Sound Issues with MTW and XP

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

I have Windows XP, and I have had Medieval: Total War for years, 1.0, on my computer (didn't know anything about patches and all that - I just enjoyed what I had). I've had some audio oddities the whole time in battles, but I ignored them (details below). I just got the Gold Edition today, so I went to uninstall the one I had...

Well, when I put in the disc (1.0), it only gave me the "Install" option, and not the "Play" or "Uninstall" options. Odd, since I've been playing it the whole time. So I went into the Program Files and tried to send the Medieval Total War file to the Recycling Bin by hand. It said I wasn't allowed for some reason in an error message. Well, fine.

So I installed the Gold Edition completely, which installed in its own folder. Then I ejected the disc, and reinserted it. Even for the Gold Edition, I just got the "Install" option instead of "Play.". But when I use the desktop icon, it starts up, just like my vanilla version. I patched it to 2.01, and that worked, and the icon works, but when I put in the disc, it only gives me the option to uninstall. So now I have two installs of Medieval: Total War, one of which refuses to go away.

Now the audio malfunctions...my battle audio in Gold Edition is still 'chunky' like my last game (i.e. I get certain sounds at a time...music + marching, or music + fighting, or just fighting sounds for seconds at a time or just the death screams, or often complete silence). I often get little "error" windows in my battles, exclaiming missing sounds I think, often using the word "Crusader" in the errors. Hitting the space-bar or return key makes them go away for the battle to continue, but in the vanilla game, sometimes it wouldn't go away and I've have to forcibly close the game, restart it and Auto-Resolve the battle to avoid the error.

What's up with my game?! I would like to have all of my audio in battles all the time as that adds to the effect (obviously), and especially be able to complete my battles without error, and if the two problems listed above are linked, I'd love to know if there's a known fix for it. Do I need to tone down the audio quality in Options?

Thanks in advance for any help!

[drone]

For your installation issues, do you still have a folder for your original MTW in your start menu? If I remember correctly, the uninstall option is in there. I would attempt to deinstall both completely, then install MTW Gold (and patch) before trying to play. What error message did you see when you tried to just delete the directory? I'm guessing it was the "deleteing an .exe" error, which you should be able to bypass. I've never tried it, but since you can just copy the entirety of MTW for a separate mod install, I assume you can just delete the directory without a problem. I don't think there are any registry keys to delete, but don't quote me on that...

I'm assuming that you see the correct version number (2.01) on the main menu screen when you start up Gold. When you patched it, did you use the MTW Gold 2.01 patch, or the MTW/VI 2.01 patch?

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

For your installation issues, do you still have a folder for your original MTW in your start menu? If I remember correctly, the uninstall option is in there. I would attempt to deinstall both completely, then install MTW Gold (and patch) before trying to play. What error message did you see when you tried to just delete the directory? I'm guessing it was the "deleteing an .exe" error, which you should be able to bypass. I've never tried it, but since you can just copy the entirety of MTW for a separate mod install, I assume you can just delete the directory without a problem. I don't think there are any registry keys to delete, but don't quote me on that...

I'm assuming that you see the correct version number (2.01) on the main menu screen when you start up Gold. When you patched it, did you use the MTW Gold 2.01 patch, or the MTW/VI 2.01 patch?

Hi, thanks for the reply.

I went to see what error it gave me when I tried to delete the original MTW (it said something or somebody else was using it), but it decided to delete this time. So that problem is solved. The Uninstall option in the Start menu never did anything at all. Since that's not my problem any more, the title of this topic should be "Sound Issues" or somesuch - thanks in advance if that can be changed.

I do have the correct version number on the startup screen, and I used the Gold Edition patch, not the VI patch.

I just started another battle and got the errors. They say various versions of "E_OutOfMemory_426" followed by a specification like "E:MTW_TROOPS MARCH SLOW." Every time I say "OK" another window is behind it with a different thing it can't seem to remember, with headings like "DirectxCall" and "Failed to Play 3D Sound." I had to close the game with the Task Manager again.

[drone]

Normally I would say a corrupt MTW install, but unlikely if you have been having it for both a new and old load. How old is your XP OS install and what does a dxdiag show for you?

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

Normally I would say a corrupt MTW install, but unlikely if you have been having it for both a new and old load. How old is your XP OS install and what does a dxdiag show for you?

Thank you for the title edit!

I have Version 2002, Service Pack 3.

