pford

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Germanboy: And it certainly is not a MacOS bug! <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> To make this perfectly clear, I said a MacOS version bug. You did not use the word version so I am going to assume it was implied, since I didn't expect it was the OS's fault. Since I am being corrected, let me display my full ignorance at once and get it over with. What does IIRC mean? How does one deploy the 150mm without it getting killed as soon as it fires? Can it use indirect fire and get targeting info from an HQ? pford

I was quite careful the second time I tried this since I assumed I screwed it up the first time. The person I have played PBEM games with has wiped me up very easily so I was being particularly cautious in my set-up phase and was pissed at myself when I started playing the computer. I retried this several times but I could not get the PBEM icon to work. Maybe I have a "bad" version or maybe it is a MacOS version bug. I will give it another try this week. THX pford

In a future release, I would like to see a PBEM game be initiated by either side. I was attempting to start a game as the Axis in VOT but it won't let me. I think the after the set-up phase, the CM could resync the PBEM game at the other players computer. pford

<QUOTE>Originally posted by tomas@transport.com: I have a G3 400 and the original demo works great. I just downloaded the golden demo and it just stops when finally loading the graphics. Goes no farther. Any thoughts?<QUOTE> Check the post by HAMPEL in the Mac/Voodoo3 problem postings. Disabling some of the extensions seem to work for him.

<QUOTE>Originally posted by Lt. Kije: If you do a search of earlier messages using 'Voodoo' as search key, I think you will find other reports of problems with Macs and Voodoo cards. In response to one earlier post, BTS said (paraphrasing from memory here), when CM boots up it checks to see what kind of 3D hardware is available; if it detects Mac + Voodoo, it runs in software-rendering-only mode. On my Mac/Voodoo 3 3000 system, this does not give the black screen problem you are having, but it does result in clunky graphics and slow animations. Not bad enough for me to not play the demo, but bad enough that I'll wait for a fix before buying the full game. (Other than this, I love the game.) BTS has said they are looking into a fix. If memory serves, they attributed the problem to poorly written Voodoo drivers/APIs, hard to work with and thus not presently coded for by BTS. I realize this does not solve your problem, but it does suggest BTS might provide a fix for your problem and mine at some point. Lt. Kije <QUOTE> (1) Voodoo 3 2000 without the RAVE drivers will give the software rendered chunky slow screen. This is what you will get if you disable the RAVE extensions in the extension folder located in the system folder. Or don't have them to begin with. Use the extension manager in the control panel or an application like Conflict Catcher to do this. (2)Voodoo 3 2000 with the RAVE drivers will give an almost completely black screen. The Voodoo 3 RAVE drivers are incomplete . The new incomplete RAVE drivers are available at the 3DFX web site. Earlier versions of the drivers and the flash ROM files did not have any RAVE support. Some here claim to have gotten the Voodoo 3 cards to work with ealier RAVE drivers. Try http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/ for more information on Voodoo for the MacOS. If you get CM and RAVE working on a Voodoo 3 card, please let me know how you did it. I have not after hours of trying. Just in case you are curious, I got CM to 'work' on a second monitor that has an ATI 128 Xclaim card with functioning RAVE.(I am having an unrelated problem, that is why work is in quotes.) I saw on Mac Gaming site that CM is going at some future time going to support OpenGL. This would solve the display problems. I have not seen that statement here. Steve, any truth to this? Regards PFord [This message has been edited by pford (edited 06-02-2000).] [This message has been edited by pford (edited 06-02-2000).]

From StrategyPage Web site: Team Trackless is a volunteer, unclassified effort to use commercial wargames to test new doctrine and tactics for the new "trackless" (wheeled armored vehicles) brigades the US Army is experimenting with. http://www.strategypage.com/tt/trackless.htm It uses TacOps. I didn't see anything regarding this on the TacOps discussion, and there may some here who are interested.

