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Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 4/28/2010 6:43:01 PM   
NCrawler

 

Posts: 30
Joined: 6/4/2003
From: Sherwood, AR
Status: offline 		Do you hate having to maintain an older XP machine just to play your favorite SP game?

Tired of not being able to enjoy the game on Windows 7?

If you answered 'Yes' to either of these questions then this fix is for you! After further research, the culprit which screws up the 256-color palette in Windows 7 is explorer.exe. Grab the attached file, win7spwawfix.jpg, and unzip it to your SPWAW folder, typically C:\Matrix Games\Steel Panthers World At War", and you're all set! You can now use the file win7spwaw.cmd to start the game rather than the shortcut which comes with the game.

Note: change the extension of the attached file to zip

Note2: you can right-click the file and choose 'Send to --> Desktop (create shortcut)' to be able to run it from a desktop shortcut.

Note3: this fix will also more than likely fix Vista related palette corruption as well since Win7 is basically just an upgraded Vista.



NC

Attachment (1)
Post #: 1
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 4/29/2010 1:16:39 AM   
sullafelix

 

Posts: 1520
Joined: 1/11/2005
Status: offline 		I don't get a file or anything when I go to save your attachment.

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Windows 7 home premium 64
Intel quad core I7
16 gig
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Di! Ecce hora! Uxor mea me necabit!

(in reply to NCrawler)
Post #: 2
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 4/29/2010 2:49:45 AM   
NCrawler

 

Posts: 30
Joined: 6/4/2003
From: Sherwood, AR
Status: offline 		Sorry, didn't notice that. This forum doesn't allow .zip attachments so I renamed it with the .jpg extension. You can get the file on the SP:WaW Depot forums as well, here: http://www.spwaw.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=23047



NC

(in reply to sullafelix)
Post #: 3
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 4/29/2010 10:11:56 PM   
sullafelix

 

Posts: 1520
Joined: 1/11/2005
Status: offline 		OK now I'm passed drooling. I followed the above link and there is no attachment in your post. I thought I had to sign up at the SPWAW Depot and did but haven't received an email back as of yet.

_____________________________

Windows 7 home premium 64
Intel quad core I7
16 gig
AMD R9 200 series

Di! Ecce hora! Uxor mea me necabit!

(in reply to NCrawler)
Post #: 4
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 9/9/2010 7:27:42 PM   
jeggett

 

Posts: 11
Joined: 3/30/2005
Status: offline 		Many thx for this..

What a game eh, I'm still playing it after all these years. Got the original and then the MAtrix edition.

Top notch!
Post #: 5
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 9/20/2010 6:20:48 PM   
Nikademus


Posts: 25684
Joined: 5/27/2000
From: Alien spacecraft
Status: offline 		btw....this fix also works for the winSP:WW2 and winSPMBT programs as well for full screen. You have to modify the batch file slightly of course.



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Post #: 6
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 10/4/2010 8:07:56 PM   
Alby


Posts: 4855
Joined: 4/29/2000
From: Greenwood, Indiana
Status: offline 		Got new PC with win 7, SPwaw showed up with crazy colors, used the file mentioned above (V2) and all is well....excellent work.


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Post #: 7
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 1/4/2011 5:46:29 AM   
Fallschirmjager


Posts: 6793
Joined: 3/18/2002
From: Chattanooga, Tennessee
Status: offline 		I want to bump this thread because I put SPWAW on my new Windows 7 and after a few hours I was frustrated and angry that I could not get one of my favorite games to work. I found this thread and the fix works. Very happy to have the game back up and running.

(in reply to Alby)
Post #: 8
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 1/6/2011 3:10:07 AM   
Grinder

 

Posts: 3
Joined: 1/6/2011
Status: offline 		Well - I wish it worked for ME!  I see no difference  :-(   I can see the file in the directory

win7spwaw   Windows Comma . . .


So what am I doing wrong - have to reboot???

< Message edited by Grinder -- 1/6/2011 3:11:11 AM >

(in reply to Fallschirmjager)
Post #: 9
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 1/8/2011 1:33:07 AM   
osiris_slith

 

Posts: 240
Joined: 1/5/2007
Status: offline 		HI

My apolgies..this fix works very nicely ..i was just not doing it right

rene

(in reply to NCrawler)
Post #: 10
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 1/12/2011 7:40:23 PM   
Mentat

 

Posts: 5
Joined: 9/27/2003
From: Sweden
Status: offline 		Thanks a million! You have just saved my Windows7 computer!

All I would want now is some way to slow down the navigation on the map when you move the cursor to the edge, as I was used to navigating that way. Oh well, I suppose I will have to live with navigating by clicking on the overview map. Not as practical but at least the game is playable.

