TEMPORARY video refresh rate fix for nVidia cards/Windows 2000/XP (maybe 98/ME too)!

[Dire Wolf]

OK guys. I got to thinking about this refresh rate problem occuring for some people. Since I only run nVidia cards in my systems I do not know if this solution will work for other video cards (though the premise is the same).

PROCEDURE:
----------------

1. Open up with windows registry using RegEdt32.exe. Note this is the NT version of RegEdit. Under Windows 2000 the keys we are editing are of type REG_MULTI_SZ - or strings terminated with NULLs (0) followed by a doube-NULL.

2. Open the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class

3. Find the key {4D36E968-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}
I'm not sure if this will be the same on your system but you
are looking for a key that has a subkey named "Class" with
the value "Display"

UPDATE: I just checked all my computers. The GUID (the long
128-bit weird looking number) is the same on all
my machines.

4. Under this key you'll find more subkeys labelled like "0000",
"0001", "0002" Go through these keys and find your video
card. Note: Typically there is only one key and it is
named "0000".

5. Open that key and open the subkey named "Settings"

6. You'll see a bunch of values such as NV10_Modes,
NV10DDR_Modes etc. Each of these keys will have a slew of
values:

(example)

8 640 480 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
8 320 200 60 70 72 75 0
8 320 240 60 70 72 75 0
8 400 300 60 70 72 75 0
8 480 360 60 70 72 75 0
8 512 384 60 70 72 75 0
8 640 400 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
8 800 600 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
8 1024 768 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
8 1152 864 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
8 1280 960 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
8 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
8 1600 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 0
8 1600 1200 60 70 72 75 85 100 0
8 1920 1080 60 70 72 75 85 100 0
8 1920 1200 60 70 72 75 85 0
8 1920 1440 60 70 72 75 0
8 2048 1536 60 0
16 640 480 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 320 200 60 70 72 75 0
16 320 240 60 70 72 75 0
16 400 300 60 70 72 75 0
16 480 360 60 70 72 75 0
16 512 384 60 70 72 75 0
16 640 400 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 800 600 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 1024 768 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 1152 864 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 1280 960 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 1600 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 0
16 1600 1200 60 70 72 75 85 100 0
16 1920 1080 60 70 72 75 85 100 0
16 1920 1200 60 70 72 75 85 0
16 1920 1440 60 70 72 75 0
16 2048 1536 60 0
32 640 480 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 320 200 60 70 72 75 0
32 320 240 60 70 72 75 0
32 400 300 60 70 72 75 0
32 480 360 60 70 72 75 0
32 512 384 60 70 72 75 0
32 640 400 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 800 600 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 1024 768 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 1152 864 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 1280 960 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 1600 1024 60 70 72 75 85 0
32 1600 1200 60 70 72 75 85 0
32 1920 1080 60 70 72 75 0
32 1920 1200 60 70 0
32 1920 1440 60 0


The idea here is to remove the values before the 0 that you do not want. Most people have monitors that can display 1024x768 @ 85Hz. So remove all values after 85 BUT DON"T REMOVE THE TRAILING 0.

Example:

Before: 32 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
After: 32 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 0

This will tell Windows that the minimum refresh rate for 1280x1024 @ 32 bit is 60 Hz and the maximum is 85 Hz.

You'll probably need to change the values for 1024x768 16/32-bit and 1280x1024 16/32 bit.

So for example:

BEFORE:

...
16 1024 768 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
16 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
...
32 1024 768 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
32 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0
...

AFTER:

...
16 1024 768 60 70 72 75 85 0
16 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 0
...
32 1024 768 60 70 72 75 85 0
32 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 0
...

Now, becareful not to remove any of the other lines. Only change the lines, don't remove them (I'm not sure what affect this will have.)

So if, for example, you have a nVidia Geforce 2 GTS (this is an NV15) you'd modify the 1024x768 16/32 settings for the registry key labelled NV15_Modes.

