rec.autos.simulators

http://www.f1racingsim.com/faq.htm

The Unofficial F1RS FAQ v1.00
copyright 1998, David Greene

              Please note: F1 Racing will not currently work
              with AMD K5 processors, or Direct 3D compatible
                      video cards with less than 4mb.
  ------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Installation Issues

         I can't launch my installation, why?
         Which install size?
         Installer cannot detect a 3Dfx Card (Voodoo1 or Voodoo2)
         If you can't install the game on your hard drive:
         Cannot copy concretdom.wav
         Bad Installs?

    Error messages

         "GCD init error"
         "No D3D present in Direct Draw Enumerate"
         Cannot copy concretdom.wav
         "System out of memory"
         "error message ir41_32.dll"
         "Windows don't run in high color mode" (65,000 colors)
         "No blend, no stipple => no game".

    Hardware Issues

         My Cyrix processor doesn't work, why?
         The game doesn't work with a K5 processor.
         I have an AMD 5x86-P75.
         Normal Video Cards
         Direct3D video cards with less than 4mb
         Diamond Monster PCI Sound Card
         Riva 128
         Diamond Stealth II (Rendition)
         Voodoo Rush Cards
         Voodoo 1 Cards
         Voodoo 2 Cards
         Upgrading from Voodoo1 to Voodoo2
         If you have a combination Matrox/Monster cards:
         S3 Virge.
         Power VR.
         Graphical glitches under D3D.

    Controller Issues

         Configuring your Wheel in Win95
         Calibrating your Wheel in Win95
         Configuring your wheel in F1RS
         Adjusting the sensitivity
         Reducing the "Dead Zone"

    Technical Problems

         Importants issues that should be considered by anyone who has
         problems with F1RS
         The menus are very slow.
         Can't click load, save or configure buttons.
         Music Problems
         General sound effect problems.
         Unusual Engine sounds.
         Dolby Surround sound.
         Virtual Memory / Hard disk space problems.
         Virus Killer and TSR related problems.

    General Game Questions

         Monaco tunnel is too dark
         Track loading music
         Viewing Ghost Laps
         Unscheduled Pitstops
         Automatic/Manual Gearbox
         Car performance for human drivers
         Driving helps
         Using the telemetry

    Game Performance Questions

         My game runs slowly, what can I do?
         First lap slowdown

    Multiplayer Questions

         Can't select Split Screen mode.
         Is 2 player modem play possible?
         Is internet play possible?

    3rd Party Addons and Carsets

         98 Season Carsets

    About this FAQ

         The Author
         Disclaimer
         Other sources of information

  ------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Installation Issues

    I can't launch my installation, why?
        This may be fixed by selecting an option in the Windows
        operating system, which will allow automatic launching from
        your CD-ROM. This option may have been deactivated. To
        reactivate it, go to Start Menu / Settings / Control Panel
        / System / Device Manager / CD-ROM Properties / Settings /
        Check the Auto Insert Notification box.

    Which install size?
        It is highly recommended that you install the maximum
        installation.
        This will prevent the "slow menu" problems and reduce track
        loading times.

    Installer cannot detect a 3Dfx Card (Voodoo1 or Voodoo2)
        If the F1RS install does not detect your 3DFX card, then
        you are probably using the 3DFX reference drivers or the
        very latest from Orchid. On installing these, a couple of
        files are missed out of your windows/system directory. Some
        software specifically uses these files to recognise the
        existence of a 3DFX card (including F1RS). The most
        straight forward solution is to put the files back in -
        this will not cause any problems or degrade the performance
        of the newer drivers, but will improve compatibility.

        The missing files are glide.dll and sst1init.dll. If you
        have these files lying around on your hard disk, just copy
        them back into your windows/system directory. If not, you
        can obtain them from http://www.ubisoft.co.uk/f1rs.zip

    If you can't install the game on your hard drive:
        1. Certain problems can arise during installation if you
        change the installation directory or -- more specifically
        -- if you have changed the name of your hard drive.
        Installation only detects the C:\ hard drive. If you have
        changed the assigned directory for the installation,
        loading of saved files may not work.

