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Video Card Issues
General Troubleshooting
Most video compatibility problems can be resolved by hitting the
TROUBLESHOOT button in the video options screen or by pointing your
browser to use http://www.won.net/re/hwcatdrivers.html
or http://www.sierrastudios.com/games/homeworld/noflash/c-support.html.
We recommend using the TROUBLESHOOT button in D3D or software video
modes, as task switching in OpenGL mode has been known to cause
problems on some systems.
General Driver Issues
To obtain the latest drivers for your hardware, download the drivers
from your card manufacturer's web site. See below for links to the
driver sections of various hardware vendors' webpages.
Additionally, you may want to install and run a third-party driver
installation program such as GLSetup (www.glsetup.com) which contains
many OpenGL drivers for a variety of video cards. GLSetup version
1.6 is provided for your convenience on the Homeworld: Cataclysm
CD to save you download time should your current OpenGL drivers
not work with Homeworld: Cataclysm. Recognize that GLSetup is not
supported by Sierra's technical support, however.
Hardware Renderers
All compatibility comments below assume that you are trying to
run Homeworld: Cataclysm with the Default OpenGL renderer as a first
attempt. Depending on your chipset, however, it may be necessary
to run using 3dfx OpenGL, Direct3D, or software. Homeworld: Cataclysm
places labels beside available renderers in the Video Options screen
that indicate the graphics API a particular driver uses: GL for
OpenGL, D3D for Direct3D and SW for software.
If your chipset is not listed in Card/Chipset-Specific Issues below,
you should consult the documentation that came with your hardware
to determine how to get updated drivers.
Some 3D hardware does not provide an OpenGL implementation and
running Homeworld: Cataclysm with Default OpenGL selected as your
renderer will then not be accelerated by your hardware at all. If
Homeworld: Cataclysm pops up a dialog box informing you that the
selected renderer is unaccelerated, try Direct3D next, then software
if all else fails (the Homeworld: Cataclysm software renderer is
considerably faster than OpenGL without hardware support). If you
must use the software renderer, try running Homeworld: Cataclysm
with the /rasterSkip commandline switch for a moderate speed increase;
some people find this too visually distracting, so try for yourself
and see.
Homeworld: Cataclysm also supports the /safeGL commandline option.
You should run with this if any of the following problems occur
when using OpenGL as your renderer: oddly colored backgrounds, no
stars in the backgrounds, no background bitmap in the loading screens,
or ship meshes that are missing polygons or are oddly colored.
Recent versions of Windows 98 provide drivers for certain 3D chipsets,
but they generally do not contain an OpenGL ICD. GLSetup drivers
or drivers from your vendor's website are preferred.
Running in OpenGL, when moving the mouse pointer to the edge of
the screen, you may notice the rest of the image having a white
border.
Display Mode Resolution
If you experience problems when testing a new display mode (new
resolution or bitdepth), be sure to see if Homeworld: Cataclysm
will run at 640x480 16 bit. Some cards incorrectly report resolutions
they cannot properly support, and Homeworld: Cataclysm may fail
to recognize the problem. If you select a new display mode and Homeworld:
Cataclysm appears unresponsive (for example, black screen or garbled
text) either wait a few seconds or hit the SPACEBAR to have Homeworld:
Cataclysm restore the previous mode. If all else fails, try pressing
CTRL-SHIFT-F12 to re-enable the default renderer (software, 640x480
16bit).
Note also that not all 3D hardware supports the same set of features
as another, and some scenes and effects will appear differently
on different system configurations. This is to be expected.
Motherboards and Chipset Issues
Users with an AMD K6 or greater processor with 3DNow! instructions
or an Intel LX chipset on their motherboard may experience crashes
or system lockups when using OpenGL with NVidia Riva TNT2, 3Dfx
Voodoo Banshee or Voodoo 3, and S3 Savage3D boards. AMD users are
encouraged to use Direct3D for hardware acceleration if this problem
occurs.
Users with an AMD Athlon may also experiences crashes or system
lockups using OpenGL or D3D with the GeForce video card. AMD is
aware of a problem with compatibility between the GeForce video
card and the AMD Athlon motherboard. There is an AGP Miniport Driver
patch for the motherboard that should solve this problem. The AGP
Miniport Driver can be found at www.agp.com/products/cpg/bin
Users running Windows 2000 on an AMD Athlon with a Voodoo3 video
card may experience random system lockups using a Vortex sound card
(support.aureal.com). The Vortex sound card appears to be the problem
and recent drivers may provide support.
Most of the newer video cards have adequate support for Windows
2000. If you have any problems with your video card under Windows
2000 make sure to check with the card manufacturer to see if there
is an updated driver. The ATI Rage 128 did not have proper drivers
for OpenGL or D3D for Windows 2000 at the time of Homeworld: Cataclysm
release.
Video Card Issues
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