<QUOTE>Originally posted by JEagar: I have a Mac Power PC at home (with a voodoo 1 3Dfx graphics card), and a Gateway PC at work. When playing the gold demo, the graphics on the PC are much better (smoother lines, more realistic terrain and trees) than on my Mac. Am I doing something wrong on my Mac?? Usually the Mac graphics are better with games...<QUOTE> As a guy that usually jumps to defend Macs, I have state that your last sentence is incorrect. PC's have much larger variety and faster graphic accelerator cards available, and usually cheaper too. To get good graphics on MacOS, the card must support RAVE. If you don't have RAVE then you get software rendering, which is slow. Also if you don't have enough memory on the card, CM will drop features and you won't be able to support higher resolutions. If you are considering getting a new card, 3DFX is going to support the Mac with its newer cards. The older cards usually had the drivers written by a 3rd party. You may want to check http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/ re: Voodoo cards and drivers. Regards pford

<QUOTE>Originally posted by Gespenster: I tend to agree with Zamo's assessment of the Epic Struggle that was the Civil War. It wasn't all about Slavery, there were many other things that divided the states as well. In fact, nearly 75% of all Southern Troops didn't own Slaves at all (could not afford them), including many Officers such as Robert E. Lee, who set all his his slaves free long before the first shots were fired at Ft. Sumter. In fact, Lee was offered the job of commanding the entire Union Army by President Lincoln in 1860 but waited to give his answer until he found out where his home state of Virginia would stand on the issue of succession. At that time, where you were from actually meant something being a Virginia Gentleman or a South Carolina Farmer commanded respect. Now a days, no one really cares where you are from, so people don't understand the fanatical pride that people had in their states in 19th century America. Once Virginia succeded from the Union, Lee stated that he "could never bare arms against his home state of Virginia" and turned down the position offered to him. So don't think the South fought merely to keep slaves, that is a very narrow minded assumption </QUOTE> To be picky and also support your point, I believe Lee did not use the word "state" for Virginia but "country." While persons such as Lee may not have fought for slavery, the underlying cause for the discord was slavery. [This message has been edited by Gespenster (edited 05-15-2000).] [This message has been edited by Gespenster (edited 05-15-2000).]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by buddy: So, do you think my old Motorola clone with a 180 processor and system 7.5.1 will run it? I should be able to let you know tomorrow (downloaded the demo in segments on a slow modem last night - very painful.) I have a feeling the game sprockets thing (only supported by system 8.0?) will be a problem. Hopefully I can find a way around the problems. Thanks for all the support!!!<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I think your graphics card makes more of a difference. Due to my unusual configuration, I have attempted several way to play it. I am having a screwy problem where it crashes if my backside cache is enabled. Using a ATI XClaim 128 PCI card there is negligible difference with only the calculation scroll taking longer when the backside cache is disabled. Moving around the screen, setting moves and watching the moves is fine with the ATI card. Using a Voodoo3 2000 without RAVE, in software mode is horrible even when tweaking my system for speed, 315Mhz. If you are going to spend the least amount of money, go for a graphics video card that supports RAVE. The earlier Voodoo1 & 2 may do this. Later Voodoo than 3 should do this.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by SaMi: I tried to download it with Netscape 4.7 and I tried segments etc. without luck gotta try it with some other way... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Don't be insulted by this question, but occasionally the easiest things are over looked. Do you have Stuffit Expander? How big is the download file, about 31 Mbytes?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by SaMi: I just tried to download "Gold" demo. First everthin goes well... comp asks where I want to put the file... and after that it starts to download. But then theres a hint of problems coz in downloadin window it say: openin file " " (or somethin) and when it has downloaded and I try to start it (cmdemo1.sit.bin) comp says "couldnt open cmdemo1.sit.bin due to unkown error type: -40. sigh! what is wrong with it... or me?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> How are you trying to download it. Netscape, IE, Fetch, Anarche??? Also what version? You may want to try segments or vise versa.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tar: I noticed something similar, but not quite as grim. When I try to start the Gold Demo, the program exits without any error message, returning me to the Finder. This occurs on a Power Macintosh G3, 266 MHz (and also on a 300 MHz machine). These are the original beige G3 machines, running MacOS 9.0.4. The graphics card is made by ATI and runs the Mach 64. Slightly different models of card in the two machines. More details: Software overview Mac OS overview Finder: 9.0 System: 9.0.4 US Active enabler: PowerPC Enabler 9.0.4 9.0.4 QuickTime: 4.0.3 File sharing: is on Multiple Users: 1.1 Memory overview Disk cache: 3 MB Virtual memory: 97 MB Used on volume: Zuma Built-in memory: 96 MB Hardware overview Machine ID: 510 Model name: Power Macintosh G3 series Keyboard type: Apple Extended Keyboard Attributes: Audio card Processor info: PowerPC G3 Machine speed: 266 MHz Nanokernel version: 2.13 Nanokernel pool extends: 0 Nanokernel scheduled CPUs:1 PCI Slot $F1 Display card Card type: display Card name: ATY,mach64_3DU Card model: ATY,GT-B Card ROM #: 113-XXXXX-1.1 Card revision: 154 Card vendor ID: 1002 VRAM size: 6 MB -del- <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I notice that the following cleared up my freezing problem although it mine usually occurs after this with moving around the field. I would appreciate it if someone else would try this. Disable the backside cache. It seems to clear up my problems. This can be done using the G3/G4 Cache Profiler from Powerlogix http://www.powerlogix.com THX pford