After you make this change, you may also need to make the exact same changes to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\nv

or

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\nv4

(It depends on the version of driver you are using...)


REBOOT your machine after making these changes

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

This solution fixed the refresh rate problem because Civ 3 wasn't able to select the highest refresh rate possible (which defaults to 120Hz on nVidia cards.)


Please be really careful when modifying the registry...If you completely screw your nVidia settings just reload the driver and that will undo all your changes.

BTW For those of you experiencing 60Hz refresh rates under Windows 2000 go here: http://www.planetquake.com/ztn and pickup the nVidia Refresh Rate fix program. It fixes the problem with the refresh rate defaulting to 60Hz. You could make these changes manually (using a similiar technique to my above instructions) but why bother :)

Anyhow...Good luck,

I'll monitor this thread to help any of those who need help with my instructions.


Dire Wolf

[Dire Wolf]

Here are my thoughts on why this is happening:

I'm guessing that when Civ 3 starts up it tries to select a refresh rate that is too high (obviously.) It gets this refresh rate from the settings for the "Display" in the registry. The nVidia drivers have refresh rates that are not always in line with what your monitor can support. So when Civ 3 starts up it tries to set a maximum refresh rate of 120Hz (at least on my 3 machines) and this tends to be more than most monitors can handle at 1024x768 (older/lower end monitors.)

The solution above changes the nVidia refresh rate values to something more reasonable - 85Hz (or whatever your monitor can support at 1024x768 ... maybe even 75Hz.)

When Civ 3 starts up it will select the highest refresh rate the driver supports but this time it hits a max of 85Hz/75Hz so things are good.

I'm not sure how Civ 3 selects a refresh rate but most games use the current refresh rate OR select the *lowest* refresh rate the monitor supports. The alternative is to allow the user a choice of refresh rates but enumerating the *monitors* availabe rates (using EnumXXX services provided by DirectX.)

Well, hopefully this solutions works for people. I'm off to try some Civ 3 (if I can snag the disk from my wife! :)

[Draco of GL]

Outstanding work DW. I tried it and it worked!

I have a Voodoo5 card, and it had a different registry structure than your NVidia.

It was the same all the way down to "Settings" but instead of the list like yours, mine had a directory structure for various 3dfx stuff. The last folder was called "Timings", and under that folder were more folders, each with a different resolution, and each resolution folder had a set of folders within it, each folder being a different solution.

Example

Settings
-Timings
--1024,768
---60Hz
---70Hz
---75Hz
---85Hz
--1152,864
---60Hz
---70Hz
---75Hz
---85Hz
--and so on down the list

Within each refresh folder were 2 keys. The values of these keys is unimportant however. Just delete the folders for the refresh rates that your monitor does not support.

For instance, I run my desktop resolution at 1280x1024, 85Hz. I deleted all the folders except for 85 and below. Rebooted the machine, started Civ3, and it worked great.

Chris

[faded glory]

Hey dire.....is 800 x 600 resolution possible???


btw I checked your registrys just to be sure.. Ill keep them in mind for when I purchase the game for my PC.

thanks,

[Dire Wolf]

I'm glad it worked for you! Thanks for posting how to fix the settings for a Voodoo card.

I'm just happy I was able to give something back to this great community :)

Best regards,

Dire

[Dire Wolf]

faded glory:

I honestly don't think it is possible. On the Civ 3 box/tin it states that 1024x768 is required. I'm sure a lot of the interfaces (like the City Manager) are hard coded for 1024x768. It even mentions this in the readme.txt file.

Sorry man.

Dire

[chumly]

http://www.planetquake.com/ztn/nvreffix/

That would be what you're looking for ;)

No mucking with registry settings, and easy to use. Enjoy :)

[TechWins]

I tried what you were doing but when I open up the REG_MULTI_SZ (you had REZ instead of REG, jtlyk) I get something completely different. What I'm seeing doesn't seem right at all. Here it is:

0000 01 00 74 00 69 00 64 00 a.t.i.d.
0000 72 00 01 00 02 00 00 00 r.a.b.
0010 00 00

I've checked out my drivers and Active X and everything is working fine as it says. Do you know what to do?

