No Install. Error extracting common.exe file

[Ted]

(I've moved this from Can't Install thread.

I don't want it to get lost there.)

OK. Seems that no matter what I do I get the same error everytime

“Error:

C:\Program files\Battlefront\Combat Mission Africa Korps\common.exe

An error occured while trying to copy a file:

The source file is corrupted.

Click retry abort…..etc”

I’ve disabled the anti-virus and Ad-ware and rebooted.

I’ve tried loading from the disc.

I’ve tried moving all the files from the disc to the hard drive and then running setup.

I’ve removed all files that were installed after each load attempt.

I tried installing into a custom folder and the default folder.

No other application is running in my task manager.

I’ve cleaned the CD.

I’ve tried all of the above in both my CD and DVD drives.

What else can I do?

[Madmatt]

While that error is still on your screen, alt-tab out of the installer screen and manually browse to the install location. What files do you show there?

Madmatt

[Ted]

All that's in the

program files\battlefront location

is a Combat Mission Africa Korps folder with

two unins.000 files

One has 0k bytes the other 75k

[Madmatt]

And you switched to the folder *while* the installer was attempting to run as I said above?

By the way, how much space is available on your hard drive? You will need at least 2.1 gigs free in order to install.

If all else fails, contact sales@battlefront.com, tell them Matt sent you and you need a new replacement disc.

Madmatt

[Ted]

Yes as soon as the error popped up I went to the install location (program files\battlefront)

and that's all that was in there.

I have 23Gig of hard drive space left so that should be no problem.

This is a good one huh.

I'm going to email sales unless there's anything else you can think of.

And thanks Matt.

[Madmatt]

Ted, sounds like you tried everything I would have thought to do. At this point, the next logical step is to get you a replacement. Contact sales as directed above and be sure and let them know that I already worked with you on this issue otherwise they may have you try the same stuff again.

Madmatt

[Madmatt]

Ted,

I just thought of something to try which might help me to get to the bottom of your issue:

I want you to try something. Run the Setup.exe again. You will notice that a WinRar window pops up after a moment and begins to extract files. those are coming out of the Common.exe archive which is now on your sysyem. As soon as you see a WinRar window appear and begin to extract files (but before it gives you the error, browse to your install folder. You should see a few folders as well as the Common.exe file itself. Now, whats happening is that the Common.exe file is self extracting but I want you to try and COPY it before it completes. Copy and Paste it somewhere safe. It should be about 615 megs or so in size.

This will not keep that error you get from occuring but it will give you a *pure* copy of the file to test with. Whats happening is that once the installer detects there is a problem, it then moves on to the next archive file (English.exe) and then deletes the Common.exe file (which is the majority of all the files) as it thinks it no longer needs it.

When you get that error, just hit Ignore, this will allow the install to move to the next file and then finish up.

Now, what we have is a incomplete install of CMAK in the destination folder and then a Common.exe file by itself somewhere.

First, try and just double click the Common.exe file. Tell me what happens and list out ANY Error messages you see.

The next part is a little trickier, it will require that you have a copy of WinRar installed on your computer. You can get it for free from www.rarlabs.com

I need to see what WinRar is seeing in that file so it might be better to do this part via ICQ, IM or even my chat system at CMHQ. Let me know if we can work on this together via chat and then we can proceed but for now, try and get a copy of that Common.exe file saved away.

One last question, how memory do you have installed in your system?

Madmatt

[Ted]

Right

Will do.

I'll get back to you shortly.

(I have 512MB memory)

Edit:

I can't get as far as seeing the directory with common.exe.

The green bar loading bar gets about a third of the way across when I get:

Error:

C:\Program files\Battlefront\Combat Mission Africa Korps\common.exe

An error occured while trying to copy a file:

The source file is corrupted.

Click retry abort…..etc”

I click ignore and I get the folder but there's no Common.exe in it.

[ December 06, 2003, 02:33 PM: Message edited by: Ted ]

[Madmatt]

Ted, Try and alt-tab to your install folder WHILE the install is running. You can use F5 to refresh the directory contents. You might be able to get the common.exe that way, but if its corrupted in the actual setup.exe archive you may not be able to. Did you already contact sales to get a replacement. I still want you to do that of course as all of this could simply be a bad disc but I wanted to continue to work on this while you waited for the replacement to arrive.

Madmatt

[Ted]

Yes I did contact sales and told them "Matt sent me" and they're sending one out on Monday.

Last time I did get to the CMAK folder but all that was in it were two uninstall aps.

