Starcraft System Crash

please refer to https://www.sevenforums.com/787904-post96.html

trying to, its just not helpful when random newbies jump on without reading the thread and post that killing explorer fixes a crash, when it certainly does not. >.<

What they are doing is not trying to help. Its the enticement of a chance at 15 minutes of fame for posting the winning fix, when they haven't even done the research behind what they are suggesting.

Its kind of obvious considering the majority who post the kill explorer fix are a 1 time poster and never show up again. Check back through the thread and you'll see what I mean. Theres a bunch of them.

Now given that we already have a fix for the colours, that being the DDraw compatibility reg patches i've posted based on warlord_7's fixes, and that doesn't fix the freezing either, then its already logical that killing explorer won't stop the freezes.

As it is, i've still not found a perfect way to stop them, and i don't run skype, or winamp, or any other app which draws overlays. I suppose it could be the g15 software or my creative volpanel, but im seriously doubting it. If it was really explorer freezing the game, it'd happen in a window as well as fullscreen, and it'd be 100% reproducible.

I'm sorry that i caused such hassle among people trying to get scbw in windows 7 working. I have been trying to work with a few of my friends using differnt methods ranging from working on compatatbility mode to single cpu, tweaking settings etc. The majority, but not all of my friends go it working with the explorer.exe being shut down and restarted, I apologize for any misunderstanding. On a side not some win7 copys it seems to run fine no editing needed others i have heard rumours of winamp leading to the problem. I don't wish to cause any misunderstandings and as such will refrain from futher posts that would possbile lead to arguemetns or just tolling and not to an actual soloution.

Schroomz from above says that using ChaosLauncher - Window Mode fixes both the color issues AND the freeze. I am beyond amazed and grateful to him.

Have any of you tried the following direct draw override in the registry for 7 x64 this fixes the colors and doing this I have never had a lockup.

Current starcraft

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\DirectDraw\Compatibility\StarCraft]
"Flags"=hex:00,08,00,00
"Name"="Starcraft.exe"
"ID"=hex:ca,89,65,49


Instructions below for C&C modify as needed.


Color fix for C&C95 on Windows 7


This is an actual fix for the color issue, rather than the workarounds we've been forced to deal with so far. It's based on an identical fix for StarCraft by warlord_7. You need to be using Nyerguds's 1.06b r2 patch for this, if you're not, you'll need to update the ID field on your own. Open Notepad and paste whichever one of these corresponds to the version of Windows 7 you're running:

32-bit:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\DirectDraw\Compatibility\Command & Conquer Gold 1.06b r2]
"Flags"=hex:00,08,00,00
"Name"="C&C95.exe"
"ID"=hex:d5,83,dd,32

64-bit:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\DirectDraw\Compatibility\Command & Conquer Gold 1.06b r2]
"Flags"=hex:00,08,00,00
"Name"="C&C95.exe"
"ID"=hex:d5,83,dd,32

File -> Save, choose All Files from the save as type pulldown menu, and save it with the extension .reg. Double click on it, confirm that you want to add the key, and give C&C a try. The Westwood intro video may still have the wrong colors (this seems random, sometimes it's fine, usually it's not), but the game and the rest of the videos will be fine. If you have your wallpaper set to slideshow, you'll still get messed up colors when your wallpaper changes. This will last until the end of any video that was playing, but will only cause a brief flicker in the actual game.

If you need to update the ID for whatever reason (new version of the C&C95 patch, fix for Red Alert or another game), run the game and then check this registry key:

32-bit:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\DirectDraw\MostRecentApplication

64-bit:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\DirectDraw\MostRecentApplication

The ID in that key is four bytes. Reverse their order, and place them between commas like in the keys above. 32dd83d5 becomes d5,83,dd,32. Use that in place of the ID in the keys I posted, change the filename to the correct one for whatever game you are trying to run, and give the key a unique name.


(And for the record, no, I have no idea what that flag actually does or what others are available. I only got it from the StarCraft fix, which itself seems to have been based on existing SC fixes already in the registry. I've searched, but I can't find any information on these flags.) This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 3/24/10 10:23:44 AM