[Dire Wolf]

Originally posted by chumly
http://www.planetquake.com/ztn/nvreffix/

That would be what you're looking for ;)

No mucking with registry settings, and easy to use. Enjoy :)

If you notice (read my post) I actually posted this but it DOESN'T work for this case. The nVidia Refresh Rate program only sets your minimum refresh rate. It does this by removing the refresh rate numbers from the registry up to the one you want set.

Example:

BEFORE:

32 1280 1024 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0

AFTER:

32 1280 1024 75 85 100 120 0


Now games running at 1280x1024 @ 32-bit will run at a minimum of 75Hz. That is how the nVidia Refresh Fix proggy works.

Now, I don't believe you can set the maximum refresh rate that the driver can be set to using that program. That is why I posted the above information...

Let me know if I'm wrong,

Dire

[Dire Wolf]

Originally posted by TechWins
I tried what you were doing but when I open up the REG_MULTI_SZ (you had REZ instead of REG, jtlyk) I get something completely different. What I'm seeing doesn't seem right at all. Here it is:

0000 01 00 74 00 69 00 64 00 a.t.i.d.
0000 72 00 01 00 02 00 00 00 r.a.b.
0010 00 00

I've checked out my drivers and Active X and everything is working fine as it says. Do you know what to do?

LOL. Sorry about that. I was typing really fast and typed REZ instead of REG. Thank god I don't do that when programming :)

Hmmm. I'm really not sure what those numbers mean :( If I remember correctly, from another post, you said you have a 4MB ATI Rage Pro right?

If you are suffering from the refresh rate proble, I'll look into this for you.

Until then, best of luck :)

Dire

[Lee Johnson]

I'm just reading about these refresh rate problems now. I had the same problem last night, with my display losing sync when I started Civ III--but the problem there was that I had my monitor set to "Default Monitor". The other problem is that my monitor is so old that XP doesn't list it with the other Sony monitors. So I actually had to go and edit one of XP's .INF files to make an entry for my old monitor with its specs, then remove the .PNF files and let WinXP rebuild the driver database. Then I selected that "monitor driver" from the display properties.

That worked--Civ III no longer tries to drive my monitor faster than it will go. Of course, the crummy part is that I have had a new monitor on order for several days, and if it had actually arrived yesterday as expected, I wouldn't have seen a problem. Oh, well.

My first advice to people having trouble would therefore be: Check your monitor configuration in Windows.

[Dire Wolf]

I tried numerous monitor profiles before I did this solution. For me selecting different profiles didn't work. The monitor kept getting driven to 120Hz (as set in the nVidia driver - in the registry.)

Still it is a good idea to try selecting a different monitor profile if you want to try and avoid the registry changes. As I said, it didn't work for me...

[iago]

DW, (or anyone w/ mad skills)

Two questions,

1. Which NV[X] mode is appropriate for GeForce 2 MX?

2. How (exactly) does one remove the refresh rates? (Another window pops up when I execute the "modify" command, and all I see are a SL'd of numbers -- which I honestly don't understand and don't want to mess with until I do.)

Thanks,

Iago:confused:

[Zapaan]

Just wanted to say thanks for the fix DW, totally worked for me and my GeForce256.

And Iago, make sure you're using regedt32.exe and not regedit.exe. The original regedit doesn't interpret the nulls and looks all screwy.

- Z

[iago]

Doh!!!! Thanks, I was using regedit.exe. Thanks, Zapaan.

[kaacee]

Originally posted by Dire Wolf

So if, for example, you have a nVidia Geforce 2 GTS (this is an NV15) you'd modify the 1024x768 16/32 settings for the registry key labelled NV15_Modes.



Dire Wolf

How do we determine which NV is for our card?