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Miyamoto Musashi: Yeah, the two times it's frozen up my computer so it had to be restarted were when I was doing some zooming in and out, checking the terrain... it doesn't do it every time, just twice in the four or five games I've played thus far. And just so you know, I'm running an iMac DV SE (G3400) w 192 mbRAM and the 8mb ATI Rage 128 card. I haven't seen anyone else post a freeze up problem like this, so I'm not sure exactly why it does, unless it just overloads my card or something. Any ideas, Steve? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Just on a lark, download a G3/G4 backside cache utility from an upgrade vendor like powerlogix http://www.powerlogix.com , and disable the backside cache and see if the problem goes away.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lurker: pford, I can assure you that ADB mice work like a champ with the gold demo, although I suspect that you knew that already. If you have not checked http://wwwxlr8yourmac.com and read the forums there regarding the ATI 128VR cards. I had planned to replace my Rage Pro VR card with a 128, but the reports on the forum convinced me to wait. I've not been reading the forums recently, but they may have some sort of fix listed up there. Good luck with the tracking the extension conflict. -Lurker<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well I tracked down part of the problem, but it is so bazaar that I can't believe it is all of it. I am using a Powerlogix G3 upgrade card running at 315 MHz with 1 meg backside cache @ 210 MHz, in a Powerwave 132. The odd part is that if I turn off the backside cache, the problem goes away! It slows the computer movement some but not too bad. I will have to check the wwwxlr8yourmac thread and see if it is any help. Steve: did you do any funny timing things? pford

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Miyamoto Musashi: I don't think 9.0.4 caused those problems, unless it was a conflict with your video card. I've got 9.0.4 and the ATI 128 card, and everything's fine. Although I was kinda surprised when, while playing Valley last night at 4 a.m. local time that the demo locked up and my comp had to be restarted.... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> What were you doing when it froze? Were you moving you viewing position around the map? I am interested because I have a similar configuration and frequent freezes. pford