DxDiag:

Operating System: Microsoft Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600)
Language: English
System Manufacturer: Hewlett-Packard
System Model: Pavilion dv8000
BIOS: Ver 1.00PARTTBL
Processor: AMD Turion(tm) 64 Mobile Technology ML34, MMX, 3DNow, ~1.8GHz
Memory: 1022MB RAM
Page File: 811MB used, 1648MB available
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)

Sound:

Name: Conexant AMC Audio
DirectX Features: Hardware Sound Acceleration Level: Full acceleration

[drone]

I'm a little out of my league here, but here goes.

Here's the latest HP driver page for the dv8000 series:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...5&swEnvOID=228
What version audio driver do you have?

And just to be sure, you have XP 32-bit, correct?

Edit-> Is there a control panel for the Conexant Audio? I'd be curious to see what options it gives you.

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

I'm a little out of my league here, but here goes.

Here's the latest HP driver page for the dv8000 series:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...5&swEnvOID=228
What version audio driver do you have?

And just to be sure, you have XP 32-bit, correct?

Edit-> Is there a control panel for the Conexant Audio? I'd be curious to see what options it gives you.

Thanks for the link; now downloading any driver that seems obscurely applicable. So whichever audio driver I had, it'll be the newest one now.

Yes, my XP is 32-bit.

The Conexant Audio has a control panel. Advanced Options gives me two sliders; one for hardware acceleration, and one for sample rate conversion quality. Both sliders are set to Full and Best, respectively.

I will restart my computer after the drivers download and give MTW a crack real quick.

Thanks again for the help so far; you aren't even paid for this. I'll edit this post when I find out if MTW reacts well.

[EDIT] No dice. I get a series of a few dozen error windows still, all of two varieties, them being: "E_OUTOFMEMORY E:\Mtw_atvi\sound.cpp(496)" and "Directxcall Failed to play 3D sound HEAVY_TROOPS_MARCH_SLOW". The specific sound in the second type varies; sometimes it involves heavy cavalry noises, etc.

I'm entirely at a loss now.

[drone]

If I'm not mistaken, E:\Mtw_atvi\sound.cpp is the source code file generating the error (here's where having the source code for an unsupported game would be nice ). I'm guessing the sound HEAVY_TROOPS_MARCH_SLOW is probably one of the three Medieval-Total War\Sounds\Battle\Troops\inf_walk_(lrg/med/sml).wav files. You could try playing the sound files independently, just to see if you have a corruption, but I doubt it since you have had this problem with multiple installs.

1 Gig RAM should be plenty to run MTW. Have you looked at the Task Manager (both before and after starting MTW) to see what your memory usage is?

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

If I'm not mistaken, E:\Mtw_atvi\sound.cpp is the source code file generating the error (here's where having the source code for an unsupported game would be nice ). I'm guessing the sound HEAVY_TROOPS_MARCH_SLOW is probably one of the three Medieval-Total War\Sounds\Battle\Troops\inf_walk_(lrg/med/sml).wav files. You could try playing the sound files independently, just to see if you have a corruption, but I doubt it since you have had this problem with multiple installs.

1 Gig RAM should be plenty to run MTW. Have you looked at the Task Manager (both before and after starting MTW) to see what your memory usage is?

I went directly to the files you mentioned, and all of the sound files play perfectly by themselves.

I haven't seen what my memory usage is before and during the game, so I'll try that now. Before the game: 1/3 of the page file (836MB). During game: 911MB use of the page file, but CPU usage is a solid and unwavering 100% just at the main menu. Battle map: 937MB page file usage, 100% CPU usage. BUT, the last two battles I just played had no issues whatsoever; the same exact battles that gave me the problem (Quick Battle is predictable). I'll play more battles and report back.

[EDIT]Another battle with no problem...fixed itself?
[EDIT]Tried it in my campaign...same errors, slightly different sound descriptions. But this time, if I space-bar okay-ed the first dozen, it let me play the battle just fine. No freezing.

[drone]

That is pretty strange. You are close to your physical memory limit, maybe MTW is having trouble with paging? MTW's RAM requirements are pretty small by today's standards (wasn't it 128Mb?), but I would think it could handle paging properly. I guess another test would be to close down everything else before starting MTW, maybe it doesn't like other programs hogging the memory.

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

That is pretty strange. You are close to your physical memory limit, maybe MTW is having trouble with paging? MTW's RAM requirements are pretty small by today's standards (wasn't it 128Mb?), but I would think it could handle paging properly. I guess another test would be to close down everything else before starting MTW, maybe it doesn't like other programs hogging the memory.

Interesting idea. The battles I reported as running perfectly fine were when I had nothing else running. When I opened my internet browser to post the results here, then the campaign battles messed up. I didn't pay attention to that correlation though. I'll do another test, play a battle with no other programs, then open the browser and try to play another battle. Hopefully that's exactly the problem.

