"#5 by Avatar Frogboy - 3/31/2003 1:27:55 PM
David - did you buy the retail version? When did you install Stardock Central?

Just so we're clear:

When you install Stardock Central, the installer checks to see if you have GalCiv installed. If it is installed, it adds some XML files to let Stardock central know that you already have GalCiv on there.

IF you installed Stardock Central first and then installed GalCiv, then it doens't know.

What we want to find out is specifically why some people are being prompted to download the full GalCiv module."

I think you may have this backwards, Brad....at least from my experience. Let me tell you what I did, as I installed GalCiv on two different computers and had a different experience on each.

On my first computer, I had downloaded and installed Stardock Central well before the game came out. When the game released, I went to my local EB and bought a copy. I installed the game from CD and then went into SDC. Once I registered GalCiv, all the updates immediately showed up. I then used SDC to download and install the Update and Bonus Pack. Everything worked just fine and I've been playing the game. Last night, when 1.01a came out I opened up SDC and "Refreshed Application Data." 1.01a showed up and I downloaded and installed the update, which came in at just under 1MB. Had no problems at all.

Now, with my second computer, I did things a little differently. This computer did not have SDC installed on it when I installed GalCiv from the CD. In this case, I decided to just download the independent .exe from the GalCiv website (containing the initial update and Bonus Pack) and install that. That worked no problem and the game played fine. Now, last night when the 1.01a update came out, I decided I needed to go ahead and install SDC on the second computer to get it. So I installed SDC, registered GalCiv, and Refreshed to check for the update. Well, the 1.01a update showed up, but it was showing as about 84MB. I hit Update just to make sure and yep it started downloading the 84MB.

So, I checked back on the forums looking for ideas. Something Brad said about needing SDC installed first (or something, I don't recall) made me decide to try something. So, I uninstalled GalCiv completely from this computer. I then reinstalled the game from the CD. That done, I started SDC back up. I clicked over to the Software tab and GalCiv immediately showed up (it was still registered from before). I highlighted the main part of the game and it showed the 1.01a update as being available and as being about 3.83MB (which would be about the size of the initial game update plus the 1.01a update). I clicked on Update and it downloaded that 3.83MB and installed it. I then proceeded to download and install the Bonus Pack from SDC and there was a Multimedia Update that I also got. Now everything works fine on the second computer.

So, in short, the key that seemed to work for me involved having SDC installed first and also making sure to get the updates and Bonus Pack from within SDC and NOT using the independent Bonus Pack .exe from the website.

Anyway, I wanted to post all this in the hopes that it may help you guys at Stardock track down what's going wrong since I think my experiences give a good bit of info.....or so I hope.





~SDC~

Andy

Yes everything seems ok... except for the fact that I lost my multimedia. Luckily I had it backupped, so I'm running fine now.

~SDC~

To: All

Don't know if this will work for you or not in regards to Stardock Central downloading the full 85 meg file - I purchased GalCiv online and then installed it first before Stardock Central. Stardock Central found the folder I'd installed the game in and I've had no troubles with downloads, updates, etc. on that machine. I know that when you install the game through Stardock Central it puts GalCiv in a diffrent folder -Dregin.net I think. I wonder if installing the game first then Stardock central makes a difference?

Maybe this will help. Stardock Central cannot find my installed file list. That's probably why it tries to install the full module again.

~SDC~

Just to add my input in...

D/L and installed SDC first.
D/L and archived GalCiv, Mult. Pack, Bonus Pack.
Restore from archive Galciv, Mult., Bonus (in that order).
At this point, SDC reports all of these installed. I even checked it again by quitting SDC and running it again. Still says all 3 are installed.
Then a few days later, ran SDC, updated app, and now it's saying GalCiv is not installed.

So I would think that when the update comes up for me (haven't checked myself), it would D/L all 87MB first b/c SDC thinks I don't have GalCiv installed yet. For some reason, SDC resets itself.