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Fionn: Do you have a "sprocket" installed?I remember Charles saying CM needs them (I figure they're kinda like "drivers" for the PC). P.s. We DID tell you that it was much, much better didn't we? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> FYI: As far as I can tell, CM gold demo will run without game sprockets on many Macs, You just won't get the stereophonic sound effects.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lurker: I'm still looking for a way to force Combat Mission to recognize one card versus the other. Thanks, -Lurker<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Does the pass through card need drivers(extensions) to be recognized? If so, maybe if you disabled them with the extension manager, the ATI card would work as the default. Worth a try. Re: 3DFX Voodoo3 2000 I have never gotten CM to work on this card in accelerated graphics mode, software OK but SLOW. I got excited when 3DFX released beta drivers that supported RAVE for this card, but they were, shall we say, suboptimal. The error message I got when using this card for CM Gold Demo was a CM error window, not a MacOS error. I will have to rerun it to find out what the mesage said but as I recall it was unhappy that something it wanted was not where it expected it to be. I have been spending time trying to get the ATI working because it worked great for the CM beta.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lurker: #1. The mouse won't click... That is a serious problem. Are you using Apple's mouse with the built in driver or are you using a third party mouse and driver? If you're using Apple's mouse and built in driver, I'd check to see if updating the Game Sprockets version 1.7.4 makes a difference. If it is a third party mouse and driver, I'd check to see if there is an update for the driver. If that doesn't work, I'd check the Game Sprockets. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> The mouse is an Apple ADB type mouse. As far as I know, all extentions,(ATI, game sprokets, etc.) are up to date. I can reverify this. I check regularly for updates via Version tracker. http://www.versiontracker.com/ Sorry, I don't have a HTML reference available to do this right. A more frequent problem is that I will be moving around the battle field using the mouse or arrows when the system hangs. CMD-ALT-ESC doesn't do anything and I have to do a hardware reset. I was fooled when using Conflict Catcher because I thought it happened immediately if it was going to happen. It can take several minutes to occur. The other is that the monitor dies, like the card was turned off, also forcing a hardware reset. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> #2 Are you using an Apple OEM Rage 128 card with the stock drivers? If so, I would point any display problems in that direction. The original ATI drivers for the Rage 128 card were extremely flakey. Try hitting ATI's web page (http://www.atitech.com) to see if there is a newer version of the driver software for the card. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> The ATI card is an Xclaim128 16Mbytes. It is the one that has a TV. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> Hope some of the advice helps. -Lurker<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Thanks for the advise, but it is sort of like mine above. I will have to do the CC test all over to determine if there is a conflict. I wish I knew how to use Macsbug. It might point to where the problem is occuring.

*** I don't know how I duplicated the above posting but since I can't really delete it this is second best. Please accept my apologies. pford [This message has been edited by pford (edited 05-11-2000).]

Re: how to get a particular video card to work. For multiple monitors, use the monitor control panel and drag the monitor strip to the monitor you want to use. Enough of your problems. Now for mine. I have a dual monitor Mac with a voodoo3 2000 and ATI Rage128. I have never gotten the ealier demo to work with the Voodoo card so everything following is for the ATI card only. (BTW it came up with some weird error I faild to write down for the Voodoo card.) I am having two problems. (1) The mouse does not "click", the arrow moves but nothing else. (2) I get an intemittent disabling of the monitor with a system hang causing a force reboot. I have been unable to determine if there is an extension conflict or a conflict with anonther program If and when I determine what is the cause I wlill post. BTS be warned, there is a problem here that did not exist with the beta demo for the Macintosh.. Note" It worked better than the demo for my Powerbook., MacOS 8.5. I have not tried it on an original iMac or an iMac DV I have.

With the new beta 12 Voodoo drivers for the Mac, CM display is horrible. Nanosaur does work after increasing the memory allocation. Next time I will not pre-announce the upgrade.

There is soon to be released beta 12 verson of the Mac drivers that will included RAVE. So finally I should be able to get the graphic accelation on my board. ]http://www.maccentral.com/news/0004/12.voodoo3.shtml [This message has been edited by pford (edited 04-12-2000).]

Why have a printed manual? It just adds cost. I will agree that it is nice to sit and read but why not ship the manual on the CD as a PDF or HTML document only?

I have a request, that is so obvious that it probably already exists or has been discussed. I would like small training scenario ,or the ability to create them. For example, how to assault a building, coordinating tank attacks, etc. For those of us who cannot get in significant play time and look like the klutzes we are, need to learn how to do some of the simple things well, or at least better. The problem with the current demos is that a repeatable consistent situation is not really possible, which is good for game playing but suboptimal for learning how to coordinate one’s moves. If this already is part of the first release, just let me know in a less than obnoxious manner. Also, I am getting impatient for the release. It reminds me of the sayings that better is the enemy of good, and a saying I heard was in a Soviet military factor, “Better sooner is good enough.”

I am greatly amuse by the lame riposte posted so far. They show great creativity and wit, NOT. There is an obvious consensus that this is a feeble scam. Review of the pre-release orders will show that I have placed an order well prior to this posting. The basic fact is that I have access to, but no influence on, person(s) who, if they decided to write a positive review, could significantly benefit the sale of CM or whose review would be useful as an ad insertion. So my big crime is that I ask who is the contact person and trying to help a little. So since you guys are sooo clever, knock yourselves out. Fionn Kelly, do you have the same name recognition the persons I listed in the e-mail? If so, great, go for it.