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Thread ID: 64179	2005-12-06 08:13:00	CIV4 sometimes runs fine but mostly won't start	R0sered (7098)	Press F1

Post ID	Timestamp	Content	User
410637	2005-12-06 08:13:00	Hi P4 2.5Ghz 512 Ram NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 420 SB Live! Audio [800] I am trying to run Civ4 - I expected this to be slow, but about 19 times out of 20 it just crashes on the first loading screen. But the weird thing is, if I can get it to run, it runs pretty good (not amazingly fast, but completely stable and playable). There is no pattern to when it will run and when it will crash - sometimes runs twice in a row, then won't run for two hours of trying. I have followed every suggestion I can find (patched, unpatched, old graphics drivers, new drivers, DirectX9c loaded, XML parser update, sound card driver update, new user account, swapped my graphics card for a friend's GeForce FX 5200, and reinstalled and rebooted countless times - nothing makes any difference. To add insult tio injury, an older laptop with just 256 mg ram shared with the graphic card will load up and run the game - very slow, but no crashes. Can anyone suggest why a system capable of running the game refuses to load it most of the time? I'm running out of options! I have already posted on Civ4 forums, but no-one has any ideas, and no-one else has the same problem, which makes me think it is something to do with my system.	R0sered (7098)
410638	2005-12-07 00:00:00	Not sure whether I'm sending you up the garden path here, but one thing I've noticed is the amount of swap space that is required when running civ4. While the civ4 executable only takes up a couple of hundred megs, other supporting files take hundreds more. I've a fixed 1Gb swap file and I've seen it use up to 800MB (under XP Pro with nothing other than civ4 and the usual background apps such as antivirus & firewall). My suggestion would be to see if you can find a nice contiguous lump of space on your harddrive and and fix the swap file to 1Gb and see if that helps. I found that the patch to 1.09 fixed a large number of playing issues and the latest video drivers fixed the problems I had with instability. It is still not perfect - but playable and this is on my machine which is four years old! Hope you can find a solution - it's a fantastic game!	odyssey (4613)
410639	2005-12-07 06:10:00	Thanks - I have already tried that - in fact I eventually tried giving it 4gb on each of two drives. Everything else appreciated the change, but Civ4 still crashes on the loading screen almost every time. I'm coming to the conclusion its either re-install Windows (ugh!) or a new system.	R0sered (7098)
410640	2005-12-07 07:29:00	Hi P4 2.5Ghz 512 Ram NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 420 SB Live! Audio [800] swapped my graphics card for a friend's GeForce FX 5200, and reinstalled and rebooted countless times - nothing makes any difference. Hmm, read the user reviews at this site: www.amazon.com And although the minimum specs say your card (and mates) should do it, take a look at the recommended.	pctek (84)
410641	2005-12-07 09:28:00	I fixed it! Uninstalled Windows SP2 and it starts every time - and it's running fine! Whew. It's on the low end of the recommended specs, but because it always ran well when it did start, I didn't think specs were the main issue. However, if Santa managed to fit a new system into my Xmas stocking I wouldn't say no!	R0sered (7098)
410642	2005-12-07 19:21:00	Odd, i have the same problem with "Evil Genius".... Id really rather not remove SP2 :(	Chilling_Silence (9)
410643	2005-12-11 21:09:00	It would appear that there is a V1.09 patch out, which may help with the SP2 issue. I am buying it today. I have 6600 GT 128MB, so it should run OK.	KiwiTT_NZ (233)
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