Thanks,

kc

[Dire Wolf]

What card do you have (ex: GF2 GTS, GF2 MX, GF3 etc)

[Dire Wolf]

Another way is to just set ALL the NV_xx settings to the same thing. :)

[kaacee]

Originally posted by Dire Wolf
Another way is to just set ALL the NV_xx settings to the same thing. :)

EEK! All of them? heh.

I'm using a PNY Geforce 2 PRO 64mb DDR


kc

[kaacee]

I happened to remember that I had SiSofts Sandra installed, ran it, and it showed my card as an NV15, going off now to see if there's any difference. :)

kc

[DuncanMcLord]

hi there,

well i have nearly the same problem and allready tried the above solutions, but didnt work either,
because my problem isnt the vertical sync BUT the horizontal sync!
my monitor supports up to 95 hf (horizontal frequency) and 160 vf (vertical...) and the drivers r the latest ones!
BUT civ3 wants to launch the game at a 98.8 hf !!!
The hf isnt editable under the above solutions, is it?
I didnt find any entry other than the vf entries :(

so, if s.o. could help me out to find the settings for the hf, i would raise a toast on him :D

oh, nearly forgot, i run (?) civ3 under W2k!

thx a lot,
and nevertheless great work done with this Thread!

so long,

Duncan McLord

:madban:

[DuncanMcLord]

UPDATE:

well, i found the settings in the monitor.inf and in the registry, but they r correct and also dont match the above style.
So, it HAS to be a civ3 error...
damn... and i really would love to play the game instead of giving it back and getting Ghost Recon for it :(

so long,

Duncan McDamn

:rant:

[DuncanMcLord]

ANOTHER UPDATE:

well, finally made it:

- uninstalled monitor
- installed plug and play monitor
- installed latest graphic card drivers BETA version :(
- installed real monitor driver again
- installed latest NVRefreshFix
- checked refresh rates under properties, which looked good, nothing to edit as mentioned in the first post

-> tried it and ... screen goes black ... :(
...but after 5 secs ... JUHU! i can see the menu!!!
PUH! finally made it... lol, that was 2h ago... damn this game is like CIV2, u dont realize how the time flies by! :D

so long,

Duncan McFinallyMadeIt

[Thala]

Might find this useful:

Card - nv* code

Riva TNT - nv4
Riva TNT2/TNT2 Pro - nv5
Riva TNT2 Ultra - nv5ultra
Vanta/Vanta LT - nvvanta
Riva TNT2 64/64 Pro - nv5m64
Aladdin TNT2 - nv0A

GeForce 256 - nv10
GeForce DDR - nv10DDR
Quadro - nv10GL

GeForce2 MX/MX 400 - nv11
GeForce2 MX 100/200 - nv11DDR
GeForce2 Go - nv11M
Quadro 2 MXR/EX - nv11GL

GeForce2 GTS - nv15
GeForce2 Pro - nv15
GeForce2 Ti - nv15DDR
GeForce2 Ultra - nv15BR
Quadro 2 Pro - nv15GL

GeForce 2 Integrated GPU - CRUSH11

GeForce 3 - nv20
GeForce 3 Ti 200 - nv20_1
GeForce 3 Ti 500 - nv20_2
Quadro DCC - nv20_3

[genghisvick]

Did everything you said but it was a no go *double checked*. I have a PNY GF3 (regular) and a KDS Avitron moniter

[genghisvick]

Firaxis really needs to release a fix to this and quick! This is a major pain in the @ss!!! :doitnow!:

[kaacee]

The fix that seemed to work best for me was to copy the nvoglnt.dll file (v21.81) to the civ3 folder. This created the smoothest scrollng I've seen so far.



1.4 tbird, 512mb, GeForce 2 PRO (22.80 driver), Asus A7V-133 mobo, SbLive 5.1 gamer, WinXP (home version).

kc

[Ramo]

I tried the NVRefreshFix program, and I still get that refresh error in Civ 3. *Sigh* Looks like I'll have to return the game...

I might buy it again when Firaxis gets all the bugs cleared up (*wink* *wink* *nudge* *nudge* ;))...