        2. During installation, there might be a copy error. Check
        that your CD-ROM drive is running under Windows and not
        under DOS.

        3. When certain files can't be copied, there may be a
        problem with the CD-ROM's default.

    Cannot copy concretdom.wav
        This appears because you have outdated CD-ROM drivers that
        aren't fully compatible with Windows 95. Your PC is running
        the CD-ROM drive in MS-DOS compatibility mode which only
        allows 8.3 characters per file name. You'll need to get new
        drivers from the manufacturer.

    Bad Installs.
        If you ever have trouble reinstalling F1, try uninstalling
        the game manually before trying to reinstall. The two
        directories to remove are c:\ubisoft\f1rs\ (or whichever
        directory you chose during installation), and
        c:\windows\ubisoft\
    Error Messages

    If you get an error message saying "GCD.init error " :

   * Check all your peripherals to ensure that they are installed correctly.

   * Make sure that there is at least 100 MB on your hard drive
     when the install is finished.

   * Set Virtual Memory to be managed by Windows.
     (check this by clicking "Start", "Settings",
     "Control-Panel", "System", "Performance", and
     "Virtual Memory") Manual settings may be
     incompatible.

   * Check if you have a standard Microsoft serial 2
     button mouse driver installed under Windows 95.
     Certain more specific drivers (three button,
     etc.) have caused some problems.

   * If you have a blank screen:
     Make sure you have at least 100 MB available on
     your hard drive after installation is complete.

   * Put the Matrox in Slot 1 and the Diamond card in
     Slot 4 respectively.

     Check in your system configuration to see if
     Matrox and Monster use the same memory range.
     Switch off all the acceleration functions of the
     Matrox.

    "No D3D present in Direct Draw Enumerate".
        This error indicates that F1RS is not recognising the D3D
        capabilities of your video card. Again, this error can
        appear for one of 2 reasons:

        First, you may not in fact have a video card which is
        compatible with the Direct 3D standard. If you're not sure
        about this - then check with the manufacturer of your PC,
        or the supplier of the card. Many fine standard cards (such
        as the S3 Trio, and the Matrox Millenium 1) are not D3D
        compatible. As indicated in the requirements listed on the
        box, F1RS needs this. In this case you have 2 choices:
        Either buy a 4mb D3D compatible 3D accelerator card (we'd
        recommend something with the 3DFX chipset), or take the
        game back and try to get a refund.

        Secondly, if your PC does have a D3D compatible card, then
        the error indicates that your software drivers are too old
        for F1RS or Direct X 5.0 to recognise it's capabilities.
        The only solution is to obtain more recent drivers for the
        card.

    "Cannot copy concretdom.wav".
        This error appears during install if you have very old CD
        ROM drivers which aren't fully Windows 95 compatible. If
        this is the case, your PC will be running the drive in what
        is known as "MS-DOS compatibility mode", and as such will
        only recognise files on the CD which have file names
        complying to the old 8.3 character standard. Some of the
        files on the F1RS CD (including "concretdom.wav" use the
        extended Windows 95 filename format. To solve this, you
        should get new drivers from the manufacturer of your CD
        ROM.

        If you are PC proficient and know your way around your DOS
        config files, then one way of attempting to fix this
        problem without getting a new driver disk would be as
        follows: Try removing the DOS CD-ROM drivers from your
        autoexec.bat and config.sys. You can then reboot Windows in
        the hope that it will detect the drive and supply it's own
        drivers. This will not always work, and is not recommended
        for those who cannot reel of their entire DOS mscdex
        command line letter-for-letter with their eyes closed.

    "System out of memory".
   On a machine with a 3DFX card, this is most likely down to
   out of date Glide drivers. To solve this problem, an
   automatic installer for new Glide drivers is included on
   the F1 CD (in the directory 3DFX).