I think there maybe something to installing SDC first. I did not do so (I did not know it existed before buying and playing the game..I thought it was a holdover for OS/2 days!)...I hope this is not the case or it can be fixed because the retail CD does not have big red letters on it saying install CDC first or you will not be able to update!
Though than again..some who have also seem to have some troubles...

ap

freespace, since it is a problem with sound, try editing the game's ini file and disabling music then see if you can start/play the game.

myomer, there's probably an issue in your registry. I had a similar thing happen when I restored from an archive. There's a string, "Exe", that references the galciv.exe. When it happened to me (SDCentral not thinking it was installed) that setting got cleared.

If you have any experience with regedit, go to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Stardock\Drengin.net\GalCiv

In there, there's the Exe string. If it's blank, change it to "galciv.exe" (w/o quotes).

There's also a Path string, make sure it points to your galciv directory.

Hope this helps.

Oh, one more thing. If the Path setting needs fixing, don't put an ending \

I installed SDC first, yet I cannot upload to the Metaverse. Wierd.

Solops, try re-registering your Metaverse registration as well. That seemed to make it work for some of us.

Is the game supposed to note tha 1.01a version on the main menu? According to SDC I'm up to date with 101a after downloading but the main menu says 1.01 at the top.
Bob

BTW, on the sound issue. I have a Soundblaster Live! Value soundcard and the game works perfectly for me....no massive crashing. The only thing is that some of the music tracks have some distortion/static in them (mainly the Senate Election and the Drengin music, that I've noticed) and when I try to play MP3s a lot of them are distorted.

Still, I don't think the SB Live, by itself, is necessarily a problem....at least if you have the latest drivers and DirectX 9

~SDC~

Great info Ardrikk! I uninstalled GalCiv and re-installed, leaving SD alone and the updates ran fine. I suppose they'll fix it eventually, but I just had to have an update.

Sweet! Glad to hear it TheFire. I'm glad my info helped *somebody* at least.

~SDC~

I am still unable to submit metaverse scores, I hear the transfer in my speaker (bad WLAN setup) so somezhing gets submitted, but I do not show up in the Metaverse. I tried any combination of registering my player, submitting score and even reregister the game . But no dice

also I get the "distortion" when playing the drengin and during elections.
earlyer the videos where chippy (sound skiping) but it seemed to be disapeared, was maybe due to speed of or bether lack thereoff (400 Mhz P II)

I can life with bad sound&video, but how can I show of before my friends without a metaverse entry

~SDC~

Hooray! 1.01a.031 is on SDCentral now. Just downloaded it, installed fine.. now to see if I can finally submit to the metaverse

YES! Metaverse submitting is fixed!

I grabbed the update last night, but I don't seem to have the option to update again today. Is this a Stardock Central Issue? (Or is there something I might be doing wrong?)

- Matt Lepinski :->

~SDC~

Stardock guys: your prompt response and presence on the forums is completely unbelievable and very cool. I only wish other studios could (or would) do the same. I also thank the gods I work on console games and so don't ever have to think about tech support

Okay, Got it! Thanks.
(Does anyone know what effect these updates have on Saved Games?)

- Matt Lepinski :->

~SDC~

I installed the updates .30 in this case and then the bonus pack. I didn't see the Terraformers...which I assumed was a unit? Anyway, I saw that the tech tree was old so I figured that the bonus pack's updates had overwritten some of the new updates. Could this have happened? I then uninstalled everything and re-installed. There was some sort of multi-media update I thought I would install first, but then changed my mind and hit cancel. Now I can't install the bonus pack update because the button is grayed out.

Until SD is fixed, can we have an exact procedure on what needs to be installed and in what order after a fresh installation?

how do you get the new version? I have a retail copy.

Yes..what must be done, in what order to get SDC to work right. It is STILL asking for the 85MB download. Does this just require a reinstall??

For those that it's saying you need to download 85meg, does SDCentral think your game is installed? If it doesn't, then you need to fix a string in your registry. See my post above about that (#33).