95 game won't run in XP

[scarrylarry 0]

Hello,

I have a Windows 95 game called the X files game. It was made by fox interactive in 1997.when I click on the setup/install exe. Absolutely nothing happens. The install shield wizard does not come up and I get no error messages. I've tried the compatibility wizard with all the different settings and that didn't work. I also tried copying the files from the install cd on to my hard drive & it wouldn’t work from there either. I can view the files and even open some of them like the read me file and some small videos. There are also 2 other exe.’s on the disc one for QuickTime 3.0 & one for Direct X 5. I clicked on them JUST to see IF the wizard would come up and got the same problem, which is nothing, happens. I'm running Xp with Amd Athlon Processor @ 2.09 Mhz and A Ati Radeon 9800 pro Graphics card My sound card is from nvidia And for XP I have Service Pack 1 can't seem to load SP2 but that's another issue. Now the funny thing is that my dad has a computer With Xp Sp2 and a Gforce 5200 graphics card and He can get the games to work fine on his machine He clicks on the exe. and the install wizard comes up asking him where to put the game and so on. But On my computer it does nothing. I also tried another 95 game that I found but that didn't work either same Problem. But on my fathers computer again it worked perfectly. So I'm guessing it's not an XP Problem is it. If anyone can help I would greatly appreciate it. If not thanks for trying.

 

,scarrylarry

 

 

[Scottishknight19 0]

Ive had this same problem with 2 games now they dont play on windows xp pro but they do on home there must be some way of getting it to play.

[peterh 1]

i have managed to install the X Files game on XP. Although you do need to install the Quicktime bit but NOT the DirectX as X Files will work on DX 8.1 or 9.

 

First check that DirectX is working correctly by running DXDiag and make sure DirectDraw and Direct 3D is enabled.

 

Also make sure autoexec.nt is available in the C:\Windows\System32 folder as that is known to cause problems with older software.

 

[Wilhelmus 1]

Originally posted by peterh:

Quote:

Also make sure autoexec.nt is available in the C:\Windows\System32 folder as that is known to cause problems with older software.

Copy it from 'c:\windows\repair', if it does not exists or is corrupted somehow.

[scarrylarry 0]

Hello, peterh & wilhelmus

 

Thanks for all your help. I Tried your suggestions and apparantly those 2 files were corrupted cause when I overwrote the files in system32 with the files from repair the game was able to load. Now the game does work BUT the sound is a little garbled at times. Kind of like static on a radio station. If you have any suggestions on that I'd like to hear them. Direct X works fine and while I was there I went to the sound tab and turned down the hardware acceleration hoping it might solve my sound problem though I haven't tried the game yet. But the main thing was getting it to load so thanks again for all your help.

 

,ScarryLarry

[scarrylarry 0]

Hello again,

 

I tried the game with the hardware acceleration in Direct X turned down to standard and there was no sound when people in the game talked. So I turned it back up to full acceleration and I got sound again but like I said in previous post it's choppy and garbled. it also kind of echoes. When I first light off the game the sound is fine but then it just goes to crap. My sound card is made by Nvidia.It's called Nvidia®nForce Audio according to System Information. I'm Pretty sure the sound card is good because I run games like Hitman,Gtavc,and Max Payne Without any problems. If you have any help on this Problem I would really appreciate it.

Thanks again. ,scarrylarry

[Wilhelmus 1]

Go to Start-> Settings-> Control Panel and select Sound and Audio Devices. On the Audio tab, press the Advanced button under Sound Playback

 

On the resulting Speaker tab, select Desktop Stereo Speakers.

Then click on the Performance tab next to the Speakers tab.

Play with the Hardware Acceleration slider (Default: Full).

[Raven1988 0]

hey guys i've been looking throughout the site trying to get C&C tiberian dawn to install on windows XP i've looked through several forums and everything i've tried still comes up giving me the same problem i open the installer file then screen goes blank for a moment then returns to the desktop. i go into the task manager and under the processes tab the installers are there as if they are running but i can't view them is there anything any1 can do to help?

[Wilhelmus 1]

Something to try:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;314452

 

and copy autoexec.nt and config.nt files from c:\windows\repair to c:\windows\system32.

 

[Raven1988 0]

thanks willhelmus but unfortunately still no luck just so every1 knows its not the game itself because it works just fine on a mate's computer running windows 98

[Wilhelmus 1]

Hmm.. try running it from safe mode, incase some other process is causing problems to it.

 

Or if your drive is not formatted to NTFS filesystem, then try download bootdisk image for 98/Me, boot with imaged floppy with CDROM support, and then try install the game.

 

http://www.bootdisk.com/

 

DO NOT TO THIS IF YOUR DRIVE FILESYSTEM IS NTFS.

 

Or try if Dosbox allows you to install it.

http://dosbox.sourceforge.net. Also get D-Fend, which allows easier configuration for dosbox.

http://members.home.nl/mabus/dfend.htm

 

[Raven1988 0]

thanks i think that dosbox may be the solution it may be because i'm tired but i can't understand how it works it says that it can't find the 'setup.mix' file but i don't know how to tell it where it is also if this doesn't work how do i use safe mode its never really been required

[Wilhelmus 1]

Start dosbox.

