Games Crashing Cont-

Hi,
Thanks guys for your helpful suggestions, but still having problems.
Here are the games that are crashing:
Sid Meiers Railroads: Windows XP, DX7
Hotel Giant: Windows XP, DX8
Sim City 3000 UK Version: Windows XP but compatable with windows Vista, DX7.

Fortunately i just bought my PC so i do not have many games, I understand
the problems could possibly be caused by trying to run XP games on vista or
having DX10 installed, but it puzzles me, why release an improved
system(vista), if older games are not going to run. Unlike when changing from
PS2 to PS3, all my old games still work.

Bear

"Bear" <Bear@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news5F4C076-53D7-47A1-BAA4-74CA24C17435@microsoft.com...
> Hi,
> Thanks guys for your helpful suggestions, but still having problems.
> Here are the games that are crashing:
> Sid Meiers Railroads: Windows XP, DX7
> Hotel Giant: Windows XP, DX8
> Sim City 3000 UK Version: Windows XP but compatable with windows Vista,
> DX7.
>
> Fortunately i just bought my PC so i do not have many games, I understand
> the problems could possibly be caused by trying to run XP games on vista
> or
> having DX10 installed, but it puzzles me, why release an improved
> system(vista), if older games are not going to run. Unlike when changing
> from
> PS2 to PS3, all my old games still work.

Yeah, it's called moving forward. Problem is you are trying to run really
old games on an operating system that wasn't around when the game was
released. Also most developers have to weigh the advantages and cost of
supporting old applications.

Sid Meiers Railroads (the new version) is DirectX 9, Sim City 3000 came out
before Windows 2K/XP (I think), so if anything this is a Windows 9x game
probably running DirectX 7.

As for what the problem is, I have no idea, you didn't post any error
messages nor your system specs. I just did a search through the newsgroup
and found your old post, a couple guys responded asking for more information
and it doesn't look like you responded, so if possible, respond here and be
specific.

-A.

p.s. - Rishs suggested:

In most cases games need DX 9 (that's they reason they work fine on
XP), so you will have to install DirectX 9 in order for them to work
properly.

Did you go to http://www.microsoft.com/directx and run the dxwebsetup.exe
tool? Try that and see if the games startup afterwards.

"Andy [Ex-MSFT]" <android8675@MAPSONhotmail.com> wrote in message
news:562E9660-BDFD-4F2B-9A2B-F9ABAE932598@microsoft.com...
> In most cases games need DX 9 (that's they reason they work fine on
> XP), so you will have to install DirectX 9 in order for them to work
> properly.

Vista is supposed to be DX9 compatible too. Directx is backwards compatible
with all versions of DX, except for DX10. Vista has both DX9 and DX10. Only
issue I know about with DX9 on Vista is that Microsoft left out one file
that some older games need and the fix for that is to install DX9.0c onto
Vista and it will put that one file back in place.

"Pooh-Man" <not_for@email.invalid> wrote in message
news:1nFri.7454$Zr1.6980@fe06.news.easynews.com...
> "Andy [Ex-MSFT]" <android8675@MAPSONhotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:562E9660-BDFD-4F2B-9A2B-F9ABAE932598@microsoft.com...
>> In most cases games need DX 9 (that's they reason they work fine on
>> XP), so you will have to install DirectX 9 in order for them to work
>> properly.
>
> Vista is supposed to be DX9 compatible too. Directx is backwards
> compatible with all versions of DX, except for DX10. Vista has both DX9
> and DX10. Only issue I know about with DX9 on Vista is that Microsoft left
> out one file that some older games need and the fix for that is to install
> DX9.0c onto Vista and it will put that one file back in place.

Not really, Windows by default does not come with DirectX. Vista has DirectX
10 because it's a Vista ONLY product, it doesn't have Dx9 or lower, just 10.
This is a first for DirectX.

Vista is compatible with all versions of DirectX, but you need to install
DirectX the first time to get it to work. Whatever version of DirectX that
comes with your game should do the trick. Problem is older games see
"DirectX 10" and they think they don't have to trigger the installer for
DirectX.

Lots of EA games used to do that, til we figured it's best to do the DirectX
installer every time to ensure DirectX files are all kosher.

So yes, Vista works with DirectX 9, but by default it does not have DirectX
9 installed. http://www.microsoft.com/directx

No, I don't know what I'm talking about, I'm just guessing, so if I'm wrong,
don't cram it down my throat, ok?

-A.