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Startup Issue


Drew213

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I own all three CM games. After I got CM:AK installed, the game launches fine then the screen does the black out to game start up then it boots me to desk top. When I click on game tab, it wont allow me to go back to the game. Its really annoying problem, that i had no issues with prior to CM:AK install. So...I have looked on the website, i found no such match, I have Quad Core AMD, 6 gig of ram, Nvidia GT 8800 512mb Card. Refresh rate issue? Whats the deal? Any help thank you!

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Yes, we will need more details.

The current versions of CMAK sold by us use eLicense, so you should get a license dialog box first. If your copy of CMAK or other CMx1 games was purchased BEFORE the Summer of 2006, then you may have the disc-based copy-protection versions. If you have the eLicense versions, then once you have licensed/activated the game, the next time you launch CMAK you should go through the resolution selection process, which will black out your screen during the process.

The resolution selection process will take over the whole screen (so it will be black). There should be information in the middle of the screen indicating the resolution and possibly the refresh rate. The CMx1 series will either start at your current desktop resolution or if that is too high or different from what it supports, it may then start at 1600x1200 as the highest resolution it will support. The CMx1 series only supports a limited number of discrete resolutions that are typically 4:3 type 'standard' resolutions. None of the currently popular 'widescreen' resolutions are supported, so CM will most likely start with the closest resolution that is at the same or lower for the 'vertical' portion of the resolution. So if you were running 1440x900 or something like that, CM may start at 1152x864 or 1024x768.

When CM starts its resolution selection process it bases its information on the video card and not the display. So it will start at whichever resolution is under 1600x1200 and is at or under your current 'vertical' resolution. At that resolution CM will run at the highest vertical refresh rate that the video card supports. This could be up to 160Hz or 120Hz, something that many monitors may not support. If CM runs at a vertical refresh rate that your monitor doesn't support you may either get a 'scrambled' screen or one with multiple images on it or you may get a message that the signal is 'out of range' or something to that effect (common on LCD displays). Assuming that your monitor doesn't shut down, you can just wait and CM will automatically try the next lower vertical refresh rate at that same resolution within 5 - 10 seconds. If you started at 120Hz, then it may try 100Hz next and then 85Hz, etc. Once CM reaches 60Hz at a particular resolution it will then try the next lower discrete resolution that it supports. In the case of 1024x768, that would most likely be 800x600, but it starts at the highest refresh rate again.

Once CM reaches 800x600 at 60Hz vertical refresh and no resolution has been selected by that point, it will 'error out' and close. This is normal behavior for the resolution selection routine and you just need to restart CM and have it go through the process again. Once a resolution is selected you should eventually see the main menu screen. When you exit CM normally a 'Prefs' file will be written out which contains information about which resolution you have selected. If you delete this file, then the resolution selection process will start the next time you launch CM.

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If you're running Windows Vista or Windows 7, you may want to right-click and select "Run as administrator" from the popup menu to launch the game. This will give it write rights to the '\Program Files' directory, which is where the Prefs file gets written to. If it can't write this file out, then you will get the resolution selection process each time you launch the game.

I'm not sure how CMAK is "letting you in" if it stops the resolution selection process. Once a resolution has been selected, the game should launch. At the proper exit of the game ('Alt+Q'), the resolution selection should be written to the Prefs file. The next time that the game starts up it reads the Prefs file for the resolution to run at.

CMAK, CMBB and CMBO support only a few discrete resolutions. NONE of them are widescreen resolutions. Typically it should not matter what your desktop is running at, though that will be the maximum that CM will try for the resolution. Again, 1600x1200 is the maximum for the CMx1 series. The vertical (second number) resolution is often the limiting one in what resolutions will be tried. So if your display is 1680x1050, the highest resolution that CM will try is 1280x1024, since the 1600x1200 has a larger vertical resolution than what the display supports (1050 in this case).

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