CMSF Crashing to Desktop on Win7 64

[Treadhead Martin]

I'm trying to run CMSF with both Marines and British Forces using the latest patch, and am getting crashes to desktop. I'm running Windows 7 Enterprise 64-bit on a Lenovo T400 with an Intel Core2 Duo P8700 at 2.53GHz. This machine as 4GB of RAM, and a ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3400. I've installed the latest ATI drivers (10-4_vista64_win7_64_dd_ccc_wdm_enu).

I have some long flights coming up, and would *LOVE* to get this running on my laptop.

[Schrullenhaft]

When do you get the 'crash-to-desktop', when you attempt to run CMSF and before you even see the main menu ? Or does this happen at some point while playing the game ? If it happens during the game, what settings do you have in the 'Options' menu of the main menu ('desktop'/resolution, 3D Model Quality, Texture Quality, etc.) ?

I assume that you have been able to license the game and modules without problem, is that correct ? If you do a Ctrl-Alt-Del and 'Start Task Manager' and then go to the 'Services' tab (?) do you see a 'LicCtrl Service' listed, which basically suggests that the eLicense software is running ?

I have not heard of specific reports that the 10.4 Catalysts have problems with CMSF, though it is possible that particular Radeons could show problems that other Radeons may not with the same drivers.

[Treadhead Martin]

I've been able to eLicense all three products. The game starts, and I'm able to start campaigns. I'm able to start a battle, but at random intervals (usually 5-10 minutes in), the game crashes to desktop. In the process, the display freezes, and the hard disk spins for several minutes.

My settings are:

Display size: desktop (1400 X 900)

Vertical Synchronization: off

3D Model Quality: Balanced

3D Texture Quality: Fast

Antialias/Multisample: Off

High Priority Process: Off

ATI Left Click: On

[Schrullenhaft]

Hmm... this sounds strangely similar to the problems that the Catalyst 9.4 - 9.9 drivers had. An OpenGL bug existed in those drivers that was a texture memory leak which would cause CMSF to crash in 5 to 10 minutes of game play.

You may want to uninstall your current 10.4 Catalysts drivers and try a Catalyst driver from 9.10 to 10.3 and see if it behaves any differently. If it does, then it would appear that ATI/AMD have re-introduced the OpenGL bug again.

One other thing to try. Do you find the 'ATI Left Click' necessary to be on with these Catalysts ? You may want to experiment with it off, just to see if there are problems with the cursor in the 3D screens or not. If there are, then it will need to be on, but if there are not, then turn it OFF.

[Treadhead Martin]

Well, I tried rolling back to to the ATI Catalyst 10.3 drivers, and I got an invalid OpenGL error message. I then tried uninstalling an reinstalling. However, the uninstall did not successfully uninstall my licenses. I'm now trying to reinstall the game, but am being told that all my licenses have been used. I've opened a ticket with Martin (DRM Manager) to have an additional installation authorized for my laptop.

[Schrullenhaft]

I HIGHLY suggest unlicensing before uninstalling. Typically a number of our uninstallers will prompt you to unlicense, but some don't. Usually if the installation is going to be done on the same computer (and same OS installation), then the game won't need to be licensed when you reinstall it (at least it should work that way). However if you install on a different computer then you should DEFINITELY unlicense the game before uninstalling it.

I'm not sure why you got the "invalid OpenGL" message. I'd suggest UNINSTALLING the 10.4 Catalyst drivers completely, rebooting (and saying 'no' to any automated driver install) and then installing the 10.3 Catalysts or earlier.

[Treadhead Martin]

Well, I've learned the lesson about unlicensing first... Now I'm just waiting to hear from the DRM manager on a new license so I can try a reinstall. Could you ping him on status?

[Schrullenhaft]

It appears that Martin replied back to you on May 14th. Since you own both Marines and British Forces modules, the CMSF base-game license key doesn't come up for unlicensing. The original CMSF executable (which the licensing is tied to) is actually overwritten with a version of the CMSF executable that uses the license key from one of the modules.

You can reinstall CMSF, install the Marines module and license that (you'll be at version 1.10 at this point). Then install the British Forces module and license it (version 1.20 now) and then finally install the 1.21 patch, making sure that it applies the patch for the base game and the two modules.

The base-game license key is no longer needed when you have either or both of the modules (and you install the modules before attempting to license).

[Treadhead Martin]

I was able to reinstall CMSF with all modules, successfully licensed them, and upgrated to v1.21. I'm still getting the same crash. I don't think I've been successful in rolling back my catalyst drivers to version 10.3. In the "Programs and Features" dialog shows that the ATI Catalyst Install Manager is version 3.0.765.0. I'm going to take a shot at uninstalling the drivers again and see what happens.