[EDIT]First battle, new symptom. Battle played without error until just before the lines clashed, I paused to do something, and I couldn't un-pause it. I could move around, command, everything, but not play. After minimizing the game and restoring it, the pictures in my unit cards don't show up.

Something's quite amiss here. I think I need to uninstall the game completely and reinstall it on top of a defrag and the new drivers and after the old vanilla install was completely disposed of. Then it will be as clean an install as possible when I put on the Gold Patch. Then I'll run the game, with no other programs running, and see how it goes for a while. If I get the same issues then, then I completely give up. I will be dusting out the old rig I used before I got this laptop. I will play this game!

[drone]

I will play this game!

That's the spirit!

I think I have 2-3 older PCs stored away somewhere for playing ancient games. I can go back to Win 98SE if I have to. Not really sure what that says about me.

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

That's the spirit!

I think I have 2-3 older PCs stored away somewhere for playing ancient games. I can go back to Win 98SE if I have to. Not really sure what that says about me.

Haha, that's awesome.

Anyway, after eradicating any trace of MTW ever having been on my computer, installing and patching from scratch, closing all other programs and setting the Audio Quality to 'Low' and unit sizes to 'Default' after experimenting with all audio qualities and unit sizes in a dozen battles, I haven't had a single error message. I even get the option to play the game when I insert the disc instead of the option to install.

So all that just for a corrupted install? Perhaps. I'll start a campaign and see what happens I suppose.

[drone]

Excellent. Hopefully it works and you won't have to do my last-resort suggestion, reinstalling XP. How long has it been since you did a full OS install on that PC?

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

Excellent. Hopefully it works and you won't have to do my last-resort suggestion, reinstalling XP. How long has it been since you did a full OS install on that PC?

After playing a Viking campaign for a number of hours yesterday, I finally got the same errors during a battle, but as long as I pressed the space-bar I could play the battle, albeit slowly and aggravatingly. So I went to bed. I'll keep playing it and see what happens. Hopefully it's just a "You've been playing all day, get your butt to bed" kind of error and I just have to give it a rest after a while.

I've never done a full OS install on this PC. I bought it from Fry's like 5 years ago, plugged it in and here I am. Just did regular defrags and cleaned up crap taking up space now and then, but I've never done an OS install. I don't know what that entails; I wouldn't even know where to begin, or how to keep all of my stuff.

[drone]

You don't really want to do it, it's just a pain, but having a fresh install usually cleans up a lot of residuals. Sounds like you are just borderline on memory, and after a while you reach the threshold. So I guess it's save early, save often, and reboot every so often, but at least it works.

Other things to try: Go into the Control Panel->Add/Remove Programs, and check for extraneous programs you don't need or are OBE. Older Acrobat versions and stuff like that. Check the notification area of the taskbar, a lot of times little useless updater programs get installed and eat up a little memory. Maybe try CCleaner to cleanse the registry.

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

You don't really want to do it, it's just a pain, but having a fresh install usually cleans up a lot of residuals. Sounds like you are just borderline on memory, and after a while you reach the threshold. So I guess it's save early, save often, and reboot every so often, but at least it works.

Other things to try: Go into the Control Panel->Add/Remove Programs, and check for extraneous programs you don't need or are OBE. Older Acrobat versions and stuff like that. Check the notification area of the taskbar, a lot of times little useless updater programs get installed and eat up a little memory. Maybe try CCleaner to cleanse the registry.

I went through Add/Remove Programs and couldn't find anything in particular to clean up. I dusted around as much as I knew how, deleting old documents and programs and such by myself in the hard disc. I'll try the CCleaner idea. Thanks for the ideas.

As an update, I played for hours last night to the completion of my Vikings campaign, and that one battle error remains the only one I had. So far so good. If the error stays around, that's fine, as long as it only shows its head once in a campaign ;-)

[drone]

Sounds like you've got it sorted then, I guess MTW just doesn't like paging. Learn something new every day.

If you have the extra cash and can actually find compatible sticks, getting an extra gig of RAM would probably fix this for good, but if you are happy with the current situation there is no need. Enjoy!

[Dyabedes of Aphrodisias]

Sounds like you've got it sorted then, I guess MTW just doesn't like paging. Learn something new every day.

If you have the extra cash and can actually find compatible sticks, getting an extra gig of RAM would probably fix this for good, but if you are happy with the current situation there is no need. Enjoy!

Really? Hm, I might have to go with that idea just for the benefit of more RAM. I know I have expansion space, and I know I have a slot for an extra hard drive, too. Both of those would make this computer last quite a while longer, and add many hundreds of hours more wear to my MTW disc.

Thanks for all the help, drone! I really appreciate it.