my situation almost identical to Aetius (did not like RTW decided to play MTW for old times sake) except i had not changed video card (using nvidia GE FX 5600 Winfast A310) or monitor - had not even updated any drivers but MTW would not work whereas before MTW had been quite stable for me.

Had tried XL mod - crashes. tried Medmod same. tried MTWVI 2.01 same. updated video card driver same result except MTW seemed to be running a lot smoother on camp map before it crashed.

Changed antialising settings to 2x as per Northnovas. been playing now for about 1 hour and all seems fine fingers crossed.

So thanks Northnovas and thanks Ludens for posting his advice. I know this is knid of old thread but thought some people may appreciate finding this thread to help with this problem now that MTW seems to be on a bit of comeback thanks to MTW2!!