven't tried this in ages, but what's the screen-capture process to get this while it's happening and then is there a way I can post the image?

I could also try playing it by setting it to XP compatibility mode and see if that does anything.

[Schrullenhaft]

Print Scrn button on your keyboard should capture an image. You just have to open up an image manipulation program like 'Paint' and perform a 'paste' action to see the screen shot.

I saw those white squares once in Windows 2000 with a particular video card and driver. Haven't seen them since. You could try the 'compatibility mode' of 'Windows XP Service Pack 2/3', but I don't think it may make a difference regarding this graphic issue.

For the 'ground' BMPs (located at \Program Files (x86)\Battlefront\Combat Mission Barbarossa to Berlin Demo\Demo Data\Bmp) I have numbers 1550-1565 and then 1571-1585. If you're missing any of these it could result in the 'white squares'.

None of the scenarios in the Demo have fog to my knowledge. So you won't be able to check whether it is missing or not with the Demo.

[normannobrot]

With the 1.04 Demo I wouldn't imagine that anything is missing. However under Windows Vista and Windows 7 you will not have 'fog effects' with an Nvidia (can't remember if the same is true with ATI/AMD). The drivers for Vista and 7 don't support fog-tables, while the Windows XP drivers do.

[Schrullenhaft]

It's an issue of API support in the video drivers. The way that CMx1 games draw fog is to use "fog tables". This is considered a bit of an 'ancient' way of doing this, so it is somewhat 'deprecated'/not supported, at least for the video driver developers. Newer, much different ways of drawing fog are supported in current video drivers. With Windows Vista and Windows 7 driver development has focused on supporting newer calls in DirectX 10 and 11. Fog tables go back to DirectX 5.x (possibly even earlier) and typically don't seem worthy of developer's time. My impression is that you will not see fog-table support under Windows Vista and Windows 7 with either Nvidia or ATI/AMD drivers, however I have not double-checked with ATI/AMD Catalyst drivers to be sure of this.

[para]

I'm going to reinstall my CMBB are there any patches i need? I haven't played it for years and i have W7 64

[Schrullenhaft]

With CMBB you will have to apply all of the patches consecutively (depending on your initial installed version). The free patches go up to 1.03. This CAN work with Windows 7, but we have seen some issues with ATI video cards that the 1.04 patch does seem to address.

The 1.04 patch is not free, but it is only US$5.00. Copies of CMBB sold since July/August of 2009 should be 1.04 already. This patch will also convert previous versions of CMBB that used a disc-based copy protection to eLicense.

1.04 is not always needed. It originally was developed to address a problem seen with newer DirectX 10 capable video cards, their drivers and Windows Vista. Shortly after the 1.04 patch was released Nvidia and ATI fixed their issues with the drivers and version 1.03 worked for many people. If you had DirectX 9.x capable hardware, then you typically didn't experience the problems. DirectX 10/11 video hardware is now very common however. The 1.04 patch was done by a then outside programmer, who is now our second programmer, Phillip Culliton. Basically it updated a few DirectX calls with some newer variants that had better support with newer versions of DirectX. Nothing else in CMBB (or CMAK, which got the same treatment) was fixed, just the updating of some DirectX calls - which is a bit harder than it sounds.

If you run into problems with a 1.03 version of CMBB, download the CMBB Demo (1.04) and see if it corrects the problem. If it does, then you'll probably need the 1.04 patch.

[Erwin]

Just curious, how can one find out if one has DirectX 10/11 or 9?

I have had no problems with my CM1 games simply copying from an XP machine to Win 7 machine using a flash card. But, as it's a new-ish machine I thought I would have the latest DirectX.

[Cranky]

go to START, then RUN, then type:

dxdiag

then click OK.

You may get a prompt asking you if you mind if a check is done via the Internet to make sure your Signatures are OK - me, I just Say No to that

Next it will display a 'Direct X Diagnostic Tool' which will enable you to fiddle about with Direct X if you so wish.

The info you want is the last entry in the System Information displayed:

DirectX Version:

Just a thought for you: whenever I have a problem like that, I just make it a SIMPLE QUESTION, and Google it!

You will find an Answers-type page easily.

Try this in Google:

how know direct x version

Took me straight to Yahoo Answers

Hope this helps.

[Erwin]

On my Win 7 after I click START there is no RUN command.

You're right... I should Google, It's still hard to remember to do that when you weren't raised in the computer age and are used to asking humans for help.

Using the HELP button got me to the tool and apparently I have DirectX 11.

And all the CM1 games run fine,

[Cranky]

"used to asking humans for help".

I'm pretty sure the responses on sites like Yahoo! Answers are posted by humans....I'm not sure I can vouch for those that post here at BFC....

[Erwin]

I meant "Humans I have some even tenuous (as in online) relationship with."

It really is an age thing.

My wife just got a iPad (and I think it's awesome BTW). Of course there is no manual so you have to ask or go online just to figure out how to turn it on and off.

I assume that people younger than a certain age have this stuff wired into their brains and it's obvious to them. When in doubt, ask a 12 year old.

[normannobrot]

mmmmm..... am still happy with me win xp..;-)

unless they somehow get the support in their fully..lol.

[hogan99]

could you try hosting a tcp/ip game? Just to see if you get a "cannot connect to tcp/ip network " error. If should pop up right away. Got a friend who gets that error when trying to host, trying to determine if its win 7 or a setting. I still run XP....

[normannobrot]

could you try hosting a tcp/ip game? Just to see if you get a "cannot connect to tcp/ip network " error. If should pop up right away. Got a friend who gets that error when trying to host, trying to determine if its win 7 or a setting. I still run XP....

iwould be glad to bud, but me bros system is down, and me other comrade isnt ready yet, plus think he runs win 7, dont know if there co-system freindly, doubt it.

last time me and me bro played, it played fine.. no probs, and we both played CMBO, and CMBB.

[Tactical Wargamer]

Is there a WIN 7 version of CMBB? Or should I just try my old CD version and reduce to 32 bit?

Thanks

[Tactical Wargamer]

ok Installed it on my win 7 machine. I can change it to a compatibility for say what? ZP service pack 3? Would that work. I don't see anything that allows for a 32 bit WIN 7 option or is that just a compatibility for XP.

Thanks

[Tactical Wargamer]

hmmm nope XP sp3 didn't work. Will have to keep plugging away at it!

[Tactical Wargamer]

Ah just going to purchase the CMBB for vista. $5.00 can't go wrong

[Schrullenhaft]

Try the CMBB 1.04 Demo and see if it works. What exact problem are you having running CMBB ? Do you get an error dialog of any sort trying to run CMBB under Windows 7 ?

The 1.04 patch only addresses a particular DirectX issue that the game had with newer DirectX 10/11 video cards. The issue was a graphical one and the game was typically capable of getting all the way to the 3D screen before the issue occurred. I'm not sure if that problem consistently appears with the current video drivers available. Shortly after the 1.04 patch was released some of the Nvidia and ATI/AMD video drivers fixed the problem, making the patch unnecessary for some. However a recent bug in the ATI/AMD drivers is fixed with the 1.04 patch.

The 'compatibility' settings for Windows 7 are usually not necessary for CMBB. If you have an old, disc-based copy-protected version, then it MIGHT help with the copy-protection, but I'm not sure.