Skipping sound

[Smauler]

Similar problems here. I have no skipping at all with the intro, or with the religion movies, they run fine. The wonder movies skip every time though. I also get random _bad_ slowdown, which is not related to the complexity of the game - sometimes it runs at 1fps at 3000BC, and sometimes it runs at 20fps at 2000AD. No crashes ever though.

edit : Just downloaded and run RAD bink video player. All movies in that run perfectly. Haven't tried the game again... I doubt anything will have changed.

[civ4dan]

I have crashed before, but not often. The skipping sound comes with a slowdown of gameplay as well.

Adding 512MB Ram to give me an even gig made it a little better but not that much better.

[Dzhel]

Geforce 6600 GT
Sound Blaster Audigy 2 zs
Latest drivers & all that.

The fixes in this thread helped alot for me but not 100%. I've only had 1 out of 5 wonder movies skip so far with the new files. Thx alot for the help.

[Lithrim]

Hi.

I have the problems with skipping movies too. Game runs ok otherwise, a little slow after a while (memory leaking?). I have tried most of the tips and trix presented here with no luck. Gonna try the bink-install-thing as a last resort tonight.

But I was thinking, is the movies actually working for someone? Looking at all the specs presented here it does not look like it's a hardware related problems. Its a great variety of different hardware setups. So whats the difference from people who got the movies working?

-Drivers? No, most here, including me has the latest.
-Ati/Nvidia. No, all present here.
-Soundcard. No, all kinds of cards here.

So, anyone who got it working, what are your specs?

Anyone tried the bink codec thing? Worked? A missing codec would be a simple and reasonably explanation.

Other than that, a nice game in need of a patch. Memory leak is no fun!

[smellymummy]

the intro movies have the sound skipping issue. always had. the in game movies used to do it when i had my geforce 5200. the 5200 also was tied into some crazy lag issues.

so i just gave up and bought a cheap new card, a gf 6200, and only the intro movie skips sound now. everything else works great. like how civ3 ran

[hetar]

I was having the same skipping problem. I have a Realtek AC97 integrated soundcard. The following fix worked for me:

-Updated to latest drivers from Realtek


"C:Program Files\Fraxis\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Civ4config

change the following:
Dynamic animation paging
from 1 to 0
Allow Screenshots
from 1 to 0
Autosave interval
from 4 to 10

EDIT: This fixed the intro movie, but the wonder movies are still stuttering.

[Ironwolf]

Skipping Sound

Tried all of the fixes listed but still have skipping sound with the intro and wonder movies. The only problem I have with the game

[kretos]

The same for me - wonder movies are hard to watch and listen.

My spec:
os: Win XP Pro
proc: Athlon 1700+
ram: Kingston 512 MB PC3200
mobo: MSI KT6V
gfx: Gigabyte Radeon 9600Pro
sound: SB Live 5.1

[Broken Hawk]

Anyone out there using a SoundMAX\Analog Devices audio card? I cannot find drivers.

I have the intro skip but everything else works fine.

[Ichirou989]

While I haven't been having the stuttering problem with the intro movie as some have, I have definately been plagued with this issue in the wonder movies. I have upgraded my AC97 drivers to current, and tried most of the various suggestions here to no avail.

However, I have discovered that at least in my case this stuttering seems to be connected with how much activity is going on elsewhere on the map. For example if I play on a small size map, the wonder movies will have no stuttering until quite a ways in...I'd say around late medieval era. Each size of map larger than this and the stuttering seems to occur earlier...to the point that a large terra map with epic turns will have stuttering on like the first or second wonder in. But if I turn off the music in the game, the movies play just fine no matter what map size I'm playing or what stage the game is in, so clearly it's something to do with the sound.

Now I'm playing the game with a 3 gig processor, 6800 series nVidia video card (and yes, I've gone through a ton of stuff on the video end as well to no avail), and have 1 gig of RAM. Maybe increasing the size of RAM I have will help...I just don't know. What I would like to know is if there are folks out there who are NOT having this problem at all, regardless of map size and/or sound settings? If so, then I'd like to hear what sound set up and other system stats that they have. Heh, only problem is that only folks with this problem will likely even be looking in this thread.

At this point I'm tired of fiddling with it and will just have to live with skipping over the movies.

Ichirou

[Lithrim]

But if I turn off the music in the game, the movies play just fine no matter what map size I'm playing or what stage the game is in, so clearly it's something to do with the sound.

Does this apply for the rest of you guys here with this problem? I'm gonna try this at home tonight. But if this is true it surely is some kind of conflict between sound playing softwares. In that case it's hard to see what we can do about it, except wait for a patch.

What I would like to know is if there are folks out there who are NOT having this problem at all, regardless of map size and/or sound settings? If so, then I'd like to hear what sound set up and other system stats that they have. Heh, only problem is that only folks with this problem will likely even be looking in this thread.

Sadly thats true...

[civ4dan]

I tried a game with a smaller map and so far I have gotten it to run smoothly.

However, on a larger map in later years I am getting stuttering sound and lagging game time.

The CPU is at 100%. I discuss this more in the CPU HOG thread.