It would have been nice, and forward compatible, to have had a preferences setting where the map scrolling speed is ruled by a numerical value for damping the speed. That would have required a patch into the program itself though and I wonder if MatrixGames even have the source code available any longer...?

Best game ever made, SPWAW!


Edit: Ooops: It was already there, under preferences as "Scroll delay". Told ya, best game ever made!

< Message edited by Mentat -- 1/12/2011 7:44:31 PM >

(in reply to osiris_slith)
Post #: 11
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 1/12/2011 11:45:22 PM   
planner 3

 

Posts: 616
Joined: 3/7/2008
Status: offline 		To mentat....."My eyes have seen the glory of Preference settings..........." gets yer every time.

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"As Pogo said, 'We have met the enemy and he is us' "

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Post #: 12
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/6/2011 11:09:00 AM   
SP4EVER

 

Posts: 11
Joined: 3/6/2011
Status: offline 		Killing explorer.exe in Windows Vista/7 to fix the color palette while running a game like SPWAW is not really the best possible solution. For one thing you may have problems restarting explorer. Secondly you can not multi task. I.e minimize spwaw and use email, etc.

However there are built-in compatibility options in Windows Vista and 7 that can be enabled to run older games without the need to kill explorer. The compatibility modes are enabled in Windows registry.

Now I have not tested how this works on SPWaW, but it has worked on a number of other old games having the color corruption problem on Windows Vista/7.

The easy way:
There is the fan made "Direct Draw Compatibility Tool" available that automates the registry editing process. The user only needs to run the Tool once and browse to the games .exe file he wants to patch and hit apply.
http://www.4shared.com/file/xeIljXSm/DirectDraw_Compatibility_Tool_.html


The manual method:
To enable the DirectDraw compatibility mode for SPWaW manualy you need to copy paste the folowing text string to notepad and save it to a file with the extension (.REG).
So you should then have a file called SPWAW_colorfix.reg for example. Then just run it and if all goes well you should get a promt asking if you want to add the information to your registry. Click Yes.


Copy paste the text below to your notepad: 
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\DirectDraw\Compatibility\SPWaW-v8.403]
"Flags"=hex:00,08,00,00
"Name"="mech.exe"
"ID"=hex:45,1a,94,43

If you have a 64 bit operating system you need to copy paste this text instead: 
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\DirectDraw\Compatibility\SPWaW-v8.403]
"Flags"=hex:00,08,00,00
"Name"="mech.exe"
"ID"=hex:45,1a,94,43

So if this works out you should be able to start the game from mech.exe and get no color corruption. Also note that this fix is for SPWaW (Steel Panthers World at War) version 8.403 and will not work on other versions of the game. It should work on Enhanced mod too because enhanced mod uses the 8.403 exe file.


< Message edited by SP4EVER -- 4/5/2011 12:40:10 PM >

(in reply to planner 3)
Post #: 13
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/6/2011 8:53:01 PM   
Alby


Posts: 4855
Joined: 4/29/2000
From: Greenwood, Indiana
Status: offline 		I just need a good fix for the artillery screen delay thingy..


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Post #: 14
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/7/2011 3:05:32 PM   
SP4EVER

 

Posts: 11
Joined: 3/6/2011
Status: offline 		The artillery screen bug is due to modern computers multicore CPU's most likely. Although it might also be due to some other compatibility issue.
There are ways to tell Windows to run a exe file in single core affinity though this can be tricky sometimes...

There is another way luckily. That is to update the exe file itself so there is no need to run separate scripts to enable the single core affinity.

To fix the affinity in the exe there is the program ImageCFG:
http://www.robpol86.com/index.php/ImageCFG


Here are links to the updated mech.exe files that should tell the computer to run the game in singlecore instead of multicore mode:

-Download and use this one if you have just the normal game patched to version 8.403.
http://www.gamefront.com/files/20195896/mech_8403_cpu_fix-upd.zip

-Use this one if you have the Enhanced FR mod.
http://www.gamefront.com/files/20195899/Mech_ENH_FR_cpu_fix-upd.zip

Do tell me if this works (or doesn't). I can't test this myself since my computer has an old single core cpu...

UPDATE:
I edited the affinity to 0x2 instead of 0x1 so it should now use the second core of a multicore CPU. This might work better.

< Message edited by SP4EVER -- 4/6/2011 12:33:07 PM >

(in reply to Alby)
Post #: 15
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/7/2011 4:16:46 PM   
planner 3

 

Posts: 616
Joined: 3/7/2008
Status: offline 		SP4EVER: I don't really have any probs, well yeah, I have one.....can you figure a fix to make tanks reverse in SPwaw please. I have played this game since ber 5 and I still dream of not showing my tail to the AI.