   One other reason for this message is that F1RS cannot read
   or recognise the Wsock32.dll file in your system. If you've
   installed some non-Microsoft Internet software on your
   system, this may have automatically replaced the Windows 95
   Wsock32.dll file with its own version - this is most common
   with Demon Internet's Turnpike software. To verify this has
   occurred, check the file in the Windows\System folder. The
   original file is 65 kilobytes. If your Wsock32.dll file is
   not that size, then your original file was
...

read more »

Michael E. Carver skrev i meddelandet

I don't know whether it's "correct" to reply to a FAQ, but I would like to
point out that to my knowledge it makes no sense to specify a *maximum*
value for the swap file. Instead, specify a minimum value but leave the
maximum value alone. That way, the swap file will never shrink below the
minimum, but it can still grow larger if it *has* to. With a large minimum
value, it will probably never grow larger, but there's no sense in
forbidding it, should the need arise.
---
Jon Petersson (http://user.tninet.se/~rdv654m/Jon.html)
I support Sarah-K and the rasf1 cars (http://www.sarah.org/rasf1/)

But there is. If min != max, Win95 may start re-adjusting the size of
the swap file JUST as you are trying to take that sharp corner. That's
one of the cases where the stu-stu-stuttering starts.
If you have set both values to the same, ie. the size of the swap file
can not change at all, this particular stuttering will cease to exist.

Thanks,
David

Sorry, but I have to disagree.

The swap file will never grow unless your computer *needs* more memory. When
that happens you have a choice of;

a) leaving the max value alone, allowing the swap file to grow, causing a
little stutter

b) refusing to give the computer more memory, which stops F1RS and brings up
a dialog saying "Out of memory - close some programs and try again" or
simply freezes the computer.

You can't just ignore the fact that the computer *needs* more memory.

Under normal circumstances, only running F1RS will *never* make your swap
file grow larger than 128 MB.
---
Jon Petersson (http://user.tninet.se/~rdv654m/Jon.html)
I support Sarah-K and the rasf1 cars (http://www.sarah.org/rasf1/)

To make sure the swapfile is large enough, I use the formula
swapfile = 2.5 to 3 times the size of the installed ram.

8?)

*Peter*    8-)
(NB: remove asterix to e-mail)

"Peter Gagg" skrev i meddelandet ...

I find that formula a bit strange, since the *more* RAM you have, the *less*
need you have for a swap file.
---
Jon Petersson (http://user.tninet.se/~rdv654m/Jon.html)
I support Sarah-K and the rasf1 cars (http://www.sarah.org/rasf1/)

Seems strange but that is correct.
Go to any hardware page to find out more.

% "Peter Gagg" skrev i meddelandet ...
% >To make sure the swapfile is large enough, I use the formula
% >swapfile = 2.5 to 3 times the size of the installed ram.

% I find that formula a bit strange, since the *more* RAM you have, the *less*
% need you have for a swap file.

I really think this is the rule that was cobbled up from the days of
Win3.x and machines with 8 to 16 meg of memory.  I agree that for normal
applications a machine with 64mb of memory shouldn't need a 160-192 mb
swapfile.  But a machine with 32mb of memory could do with a 64-96 mb
swapfile.  I have a 64mb of memory and use a 64mb swapfile.  Even in
F1RS about the only time I notice a stutter in the framerate is the
first time an audio segment is loaded (ala "new track record").

I think the "rule of thumb" is just that, it's an easy way to get the
information out and basically cover the ground.  The goal should be to
find the proper amount of memory required (both real and virtual) to run
the applications (and combinations) that one needs.  Start with the rule
of thumb and then do some system monitoring (use Win95 System monitor),
and watch your used and free memory.  Then you can fine tune your system
for your needs.  

--
**************************** Michael E. Carver *************************
     Upside out, or inside down...False alarm the only game in town.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=<[ /./.  [-  < ]>=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

i use about 100mb swapfile .. no problems with any program.
windows performance same if i increase it further ... or should i am
talking about heavy usage ... winbench results maxed out as well.

i have 128 ram ... so if you say 3 x ram .. than its around 400mb ...
geez ..

--ray