So pray tell, if this other forum of yours is so great, why didn't you ask for help there in the 1st place? if it's not FL oriented, why would anyone here go there?

Lock this thread: pure advertisement of other sites.

Actually not. These other forums are not "so great" as you are saying. They are only helpful to people, including newbies. Most of our visitors are gamers, not Freelancer players. And this post does not actually contain the URLs either. I will have to mail me to get them. Nobody is forcing you.

Lock this all you want. The intention was not to advertise and it is obvious that you missed my post completely - typical of the attitudes around here. I don't care if people do not visit these 'other forums' either, but I DO care about Freelancer.

So, let me spell it out for you then:

1. If you have problems getting the game to run, contact the supplier - they are more helpful. They actually do care.

2. Play the game - once you get it to run - discover it for yourself.

I did ask for help here - repeatedly. Guess what? I was answered by newbies who are in the same boat. At least they tried and for that, I hereby applaud them - at least those who responded. For the rest, never mind - I got sorted out by Microsoft in the end. And just in case you are thinking I am punting Microsoft - I am not - I am not a 'fan' of theirs... I went to them because like so many people out there, I did not have a choice. If i wanted to play their game, I HAD to ask for their support.

If you were the helpful and courteous kind, you would have grasped the meaning of my original post and responded accordingly.

Like I said - this place is truly a waste of time and I am gone! Bravo on your website though - clearly run by capable people!

Edited by - JPsEmpire on 12-05-2003 12:09:39

Look son... You may be dissapointed, or even offended by this forum, but the things you wrote about it aren't so bad as you make them sound.
The reason why some of us are "rude" to newbies is that they aks questions that were asked 50 times before, or post a completely usless info, just for the sake of posting...
I mean, take Fear Factor for example: He's here for God knows how long, has about 750 QUALITY posts, and has seen almost everything to be seen in FL...
Then a newb comes along asking is it possible to trade your ship in for another one... How would you react?
Bottom line is: Search the forum before you ask something! If your question has not been asked before, then
a) It shouldn't have been asked in the first place
b) It's a new one
So, if it's the "a" case you'll get flamed. If, on the other hand it's "b" , you'll get "let me check this out, brb..." and/or some humour regarding the topic, to pass the time while researching...
If you want to argue further, may i suggest you take it outside?




CMPT XPBATCKOJ !!!

Point taken. Thank you for your reply. I was not trying to be offensive - I just hate my time being wasted.

Son? I wish. I am 47 years old and am a seasoned software executive and love to play games, specially wargames.

Thank you again for you nice reply.

-------
JP

---

1. If you have problems getting the game to run, contact the supplier - they are more helpful. They actually do care.

---

People here may not know the answer to your questions (Technical problems can be like that) So they cant help you! I have been to the tech forum and helped where I can... Yes.. The game Dev's know how to fix them better than us, they made the game, They make their living from games! Dont flame the community because we dont know the answer to yor question! Because YOU DONT EITHER!
PEOPLE ON THE COMMUNITY HELP OTHERS OUT OF KINDNESS, DONT GET PAID OR ANYTHING ELSE FROM IT!

---

2. Play the game - once you get it to run - discover it for yourself.

---

Firstly, Its more fun to play the game like this than to get people to tell you where things are. Secondly, As I meantioned above, People dont have to help you, If you post people dont have to reply. So stop talking to us like we owe you something. Its More than likely you asked a question which has been asked a million times before and you could have found the answer by using the search feature whcih is why it was ignored.


-----------------------
WARNING: THIS POST MAY CONTAIN TRACES OF PEANUT

just a thought, I don't know if you've done this already, but could you post the solution to your problem, so as to help those other newbees who you said were having the same problem

TheJkWhoSaysNi - your post does not even deserve a reply.

Starshock - the following will detail my problem and solution:

Problem:

< Hardware >
Processor: GenuineIntel Family 6 Model 8 735 MHz Stepping 3
Math Support: On Chip
BIOS: Award Software 08/01/00

Bus Type: PCI,ISA,USB,AGP
Ports: 1 Parallel, 2 Serial
Memory: 384 MB (32% Utilized)
Floppy Disks: 1.44 MB
Hard Disks: 28.64 GB
Multimedia: Sound, Joystick, CD-ROM
Video: 1024x768 in 64K Colors, NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 Ver. 4.0
Video RAM: 64 MB on board
Drivers: 4.13.01.4109 (tried latest, failed)

< Operating System >
Windows: 98 Second Edition 4.10 (Build 2222 A )
DOS: 7.10
Net Clients: Microsoft Network, Microsoft Family Logon

< Sound >
Sound: Avance AC97 Audio

< Input >
Keyboard: Microsoft HID Compliant keyboard
Mouse: Nicrosoft USB Intellimouse Explorer (Intellipoint) Infrared

< DirectX >
Version: 9.0a (4.09.0000.0901)

Microsoft Freelancer: As released, no mods

Problem:

Game crash at random to desktop. During combat, during landing, space launch, docking, moving around bases/planets, entering/exiting jump points. Game will play ok for about 5-10 minutes before a crash.