Then execute following commands:

 

mount D "E:\" -t cdrom

This mounts E: CDROM drive to D: , change E:\ to your primary CD/DVD drive.

 

mount C "C:\"

Mounts C:\ to C: so you can access c:

 

Then try run the installation from the mounted D drive.

If success and installation starts, install to C: drive.

 

But now the fun begins, you can not run game because it does not recognize CD... Solution: create ISO image from it and mount it from dosbox (Download e.g. Alcohol software for creating iso file from cd).

 

imgmount D "c:\images\tibdawn.iso" -t iso

Mounts tibdawn.iso file to D:

 

Then try running the game via dosbox.

 

I also stumbed to this artice while googling:

http://www.planetcnc.com/cnc2sw/dos_xp.html

Try if those tips help.

 

[Raven1988 0]

thanks for all the tips they've been very helpful but at the risk of sounding a bit dim i don't know how to create an ISO image if you could give me help on thaqt it would be very, very much appreciated

[DosFreak 2]

Download WinIso or Winimage. Within those programs are the options to create an .ISO of your CD.

[Raven1988 0]

thanks heaps every1 i've got it running but i need 1 last tip: how can i get the sound to run more smoothly?

[Edited by raven1988 on 2005-03-18 23:12:29]

 

[Wilhelmus 1]

Try these.

 

Quote:

Q. What if the sound doesn't work?

 

A. The section in 'dosbox.conf' that relates to the setting up of your sound card looks like this:

(The 'dosbox.conf' file is in DosBox installation folder, e.g. c:\dosbox)

 

[sblaster]

# type -- Type of sblaster to emulate:none,sb1,sb2,sbpro1,sbpro2,sb16.

# base,irq,dma,hdma -- The IO/IRQ/DMA/High DMA address of the SoundBlaster.

# mixer -- Allow the SoundBlaster mixer to modify the dosbox mixer.

# oplmode -- Type of OPL emulation: auto,cms,opl2,dualopl2,opl3.

# On auto the mode is determined by sblaster type.

# oplrate -- Sample rate of OPL music emulation.

 

type=sb16

base=220

irq=7

dma=1

hdma=5

mixer=true

oplmode=auto

 

# Try tweaking this setting.

# (8000, 11025 [telephone quality], 16000, 22050 [radio quality], 32000, 44100 [CD Audio quality])

# E.g. lower it to 16000.

oplrate=22050

 

Another thing that could happen regarding sound is that your PC will normally be utilising full hardware sound acceleration - something that did not even remotely exist back in the good old DOS days. If you suspect this might be a problem, try the following:

 

Start -> Run -> dxdiag.exe

 

Then go to the Sound tab, and knock the 'Hardware Sound Acceleration Level' down a notch or two. Start up DOSBox again, and see if that gets you some sound.

 

Q. What if the sound is stuttering or the video is going too slow?

 

A. The sound is rarely going to be crystal clear because we are not using real sound hardware, remember? But if there are too many 'clicks', or the sound is cutting out, or the video is going too slow in a 3D game and you just keep spinning around when you try to move... then you are probably trying to emulate (sigh) more cycles per millisecond than your machine is capable of handling. There are several things you can try to remedy this problem:

 

1. You can reduce the number of instructions DOSBox is trying to... execute per millisecond via Ctrl-F11 (use Ctrl-F12 to increase again). Once you get the setting to the way you want it, Alt-Esc out of the game and DOSBox will tell you what the current setting is. You can then enter this value permanently into 'dosbox.conf' via:

cycles=?

 

2. Likewise, you can try skipping video frames via Ctrl-F8 (use Ctrl-F7 to add them back in). Skipping frames will decrease processor requirements at the expense of video quality. You set this value permanently into 'dosbox.conf' via:

 

frameskip=?

 

Quoted from

Quandary DOSBox FAQ.

 

[Raven1988 0]

i know i said that the last tip i asked for was gonna be all but i didn't anticipate this since i restarted my computer the game doesn't run in full screen anymore it takes just a small box in the middle of the screen

[Wilhelmus 1]

Check your 'dosbox.conf' file.

There should be section called sdl.

Change the fullscreen to true.

 

Quote:

[sdl]

fullscreen = true

 

http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php?page=dosbox.conf%2Fsdl

[Raven1988 0]

ok thanks every1 got it working without any problems now

[CriticalMass 0]

Raven, I'm glad you did.

Unfortunately, I have a similar problem. I'm running the same X-Files game that I got from Ebay, and when I loaded the game, the sound was fine until I went back to the main menu, or loaded a game, and then the sound disappeared. Video was fine, however. I found out that I should uninstall Quicktime, and re-install the version that came with the game. It worked ONCE. Now, when I load it, I get sounds, but no video. I'm banging my head against the wall. Does XP have a DOS Box? I've done everything else mentioned except that.

 

[Wilhelmus 1]

Originally posted by CriticalMass:

Quote:

Does XP have a DOS Box?

No, you need to download dosbox from: http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/