[Treadhead Martin]

I'm showing the same ATI Catalyst Install Manager version, and driver version 8.632.1.2000

[Treadhead Martin]

Ok, looks like I've been able to roll back to driver version 8.563.2.1000. However, now I'm getting the following error:

This device is not working properly because Windows cannot load the drivers required for this device. (Code 31)

[Schrullenhaft]

I'm not sure what is happening with your driver uninstalls. You may want to try a program like Driver Sweeper. Just make sure to ONLY uninstall your video drivers, since the program may uninstall some other chipset drivers that you DO NOT want uninstalled.

So the course of action would be to download the 'Driver Sweeper' program and the 10.3 Catalyst driver, install and run the 'Driver Sweeper' program. Once it has finished uninstalling your video drivers (again make sure it ONLY uninstalls your VIDEO DRIVERS) REBOOT. When Windows loads back up, cancel any attempts at reinstalling your video drivers. Hopefully all of your Catalyst 10.4 drivers and Control Panel applets have been removed. Now install the 10.3 Catalyst drivers, which should require a reboot once they're finished too.

[Treadhead Martin]

I've now successfully rolled back to the 10.3 Catalyst drivers. However, when I try to start the game, I get the following error:

"Could not initialize OpenGL graphics. Please update your OpenGL drivers."

[Schrullenhaft]

I'm not sure why CMSF is not seeing your OpenGL install. The OpenGL ICD driver file gets installed with the rest of the Catalyst driver package and it is typically just one file (and registry settings).

To check your systems current OpenGL capability you can download the OpenGL Viewer utility which will report on your driver's OpenGL support. To download it select 'OpenGL Extensions Viewer' and 'Windows XP/Vista/7 or later' in the drop-down dialogs. There are some quick tests for OpenGL that are much like the DirectX tests in the DxDiag program with a spinning cube.

If the OpenGL Viewer claims that your OpenGL capability is 1.0 or 1.1, then your OpenGL driver is not loading properly and your system is just using the generic Microsoft software support for OpenGL.

For ATI/AMD video cards the 'driver'/OpenGL ICD file will typically be the ATIOGLXX.DLL file in the '\Windows\SysWOW64' directory for 64-bit Windows versions. I don't have a Windows 7 64-bit system with an ATI video card in it to double-check at the moment. If you can't find the file there you could also look for it in the \Windows\System32 directory. Once you find this file you could potentially copy it (don't move it) to the CMSF directory and CMSF may use this file to load up the OpenGL ICD.

In fact this method allows for the mixing of OpenGL versions with different main (Catalyst) driver versions. So if you needed to use a newer Catalyst, but needed an older OpenGL driver for CMSF, you could copy the older OpenGL driver to the CMSF directory while the main driver for the system is a newer Catalyst. This works in Windows Vista and Windows 7, but NOT in Windows XP. This method of moving the OpenGL ICD driver file to the game directory for use by that game has worked in the past, but the possibility exists that this method may not work now or it may not work consistently (mixing different driver versions, etc.). It's also possible that if you have problems with the driver's registry settings then copying this file to the CMSF directory may still achieve nothing.

[Treadhead Martin]

Looks like I spoke too soon on the driver update. I'm not getting told that I have an invalid INF file.

Below is the dump from the OpenGL Extensions Viewer

Renderer: GDI Generic

Vendor: Microsoft Corporation

Memory: 1772 MB

Version: 1.1.0

Shading language version: N/A

Max texture size: 1024 x 1024

Max texture coordinates: 0

Max vertex texture image units: 0

Max texture image units: 0

Max geometry texture units: 0

Max anisotropic filtering value: 0

Max number of light sources: 8

Max viewport size: 16384 x 16384

Max uniform vertex components: 0

Max uniform fragment components: 0

Max geometry uniform components: 0

Max varying floats: 0

Max samples: 0

Max draw buffers: 0

Extensions: 3

GL_EXT_bgra

GL_EXT_paletted_texture

GL_WIN_swap_hint

Core features

v1.1 (100 % - 7/7)

v1.2 (12 % - 1/8)

v1.3 (0 % - 0/9)

v1.4 (0 % - 0/15)

v1.5 (0 % - 0/3)

v2.0 (0 % - 0/10)

v2.1 (0 % - 0/3)

v3.0 (0 % - 0/23)

v3.1 (0 % - 0/8)

v3.2 (0 % - 0/9)

v3.3 (0 % - 0/9)

v4.0 (0 % - 0/13)

OpenGL driver version check (Current: 1.1.0, Latest known: 1.1.0):

Latest version of display drivers found

According the database, you are running the latest display drivers for your video card.

No ICD registry entry

The current OpenGL driver doesn't expose the SOFTWARE/Microsoft/Windows (NT)/CurrentVersion/OpenGLDrivers registry entry. Unable to detect the driver version, driver revision name and filename.