_____________________________

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Post #: 16
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/7/2011 5:26:50 PM   
Alby


Posts: 4855
Joined: 4/29/2000
From: Greenwood, Indiana
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: SP4EVER

The artillery screen bug is due to modern computers multicore CPU's most likely. Although it might also be due to some other compatibility issue.
There are ways to tell Windows to run a exe file in single core affinity though this can be tricky sometimes...

There is another way luckily. That is to update the exe file itself so there is no need to run separate scripts to enable the single core affinity.

Here are links to the updated mech.exe files that should tell the computer to run the game in singlecore instead of multicore mode:

-Download and use this one if you have just the normal game patched to version 8.403.
http://www.gamefront.com/files/20072035/mech_8403_cpu_fix.zip

-Use this one if you have the Enhanced FR mod.
http://www.gamefront.com/files/20072037/Mech_ENH_FR_cpu_fix.zip

Do tell me if this works (or doesn't). I can't test this myself since my computer has an old single core cpu...




It did NOT work for me, running Windows 7.
I am using it in conjunction with the color fix program

< Message edited by Alby -- 3/7/2011 5:27:51 PM >

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Post #: 17
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/7/2011 6:10:20 PM   
SP4EVER

 

Posts: 11
Joined: 3/6/2011
Status: offline 		Then it can't be a problem related to multicore CPU's either. Thats a bummer.

I know someone who has the artillery screen problem on his Windows 7 laptop. I'll have to try and see if he will let me mess with he's computer.

I strongly believe though that it is fixable. There are alot of things still to try.

For one there is the Aplication Compatibility Toolkit by Microsoft that has 100 or so fixes selectable so theres one place to start. Just have to go through the entire list one by one and see if any of the fixes work.

Then there are some dll files in the game directory that can be updated. That helps sometimes. I think it was windx.dll that has a newer version available online somewhere. It might fix something when updated... or not. I'll have to search for that.


(in reply to Alby)
Post #: 18
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/7/2011 7:01:58 PM   
SP4EVER

 

Posts: 11
Joined: 3/6/2011
Status: offline 		Found the dll file I was talking about...

It was infact NCrawler's post at Shrapnelgames that had the link to the website regarding WinVFX.

http://www.thegleam.com/ke5fx/

On that site in the bottom there is the link for VFX Version 1.19.

Not sure if it matters at all, but one can update the windx.dll in the game directory with a newer dll from the archive available at the site.
Basicaly you download this archive:
http://www.thegleam.com/ke5fx/misc/vfx119.zip
Then unzip it somewhere in a temporary folder.
Then you should find a folder named "WINVFX16" there and a file called "winvfx16.dll" in it. Then rename that file to "windx.dll" and copy that in your game dir overwriting the old one.


(in reply to SP4EVER)
Post #: 19
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/12/2011 12:34:59 PM   
SP4EVER

 

Posts: 11
Joined: 3/6/2011
Status: offline 		No luck with the artillery screen bug I'm afraid.

After reading these posts...
http://enhanced.freeforums.org/windows-7-direcx-11-display-erratic-colors-t579.html

I wonder if it is a problem with laptop computers and their advanced cpu management routines? Because It appears changing the game to run on the second core worked for the guy who posted the fix there. Maybe he had a desktop computer instead of a laptop?

So it would seem multicore cpus is indeed the problem, but even forcing the game to run on one core will not solve the problem for all systems.

I think this might need a fix in the game code itself. Some tweaking with the values for how the game handles cpu time. That is ofcourse beyond our abilities to do.


Anyway I'm out of options.


(in reply to SP4EVER)
Post #: 20
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 3/13/2011 6:28:32 PM   
Alby


Posts: 4855
Joined: 4/29/2000
From: Greenwood, Indiana
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: SP4EVER

No luck with the artillery screen bug I'm afraid.

After reading these posts...
http://enhanced.freeforums.org/windows-7-direcx-11-display-erratic-colors-t579.html

I wonder if it is a problem with laptop computers and their advanced cpu management routines? Because It appears changing the game to run on the second core worked for the guy who posted the fix there. Maybe he had a desktop computer instead of a laptop?

So it would seem multicore cpus is indeed the problem, but even forcing the game to run on one core will not solve the problem for all systems.

I think this might need a fix in the game code itself. Some tweaking with the values for how the game handles cpu time. That is ofcourse beyond our abilities to do.


