Steel Panthers Crazy Colors

Marder · #1 March 3rd, 2014, 07:19 AM

Hello i recently bought a new Computer ( Windows 7 ) and both steel Panthers games are showing extremely awkward colours in Fullscreen. Before that i also had an older PC but also with Windows 7 as Operating System but it was no Problem then and all colours were correct.

Could anyone help me fix this or point me in the right direction ?

Mobhack · #2 March 3rd, 2014, 07:43 AM

Have you read the sticky thread on Windows 7 and Vista installation at the top of this forum?

Marder · #3 March 3rd, 2014, 10:21 AM

Of Course, i tested with the batch files etc. compatiblity mode, manually killing explorer exe and starting SPMBT and SPWW2 via task manager, deactivating Aero, i don't think there is an Issue with Windows 7 ( My old Computer can play it fullscreen and windowed without problems and was a Windows 7. Just my new Computer displays these strange colours.

My question is could it be the video card ?

FASTBOAT TOUGH · #4 March 3rd, 2014, 03:29 PM

Not much on software but video cards that's a little different.
1. Not knowing all your system details have you verified that you have the latest update for your card? I would recommend that I.E. if HIS made your ATI RADEON card that you go to AMD for the latest updates as the card manufacturers are normally one or two updates behind. This is sometimes a very common issue on new systems depending how long they;ve been sitting on the shelf. Also this applies to your OS as well.

2. A video card can sometimes act normal in everyday use (Though somewhat rare.) such as going to your homepage etc. Have you tested it trying to use a different game that's not in the SP family? This will help narrow down any setup issues within this game. If another game is doing the same it'll probaly be something related to the setup of the video card.

3. Open the box to issue the card is connected properly. You can with some setups not have a "good connection" but still have enough data flow to cover "light use" functions as noted above. This happened to me once many years ago. Again the card has to be "challenged" if you will.

4. This can be done before #3 if you want. Verify you video card settings match your desktop settings. I wouldn't think the game settings would cause your current problems though. But I know Andy is looking at this for you.

5. Sorry if you've already done the above just basing mine I what I read.

Regards,
Pat

Mobhack · #5 March 3rd, 2014, 04:13 PM

It worked before on a windows 7 machine - and now does not work on a different windows 7 machine. Therefore something in the setup of the second machine is causing problems.

You'll likely have to play about with its video card, check it has the latest drivers, if it is shared memory have you assigned enough RAM to it? - and so on. See the instruction manual for your video card - we cant drive it from here.

Also, remember that it is the game's executable (WinSPMBT.exe, WinSPWW2.exe)) that you have to set any compatibility modes etc. on - not the gameoptions launcher or the short-cut to the gameoptions launcher!.

If you are trying to play the free demo version on a very large wide-screen monitor, that may also fail as 800x600 does not work on some cards set to extremely large pixel sizes. In that case I have heard that manually setting 800x600 resolution on your desktop and then launching the game may work.

Also - ensure that you don't have the windows taskbar set up to auto-hide. You may also want to make sure you are using the classic XP-style desktop theme as well - on the off chance you have one that does palette rolling, same goes for the mouse, some of these "radar" schemes and other oddities can cause games to have fits (not just this one!). So KISS for the desktop and the mouse schemes and select the classical settings, it may help.

You may also want to check your anti-virus (and other programmes) for pop-up windows or animated icons on the windows information section of the taskbar. Mine (Avast!) has a way to remove these and put it into gaming mode. Until I discovered that option I used to get the occasional psychedelic screen problem. Avast did pop-ups while the game was playing, and it also had a "rotating globe" thing in the info bar, ISTR.

Now it may just be that the video card you had before could handle 256 colour mode, and the new one cannot. In that case - stick to windowed mode, and if you have the full CD version of the game, select "desktop" resolution so it takes the entire desktop.

Marder · #6 March 3rd, 2014, 06:59 PM

First Mobhack and FASTBOAT TOUGH thanks for the replies

Mobhack thanks to you i found the issue

I wanted to see if the taskbar is set to auto hide and saw a little option called "Use Aero Peek for desktop preview", i deactivated it and e voila it runs in normal colours. I thought this would be deactivated autmatically if i deactivate Aero.

So again thank you for your time and help