I'll try again tomorrow.

And thanks for your help in this, you've been great.

[kstevens]

Matt,

Im having the exact problem Ted had. I get to probably 95% completion of the common.exe file and get an error stating its corrupt. No luck copying the file over to my hard drive and installing either. I have about 60GB free of hard drive space and 512 Ram. In my case though if I hit ignore when the error message comes up, the install process does not progress. Do you recommend that I contact sales for a replacement disc as well? Advise would be appreciated.

Kurt

[kstevens]

Forgot to mention that I had tried to install on two seperate computers with a total of 4 seperate drives. There were also some scratches present when it arrived which I tried to clean up with alcohol and a cotton swab.

[Ted]

Whew.

I was beginning to think it was my machine and not the CD.

Kurt, you say you also copied all the files to your hard drive and tried to run install with the exact same results?

[kstevens]

Ted,

I actually cant even get the files to copy. Ive tried on both systems. I get about 90% of setup.exe file copied and I get a message stating an error has occured and the file will stop copying. Im pretty sure its a bum disc. Just my luck. Ive already got a PBEM file from a friend in my inbox and I cant get the game to work. It sounds like there are a few others on the board here with similar problems like ours. I actually mailed sales and asked for a replacement disc. Havent heard back yet.

Kurt

[kstevens]

Just heard from customer service, on sunday no less. They are shipping a new disc out to me tomorrow. Great customer service as usual.

[Ted]

The customer service (aka MadMatt)is the best I've ever encountered.

Seems like Matt is just sitting around waiting for me to have a problem so he can help with it.

It's quiet today though.

He's probably at a Peal Harbor memorial or something.

I guess Steve and Charles have to give Matt a day off now and then.

It's the Christmas season after all.

Good Luck Kurt!

[Madmatt]

Sorry guys, just lamenting my home team Bengals falling to the Ravens.

Anyway, hopefully new CD's will fix you guys up. I have tried to replicate the issue with several PC's I have access to but it always works for me so I am thinking its probably just a pair of bad discs for the two of you. % wise, there will always be a few bum disks in a production run but I am encouraged that the defect rate seems so low at this point.

Madmatt

[kstevens]

Hopefully, the new cd will work. I really think it will. I cant think of any other reason the install would fail on two computers with 4 different drives other than a bad disc. Im sure there has to be a few bad ones in every batch. I knew the service was great here when I got the reprinted strategy guide in the mail without even asking for it.

Matt, I was hoping the Bengals would pull one out today too. Of course, Im a Steelers fan so a win by the Ravens put them out of the division race for sure. Ah well, there is always next year.

Kurt

[Ted]

Looks like we’re all kind of in the same boat,

I’m a Jets fan.

And a Giants fan.

Look at the bright side at least you get to say "There's always next year" in December and not September.

Matt, you mean to say you don’t even get Sundays off?!

Sheesh. You must work for a couple of slave drivers.

Anyway, I kind of hope it’s my machine because I went nuts and bought a Dell.

(I had to justify it to my wife and not being able to load CMAK was the best excuse.)

I’ll have the machine by the 17th.

I know I’ll get the new disk first, I’ll try it and let you know how it works either way.

[kstevens]

Well, I received my new disc in the mail today but the results are the same. It takes forever for the disc to load but it does. I can start the install and it progresses to probably 90% of the common.exe unpacking then I get an I/O error and I get the option to ingore,cancel or try again. If Ignore, it gives the same error on the next file and the next one and so on. I cant even get a copy of the setup.exe to the hard drive. I get errors while trying to copy the file. This occurs on 2 different computers. On my second computer, I get a file corrupt error with install instead of the I/O error.

Any ideas? The sad part is the demo installs and runs fine. Im getting pretty frustrated. The drives Ive tried it on are 2 different models of dvd drive, a cd-rw drive and a dvd-rw drive. My system is as follows:

P4 3.02

512mb Ram

59 gigs free hard drive

windows XP pro

ATI Radeon 9700 video card

Lite On dvd drive

NEC DVD RW drive

Do you think its a bum disc? I find that hard to believe since its the second one but with an install error and a corrupt disc error I dont know what else it would be.

Kurt

[Madmatt]

Seems there are two different errors being reported here. a "Source file is Corrupt" error is usually caused by a bad disc. But a "I/O 23" or "cyclic redundancy check" error is usually triggered by a virus checking program and can be cured by disabling or even uninstalling the virus program prior to install.

