Black bars and distortion

[Aurora]

Hello everyone.

I recently purchased CM, primarily due to the article written in the NY Times. Reading hte manual intrigued me, but it seems my computer has the unfortunate habit of developing flashing black bars running horizontally across my screen along with distorted images. Sometimes they appear right from the beginning of a scenario, but other times (particularly with the tutorial) it doesn't develop until a few turns into the game. Suffice it to say, it detracts from what seems to be a terrific game.

I searched the archives to see if others had a similar problem. At the very least, I managed to stop my mouse pointer from leaving squares but that's minor in comparison. What I did find, however, was an informative and dedicated group of people who helped others in situations like mine. I hope that someone can help me.

I have a cyrix 330 MHZ processor, with a SiS6326 video card. I have a soundblaster sound card, and 64 megs of SDRAM. I also have downloaded the latest drivers along with DirectX 7a.

I am not the most technically inclined person, but help in resolving this would be greatly appreciated. Out of all the games I own, CM seems to be the most intellectually satisfying and visually stimulating.

So, anyone who can help me fix these technical glitches so I can get hooked would have my gratitude (and probably my fiance's ire, but that's another story).

Josh

------------------

-------- >< --------

Hammer nail above for

new monitor

[Schrullenhaft]

What OS are you running, I assume it is Windows 98 ? Where did you download your SiS drivers from, was it www.sis.com.tw ? Is your SiS video chip built into the motherboard or is it a separate AGP card ? Do you know if you have the latest BIOS for your motherboard ? Do you know the model and revision of your motherboard ?

I don't know if you have it installed, and it would probably cause other problems than what you're seeing in CM - are you using the BIOS/TSR for the SiS 6326 chip. Apparently the latest drivers need this BIOS update, which can be run as a TSR from your AUTOEXEC.BAT file.

[Aurora]

Apparently, there was a glitch in installing one of the drivers (which one, I don't know). A friend helped reinstall all of them, and now the distortions/random black horizontal bars have disappeared.

Now the only question remaining is why there appears to be a drastic slowdown in gamespeed compared to when the graphical problems were present. A lousy tradeoff, and one that hopefully can be reconciled without purchasing a new video driver.