Anyway I'm out of options.




I am not on a laptop, but I can deal with the artilery screen problem, its more of an annoyance than it is a game killer for me.


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Post #: 21
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 5/13/2011 7:20:31 AM   
NCrawler

 

Posts: 30
Joined: 6/4/2003
From: Sherwood, AR
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: SP4EVER
Not sure if it matters at all, but one can update the windx.dll in the game directory with a newer dll from the archive available at the site.
Basicaly you download this archive:
http://www.thegleam.com/ke5fx/misc/vfx119.zip
Then unzip it somewhere in a temporary folder.
Then you should find a folder named "WINVFX16" there and a file called "winvfx16.dll" in it. Then rename that file to "windx.dll" and copy that in your game dir overwriting the old one.


Not a good idea. The windx.dll in SP:WAW IS NOT a winvfx library! It looks like they inline compiled the winvfx??.lib files instead of using the .dll.

(in reply to SP4EVER)
Post #: 22
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 5/13/2011 7:23:28 AM   
NCrawler

 

Posts: 30
Joined: 6/4/2003
From: Sherwood, AR
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Alby
It did NOT work for me, running Windows 7.
I am using it in conjunction with the color fix program


I am almost finished with a proxy ddraw.dll that uses GDI to render the graphics on screen which will do away with the 'closing explorer.exe' trick.

(in reply to Alby)
Post #: 23
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 5/15/2011 4:22:22 PM   
Alby


Posts: 4855
Joined: 4/29/2000
From: Greenwood, Indiana
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: NCrawler


quote:

ORIGINAL: Alby
It did NOT work for me, running Windows 7.
I am using it in conjunction with the color fix program


I am almost finished with a proxy ddraw.dll that uses GDI to render the graphics on screen which will do away with the 'closing explorer.exe' trick.

Sounds good, altho it's all over my head...LOL

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Post #: 24
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 5/16/2011 4:06:21 AM   
NCrawler

 

Posts: 30
Joined: 6/4/2003
From: Sherwood, AR
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Alby


quote:

ORIGINAL: NCrawler


quote:

ORIGINAL: Alby
It did NOT work for me, running Windows 7.
I am using it in conjunction with the color fix program


I am almost finished with a proxy ddraw.dll that uses GDI to render the graphics on screen which will do away with the 'closing explorer.exe' trick.

Sounds good, altho it's all over my head...LOL


It's just a library file (ddraw.dll) which intercepts all calls that the game makes to DirectDraw and allows the programmer to insert his/her own routines before passing control back to the real DirectDraw. Doing it this way, the program can be rendered with OpenGL instead of DD which fixes the weird color issues. So far in my testing, it seems to improve the artillery dialog also. I almost have it at the point where it can be released. I need it tested on different systems so would you mind giving me a hand testing it?

(in reply to Alby)
Post #: 25
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 5/29/2011 5:22:50 AM   
fmonster


Posts: 217
Joined: 6/16/2003
From: Cartersville, Ga. USA
Status: offline 		I, for one, am interested in your fix, NCrawler. While the other fix works on colors, my game becomes very sluggish and I can't seem to get sound, where before adding the file I had a good sppedy game with bad colors. Hope you fix comes soon, and thanks for the effort!

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Matrix Games Owned

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- John Tiller's Campaign Series
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(in reply to NCrawler)
Post #: 26
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 5/29/2011 2:30:26 PM   
NCrawler

 

Posts: 30
Joined: 6/4/2003
From: Sherwood, AR
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: fmonster

I, for one, am interested in your fix, NCrawler. While the other fix works on colors, my game becomes very sluggish and I can't seem to get sound, where before adding the file I had a good sppedy game with bad colors. Hope you fix comes soon, and thanks for the effort!


PM me your email address and I'll send it to you.

(in reply to fmonster)
Post #: 27
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 8/23/2011 7:07:42 AM   
pbhawkin1

 

Posts: 158
Joined: 4/4/2001
From: Mudgee, Australia
Status: offline 		Hi,
I have Ncrawler's fix and it gets the game to run BUT I too have the arty bug AND it makes it almost unplayable as I am unable to select any of the various options in the menu!
I do find the closing of explorer to be a issue too and would like to try your DLL as well.

thanks.

peter

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Post #: 28
RE: Windows 7 *GUARANTEED* fix - 8/23/2011 4:03:52 PM   
planner 3

 

Posts: 616
Joined: 3/7/2008
Status: offline 		pbhawkins: I found that if I hit "SHIFT" and hold it, prior to making any selections on the Artillery swcreen that the majority of the problems disappear. HTH you.

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Post #: 29
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