Road To War -- Hardware Problems

[Dwight Kucera]

I really liked the “Desert War” scenario in CivIV, and the “Road To War” scenarios in BtS look even better. Unfortunately, my computer hardware seems to be insufficient to run those scenarios -- I’m getting “Virtual Memory Insufficient” errors, and/or crashes when loading saves. For the record, I’m using the 3.17 BtS download and the Ultimate RtW download; since I was able to run the “Final Frontier“ scenario, I assume my problem is specific to RtW.

I’m a retired programmer/analyst, but my useful knowledge of PCs ended with the passing of DOS. I need advice on what I should do in today’s computing world.

My computer is a Gateway DX200X --
CPU: Pentium 4, 3.06 GHz
System: Windows XP, SP3, with current automatic updates
RAM: 504 MB
Hard drive: 80 GB, 52 GB free
Graphics: “Integrated Intel Graphic Media Accelerator 900 with up to 128 MB shared memory”

I can’t find any info about the sound hardware, but I’ve been turning off all sound since the days of the original Civ; I can only hope that the problem is elsewhere. I’m guessing the problem is with graphics.

So -- I have absolutely no interest in either fancy sounds or graphical eye candy. I’m not going to shell out big bucks for some SuperGamer Screamer system, but I’m willing to upgrade my hardware solely to access RtW (assuming I can find any necessary hardware compatible with my 4-year-old computer). Do any of you techie types out there have any advice or suggestions?

[Dale]

500 mb RAM is pretty small by games these days (even in BtS days). You should really upgrade that to 2 gig. And it's very cheap to do. That'll increase your performance by heaps, just that one simple act.

[Dwight Kucera]

Thanks for your really prompt reply.

I'll check into upgrading to 2GB of RAM tomorrow. It's a bit deceptive, however, that the BtS box lists 256MB as "minimum" and 512MB as "recommended"; I suppose the folks in Marketing wanted the infamous pig-with-lipstick.

Do you have the foggiest idea of whether that mysterious "Media Accelerator 900" of mine is part of the problem?

Oh, and let me be the 10,000th guy to congratulate you on an amazing job with RtW!

[Petek]

Do you have the foggiest idea of whether that mysterious "Media Accelerator 900" of mine is part of the problem?

For one thing, this integrated graphics "card" doesn't have memory of its own. It uses up to 128 MB of system memory as video memory, leaving your PC with that much less memory. Systems with integrated graphics have a history of running Civ 4 poorly.

Petek