Seems McAfree usually triggers that I/O error as it tried to scan inside an archive file as its installing.

Ted, whats your status, did your replacement fix the problem?

Kurt, it *could* be a second bad disc, but my gut feeling is that its something else (virus program running). Check on that and let me know what you find.

Madmatt

[YankeeDog]

Matt -

As I noted in a previous thread, I appear to having the same "Source File is Corrupt" error as Ted and kstevens.

I received my replacement disc yesterday and made several attempts to install off of it, but ended up with the same error.

I have made absolutely sure that all anti-virus, software firewall, automatic backup programs, etc. are disabled or turned off for the install.

In addition to the remedies you have suggested, I also went though and did all of the computer maintenance/upkeep things I could think of just in case anything like this would make a difference, including defragging the HD, etc. Norton Systemworks turned up a couple ActiveX/Xcom problems, but these were fixed with no problems, and the next install attempt didn't work either.

Just for completeness, here are my hardware states again:

Dell Insprion 8200 (Notebook). Running Windows XP (fully updated according to WindowsUpdate), 1.6 GHz P4, 256MB RAM (Showing about 116MB available before launching Setup program), about 7.8GB available on the HD for install.

I have not had problems installing any other programs recently, although I don't think I've installed anything with WinRar of late. I also haven't needed to install anything as large as CMAK in recent months.

In view of the fact that kstevens seems to be having the same problem with his new disc, it would seem *extremely* unlikely that this is a bad disc problem. I'm stumped, though. I'm no computer genius, but I can't think of any more tricks to get the install to work.

Looks like I may be stuck on the East Front. . .

Help!

YD

[Ted]

Matt,

I received the disk and well, yes and no.

It looked to be the same problem.

First I moved all the files to the hard drive and tried to run the setup from there.

I got the exact same error as the 1st cd and the same as kstevens: “I can start the install and it progresses to probably 90% of the common.exe unpacking then I get an I/O error and I get the option to ingore, cancel or try again.”

I then tried loading from the DVD drive a couple/few times and finally progressed a little further to the point where I started to see unpacking BMP files. (Halleluiah)

That went on for a few seconds until I got a load of CRC errors and then stopped and gave me an error asking I wanted to send an error report. After saying No it went on and finished installing the game.

It looked like all the files were there but on trying to open or run the game all I got was an hourglass next to the mouse pointer for a second and then nothing happened.

I clicked the icon on the desktop with the same results.

I then loaded it from my CD/RW drive and seemed to get less CRC errors but the same results of hourglass then nothing.

I tried to install the game a few more times and finally it to worked.

It seems to work fine but I did notice several CRC errors when unloading bmp’s and wav’s.

So although it’s working I’m waiting for the time of getting black spots on the map and who knows what sounds I’ll be missing.

In any case, I’ve seen some CRC errors before. When installing the demo I had a few and the sides of the Mosque building were black. I reinstalled the game and it was fine.

I attributed this to the motherboard I bought.

I have an

Asus A7V333 motherboard w/533MHz front side bus and 512Meg of 333MHz RAM.

I fear that the communication between the CD/DVD drives is not quite right.

Or something is funky in the BIOS.

I wondered if Asus released this motherboard before all the bugs were ironed out. (shocking wouldn’t it).

I just purchased a new Dell P4 2.66GHz that arrived yesterday (my wife took pity on me when she saw my head on my desk moaning that CMAK wouldn’t load) and will try and install CMAK on that machine tonight.

(If it doesn’t I’ll go back to my CRC error filled machine and sell the Dell on this board.)

Wish me luck!

Ted

[kstevens]

Ted,

It sounds like at least you've had some success. Im pretty stumped at what's going on. The demo and both the other combat missions games work fine. Did you do anything special to bypass the errors Ted? My system just stops responding and the drive thrashes around.

Kurt

[YankeeDog]

Eureka! I managed to get an install.

I installed in Safe mode. Worked like a charm.

Obviously, some background program was the culprit for my previous failed installs. As to which, I have no idea. As I mentioned before, I did turn off the most likely offenders, such as Norton Anti-Virus. Personally, I suspect one of the AOL extensions. . .

Anyway. It's installed and running, though I am now experiencing a slow frame rate CMAK, much slower than I should be getting. I suspect I did something I shouldn't have while monkeying around with my system trying to get the install to work as I had a good frame rate in the demo, and now the slow frame rate is affecting the demo too.

Perhaps there are some issues with the new NVida drivers?

Cheers,

YD