I too have to put this aside for now

[Brad Mayer]

Yep, exact same symptoms here. I've actually gotten used to it. The very first time the screen flashes, I wait for the rerendering (90% of the time it comes back after the first incident it comes back to life, but after that it rapidly becomes unstable), and then immediately save, exit, and reboot.

Although I'm rather nonchalent about this, sometimes I've found that the WinXP OS software shutdown functioality has been disabled by the Civ4 process after exiting to the deskop. I then have to do a hard reboot (hit the power button).

That IS a serious problem when you are destabilizing basic OS functionality with your program. Much more serious than hosing the onboard graphics and/or driver, the usual reason for a reboot.

Otherwise I am content to wait. I suspect the lack of response to these many similiar reports shows that Firaxis knew of the issue at game release, but was rushed by the distributer at the end of quarter - a VERY common situation I can tell you as someone who has worked in the S/W industry for 13 years.

Surely someone at Firaxis had to playtest an aggressive game on Large or above, Epic, on a simple variety of platforms and had to run into this issue.

[vmxa1]

I had not even mentioned the few times I have had the thing leavemy system in some 4bit color at 800 and it cannot be reset.

No selection for any of the 32bit or even 16 bit colors. Cannot change the resolution and must reboot. This I blame on the OS.

I worked as a systems program for VM on 370 and beyond. The OS is not suppose to let applications corrupt it. In VM we had guest OS (DOS/MVS) and they were isolated from the nucleus (hopefully).

So if a game can crash the OS, it is the OS's fault. They should have mechanisms to intercept any calls to the underlying hardware and simulate that call.

I know Windows does not do this in most of it incarnations and hence games can go amok.

[greggbert]

Originally posted by Brad Mayer
Yep, exact same symptoms here. I've actually gotten used to it. The very first time the screen flashes, I wait for the rerendering (90% of the time it comes back after the first incident it comes back to life, but after that it rapidly becomes unstable), and then immediately save, exit, and reboot.

Wow, this is EXACTLY what happens to me, and the reboot always fixes it so it's not the save game that's corrupted, it's that your machine gets into some state after playing for a while that is unstable. Closing the program and restarting does not fix it, but rebooting does. I think it might be a video ram leak or something.

[vmxa1]

Patch is out now 1.08, gonna see if it helps.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Urban, at least it gave me time to squeeze in some MOO, but I am getting anxious to try more IV.

Hiya

I probably shouldn't play the game during week nights, but it bothers me a lot when it doesn't work.

I haven't seen a computer frozen solid for a very long time, not even on Windows boxes.

This kinda brings back some bad memories.

[vmxa1]

The painting of the map with a stutter is still there so far. I did not see a crash (yet), but did not get in that much playing. Going to bed.

I will apply the 11/14/05 driver for Geforce before I try tomorrow.