[Ramo]

I manually changed the registry, and the refresh problem still exists. :(

[genghisvick]

Originally posted by Ramo
I manually changed the registry, and the refresh problem still exists. :(

Same here, are you using a GeForce3 by any chance?

[Buddy]

I tried it and it didnt work. Nothing worked until I changed my Monitor from Default to the correct driver in the System manager.

Everything peachy now.

[Ramo]

Nope, actually a Geforce DDR.

[Ramo]

Firaxis people - Are y'all going to fix this problem???

[DhulKhidr]

My display adapter allow me to set the screen to 1024 x 768. However, when I checked the registry key 4D36E968-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318 as mentioned by Dire Wolf earlier the maximum screen area listed is 640 x 480.

Example:
8 640 480 60 70 72 75 85 100 120 0

Does this mean my display settings are lying to me? I have a 15" monitor. Do I need to get bigger one?

My system specs:
System specs:
800 MHz AMD Duron
640 MB SDRAM
32 MB GeForce 2 MX
Windows 2000 Pro
30 GB with plenty of empty space
15" MAG monitor
DirectX 8.1
BIOS, Nvidia drivers are updated

[snake_3017]

I HAVE A EASY EASY FIX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
go into the civilization3.ini file and add refresh=60(or whatever u want it to be) then it will work no problem!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :D :D :D :b: :b: :b:

[Purest Warrior]

...and where might this civilization3.ini be found, wise one?

[Purest Warrior]

:hmmm: Found it! It doesn't work, though.

[Purest Warrior]

Haaaleluja!

It does actually work!
I had to uninstall my driver for my NVidia GeForce2 Ti first, though.
Maybe it overrides the civilization3.ini or something.

Well, I'll be off, then. I have some important ... stuff ... to attend to (Yes, that'll do).

Thanks, everybody.

[Muggeh]

Tbh i can find the settings thing in regedit and NV MODES init but thats all im getting, in NV MODES there are screen resolutions but no refresh rates :confused:

i have WIN XP and a Geforce 4 MX 440 if that can help, Thx in advance...

Btw i tried KeepRes=1 and Refresh=60 already and it didnt work.

Civ3 start menu worked once, when i was continuasly pressing ctrl alt del to get out of the game cos the screen was all mixed u .... u know wot i mean,

then everything went black i could only see the start menu. So i pressed preferences didnt see anything bout changing resolution...

So i decided to just play and i pressed new game and the whole thing crashed...

Neways ANY help is welcome... Thx in advance

Edit: Dont bother anymore, i have found a program called Reforce, its auto searches the refresh rate for each resolution your monitor can handle, its a box displayed like this: Width Heigt Hz

For example 1024 768 120

In my case i needed hz 60 so i clicked the 120 few times and change it to 60

I started Civ3 and voila, works perfect

You can find it here : http://home.online.no/~lustroem/reforce/ReForce.exe

-Muggeh

[Blademun]

Hey guys, I also had this problem, but of a diffrent kind. YOu see my 9600 Pro card seems to have a refresh rate problem. At 60Hz a horizontal..wave gos up my screen..at any other refresh rate my screen vibrates. So when launching this game, the menu starts vibrateing... ¬_¬

So, fortunately as a ATI user, it was very very simple to fix the problem. IF you are useing the latest Catalyst drivers, then go to your ATI Icon, right click, go to settings, display settings. Once the Advanced display settings box comes up, go to the tab labled 'Displays'. Under that tab you'll see a button named monitor. (it'll have a piccy of a monitor under it.) Click it and it brings up a lil Menu. Hit the blue button that says 'Use DCC Information'. That makes two drop menus avalible nearby, under the drop menu labled Maximum Refresh...Put it to whatever your setup can handle. And thats that, it works perfectly.

[Carenza]

Is this the thing where once you install Civ 3 it starts with a black screen with a funny noise in the background?

I got that but installed Conquests straight away after and that fixed it.