I tried everything. Sound updates as per forum suggestions. The latest Nvidia drivers causes a black screen. Game has been unintalled and re-installed many times. Drive has been initialized. Everything that I can think of has been done.

MicroSoft has been contacted. No solution available from them.

Other things I tried:

I had the sound issues that many players on these boards had. Used the fixes suggested and it fixed my problems. I tried the latest DirextX 9.0a (see above). I tried turining graphics acceleration down a notch. I disabled sound acceleration. I switched off AGP texturing, tried a clean Windows boot, etc, etc, etc...

My Background:

I am an IT proffesional for 30 years from Cape Town and have been playing games since PC's came out. I consider myself a power user.

The following current games are also being played and is running fine on this system:

Half-Life Series, Emperor Battle for Dune, Empire Earth, Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds, Homeworld, Silent Hunter II, SimCity 3000 Unlimited, Need for Speed Porche 2000 (using Brooklyn Booster 9000 set), Microsoft Filght Simulator 2002 (using Microsoft Sidewinder Precision 2), and many other games.

I realy like Freelancer. I also played all the Wing Commander games, Privateer, Righteous Fire, Privateer 2 and so on.

I cannot afford to play it like this any more. I am at the end of my ability to get this game to play stable. I know that there is a power user out there willing and able to help me. For now this game will have to be shelved until real help arrives...

PLEASE HELP ME (if you can)...

------------------------------------------------------------

Solution:

After numerous additional phonecalls to Microsoft, we decided to try Microsoft XP Proffessional. I kept the hardware config the same.

This solved my desktop crash!

Edited by - JPsEmpire on 12-05-2003 16:22:49

thanks for that,

but i did notice that there was no solution to your problem other than buying a new version of windows, so how exactly where these guys here supposed to give you an answer that doesn't exist?

and if they had told you to go out and get a different version of windows it would have seemed more like a rude "go away" than a genuine solution

I don't like seeing people leave this place in a huff, specialy my own compatriots, you should stick around so that next time there is some one who isn't getting an answer to his problem you might be able to give him an answer

Edited by - StarShock on 12-05-2003 16:38:12

Ok, here is a guess on the technical issue. Unlike most of the other games you posted, Freelancer is very heavily mouse dependant. You are running an IR -> USB MS Intellipoint mouse. I'm guessing that the USB support in Win98 was insufficient for that type of hardware interaction and after getting further and further behind in buffering, the mouse blew a memory location and dropped you back to the desktop.

I'm assuming it is to late to try since you changed OS to WinXP (which has much better USB support), but if not, get a dumb ol' PS/2 mouse and try the game that way.

.sig/ Kentucky windage needed for weapons of differnt speeds....

I had a USB joystick that consistently failed under win98, but worked perfectly under winXP, so that sounds plausible.

More importantly - you bought a game certified to run on windows 98. TO get it to run, you had to buy XP professional. If I were in your position, I would be very unhappy with microsoft.

R U done ripping into our website forums now Johan? Can I come critique your Panzer Gernal forums with the same open-minded attitude as you have displayed here? 47 years old and the patience of a script kiddie, now that is depressing! You just registered within this past month (not that it make any difference), posted a message last week (see here) and give this forum community exactly 7 days to come up with an answer (less actually if you took the time to contact MS and have them tell you to change OS).

Give us a break man, I for one have had my technical expertise questioned on more than one occassion and that makes me even more hesitant these days to offer my FREE advice anymore around here. Look at my signature for proof of my attitude. To me it looks like you got what you paid for here and now you want to jump up on a soapbox and declare our forums a waste of time for everyone? Brass ones buddy....heavy too apparently because there's just way to much hostility in your words for my liking.

I can't wait to come to your forums and treat them with the same amount of respect as you have shown here. Flame on my friend...flame on.

Rob "Stinger" Lordier
Moderator - Lancers Reactor
Creator Privateer FAQ
no good deed will ever go unpunished

Without much further ado, I'll select to just say... bye... *click*

Best Regards
Christian "Bargib" Koerner
Editor in Chief, The Lancers Reactor