Holien Posted August 21, 2003 Share Posted August 21, 2003 Hi Guys, I See from a thread below that there has been an issue with Win XP and freeze ups trying to tab out of the game. Since getting back from my Honeymoon and all the fuss about a certain virus, I updated my PC with all the latest Windows fixes, and a new version of Zone Alarm. I now get a ping of death when playing CMBB and the whole PC locks up. I then have to reboot and I can not jump out of the game to the desktop. I am running Second Ed 98. I will test at home tonight to see if I can jump out of the game before it pings. Just wondering if anyone else is having the problem? Reading the thread about XP I am hoping that MS have not introduced something in Win98 as per XP. Any advice taken as this has happened too often now (since Monday when I got back). Cheers H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted August 21, 2003 Share Posted August 21, 2003 In what mode are you playing CM when you get the 'ping of death' - solo, PBEM or TCP/IP. I assume it's TCP/IP, but I just want to make sure. If TCP/IP play is having problems, you may want to check your settings in Zone Alarm for CM (and possibly remove them and have ZA recreate them). 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 21, 2003 Author Share Posted August 21, 2003 PBEM Mode... I have just tried updating the Directx driver to 9.0b. This failed first time and caused some odd problems on the PC. I then tried a second install. This seemed to go all the way and after a reboot seemed to update the settings but right at last moment the PC locked up and came up with DXDLLREG caused Illegal Error. So I have re-booted PC and it seems OK now. I am trying to find out what that DLL does. I will now experiment with CMBB. BTW it was CMBB 1.02 as it was a ROW game I was doing the turns on. Will try to jump out of it now... More soon. I hate PC's at times and this is one of those times... H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 21, 2003 Author Share Posted August 21, 2003 Hi, I can jump in and out of the game, so that seems fine and I would guess the problem lies elsewhere. Hmmmm H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 22, 2003 Author Share Posted August 22, 2003 Just happened again... Bugger... at least I saved the turn just before it ping'd... So I had loaded, Zone Alarm, Several Windows Browsers, and Macfree was loaded as well. I played the vid a few times then started to issue orders in the PBEM. about 5 minutes or more through it Ping... Then I could not jump back to desktop and only Ctl Alt Dlt re-booted the PC. Something is now conflicting with this version of CMBB and I never used to have this problem. I can only guess that it is something in the recent Windows Patches or the latest Freebie Zone Alarm for home users. I guess I could take Zone Alarms back to the previous version.... Hmmmm I shall try this same file with out Zone Alarm loaded. H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted August 22, 2003 Share Posted August 22, 2003 Do you happen to have an Instant Messaging client loaded up on the computer and running (i.e. Yahoo IM, MSN Messenger, AOL IM, etc.) ? These programs can cause CM to lockup, especially when a message is received. Sometimes ZoneAlarm just seems to 'go to crap'. I had to uninstall it once because it blocked all of my TCP/IP traffic for some unexplicable reason. If you need ZA on your computer (and it's highly recommended if you're on a cable/DSL hookup), then I suggest uninstalling it and any previous versions and then reinstalling it. You'll have to go through the hassle of setting up all of your applications to go through it, but that may help in this case. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 22, 2003 Author Share Posted August 22, 2003 Hi, No Instant Message progs, killed them yoonks ago as they were a pain in the bum. Previous to posting I had uninstalled ZA and put it back as a clean build. I shall see if putting it back a version helps. As a general observation the PC seems less stable since putting Directx 9b on it. This is of course pure speculation and as I have limited life time to spend on computers I shall not be trying to prove this. Has anyone done an upgrade to XP from Second Ed 98? Is it worth doing? Anything to watch out for if I do it? H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 22, 2003 Author Share Posted August 22, 2003 Hi, Further woes... I unloaded the latest of ZA and then loaded the previous version. This locked up when I tried to play the video and I manged to get a message up before rebooting the PC. Black screen with EMM386 Error #a6 in application in memory location @ 0000:01D2. Not sure if anyone knows what that means but I throw it out in hope of an answer. Off to do a google search and try an older version of ZA. I am also getting today and the last few days heaps of spam with attachments. The first day I had over fourteen from mainly Finland. Of course all the attachements were dodgy and all killed by me. Then I started getting messages from other sites saying I was sending out messages with attachments. I have the latest Macfree Dat etc... and my system seems clean. I presume someone is sending out stuff to other people pretending that it comes from my E-mail Address? I presume that is possible? I need to get clued up on how to track down spam e-mail and see if someone is targeting me. This stuff is not the normal junk mail and is specific attempts to send me a virus and seems a tad hostile. I guess someone out there has too much time on their hands. Ohhh the joys of computing. Any advice welcomed. Cheers H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 22, 2003 Author Share Posted August 22, 2003 Ahhh Hahhh. I know why the e-mail spam is happening and I would guess one of my Finish Opponents has an infected PC. http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/originalContent/0,289142,sid14_gci920149,00.html This site explains it. I would also guess that they have sorted it as the attacks have stopped from Finland. I guess the other source is someone I know in the UK but that will be harder to track down and I just hope they find out that they have a virus sooner rather than later. This clever little thing spoofs an e-mail at random and then people think it is that person. By looking at who is (spoofed) sending the e-mails to me I can get an idea of who the person is from the content of their e-mail address book, as every mail is spoofed from their e-mail address book. As for CMBB this is still causing me grief (not CMBB's fault BTW.) H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 22, 2003 Author Share Posted August 22, 2003 Right more research has thrown up the possibility that I do not require EMM386 to be loaded? Does CMBB require it? Does anyone out there know if EMM386 is useful on a Win 98 Second Ed op sys? H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted August 22, 2003 Share Posted August 22, 2003 EMM386 is an expanded memory emulator. Hardly any (read: next to none) programs use it anymore since extended memory is the near defacto standard (and most Windows OS's are now 32-bit, so the 'extended' memory definition is a bit of a dinosaur itself). Anyway, most people with Win9x use EMM386 to give them access to memory between 640K and 1Mb. This allows them to load up drivers and other small utilities from their CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files into upper memory. This helps preserve and maximize the 640K and below segment. However this segment of memory doesn't need to be as protected and preserved nowadays since few programs require that they load up in this memory area (usually only DOS-based programs require it). You may be loaded up some device drivers, etc. with the EMM386. Open up both your CONFIG.SYS (where EMM386.SYS is being loaded from) and your AUTOEXEC.BAT and check for any lines that start with 'LH' or 'loadhigh'. These are the utilities/drivers that are being loaded up into upper memory. You can 'rem' out the EMM386 and the next time you boot it won't be loaded. I've seen some SoundBlaster installations automatically put EMM386 in to load up one of the DOS-based drivers for the PCI sound cards (though it isn't necessary, I believe, for the driver to be loaded high). Oh... and CMBB doesn't require EMM386. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted August 23, 2003 Author Share Posted August 23, 2003 Update for anyone interested. Emm386 removed and a dodgy update of Det Drivers unloaded and the latest 4523 driver loaded. CMBB just crashed this morning with the latest PBEM turn but this time I was able to jump out of it and use Alt Dlt to ask windows to close it down (CMBB) without shutting down windows. So perhaps the removal of EMM386 has helped. Still crashing though so I will try an older version of ZA and see what happens. H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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