No hardware support

Your current video configuration DOES NOT support hardware accelerated OpenGL.

No compiled vertex array support

This may cause performance loss in some applications.

No multitexturing support

This may cause performance loss in some applications.

No secondary color support

Some applications may not render polygon highlights correctly.

No S3TC compression support

This may cause performance loss in some applications.

No texture edge clamp support

This feature adds clamping control to edge texel filtering. Some programs may not render textures correctly (black line on borders.)

No vertex program support

This feature enables vertex programming (equivalent to DX8 Vertex Shader.) Some current or future OpenGL programs may require this feature.

No fragment program support

This feature enables per pixel programming (equivalent to DX9 Pixel Shader.) Some current or future OpenGL programs may require this feature.

No OpenGL Shading Language support

This may break compatibility for applications using per pixel shading.

No Frame buffer object support

This may break compatibility for applications using render to texture functions.

Few texture units found

This may slow down some applications using fragment programs or extensive texture mapping.

Extension verification:

GL_EXT_color_subtable was not found, but has the entry point glColorSubTableEXT

[Schrullenhaft]

Yeah, it looks like the OpenGL Viewer is only seeing the Microsoft OpenGL files which give you software compatibility up to OpenGL 1.1, which is NOT enough for CMSF.

Something is still wrong with your video driver installation. Were you able to find the atioglxx.dll file ? I don't know if copy that would even work if your system doesn't properly recognize your driver install. You may want to uninstall the drivers again with Driver Sweeper. Where are you getting the 10.3 Catalyst driver from, is it the AMD website ? You are rebooting before attempting to reinstall the video drivers, correct ?

[benpark]

I'm getting lots of CTDs after switching to Win7 64bit, every time I play in fact. I can get through 10 minutes or so, and then an immediate crash right to desktop with no error. I'm not sure if there is any discernible pattern.

I've got a new graphics card (was 3870, 4870 coming), so I'll see if that helps. I'm on Bootcamp, which was never a problem under XP, but the drivers for the older card weren't kept up to date.

[Schrullenhaft]

benpark - the problem that you're seeing is related to using a Catalyst driver from 9.4 to 9.9. I believe that the default drivers that are supplied with Windows 7 will be of the 9.8 or 9.9 Catalysts. These drivers have an OpenGL bug in them that causes CMSF to crash within 10 minutes of playing.

You need to upgrade to newer Catalyst drivers. Catalyst 9.10 and later work, with the exception of 10.2 and possibly 10.3. I'm under the impression that the latest Catalyst drivers work, but I haven't checked them out myself.

Catalyst 10.6 drivers for Windows 7 64-bit are the current latest and I believe that they'll work. If not you will need to uninstall them and try something a bit older such as the 10.1 Catalyst or you can experiment and find the best version for you.

[dan/california]

I have the same basic set up, Windows 7 64. I installed 10.6 drivers today and the game is still crashing the same way. Is there any hope that the changes included with the NATO module will fix this permanently. It really is rather frustrating, especially since there is no automatic way to save every turn.

[Schrullenhaft]

I suggest completely uninstalling the 10.6 drivers and trying the 10.1 drivers and see if they work.

The NATO module will not change how CMSF works in regards to driver-related crashes. The problem is with the ATI/AMD drivers and it is futile to attempt to program around them (if that is even possible with some driver bugs). Video drivers OFTEN have bugs. These bugs are usually introduced in attempts to "optimize" the driver's performance or expand its capabilities or API support. The biggest problems come when newer video hardware will not work with older video drivers that do not have the problem.

[dan/california]

OK I just spent 3 hours on the phone and or chat with every ATI/HP/Mircosoft. The trick we have all been missing is to enable video sharing so that your Video card can access a large chunk of space on your hard drive. That and 10.6 drivers seems to have been curative. I hope this helps some other folks.

[benpark]

How might one enable video sharing?

[dan/california]

I am not blowing you off by leaving out the details. My laptop is almost new and I let HP technical support sort it out. They really went above and beyond, had them on the phone for like an hour. There was some crazed issue getting it to accept the new video drivers, so by the time they tweaked the menu I was a little lost in deep system screens and windows file extensions.

[Schrullenhaft]

So there is a possibility here that the 'fix' that HP support was able to implement was just getting the new drivers to actually work with your laptop.

When it comes to laptops, sometimes you can only use the drivers provided by the laptop manufacturer. Nvidia and ATI/AMD offer their standard drivers that often don't work with laptops on purpose. The reasons vary from "custom modifications" to 'contracts' between the video chipset manufacturer and the laptop manufacturer that stipulate certain support options (possibly for 'easier support' and other issues). There are ways around this that involve changes to .INF files in the drivers, etc. In the case of what HP support had to do, I'm not sure what was involved, but I assume that they figured out that 10.6 drivers actually didn't install fully.