Help with game startup.

[Lightning4564 0]

Here's my problem. I've been playing simcity 4 for about a year now, and it worked fine. just a few days ago, I started up the game, and nothing happened. I went into Computer, clicked on the CD drive with the SC4 disk in it, and nothing happened. The window with the cars crossing the bridge didn't even come up, nor did the cd spin in the drive. I have a HP Pavillion with a Pentium Dual Core processor at 2.50 gigahertz. The hard drive space has about 580 gigs. The ram has 6 gigabytes memory, and the operating system is windows vista home premium. I have tried various things: restarting the computer, installing and reinstalling the game, cleaning the disk. I can't post a picture, because there isn't anything to post a picture of ! Please help me! if you need any further information, please let me know. I'd really like to get back to the game!

Combined your two posts and moved thread.

-CaptCity

[joshriddle 29]

You may have to list some of your computer specs. It kinda makes it hard to answer without them.

[Lightning4564 0]

Here are some specs: Windows Vista Home Premium, 64 bit operating system, Intel Dual Core processor @ 2.50 ghz e5200, 6 gigs memory, graphics card has 1 gig memory. if u need anything else, please let me know.

[x493x 446]

Sometimes that happens to me but all of my icons don't work, just restart the computer if you haven't done so already, worked for me.

[joshriddle 29]

It might be a Vista thing. Try seeing if it is possible to run in Compatibility or as an Administrator. It may also be that the disc drive is slightly damaged or the disc is dirty. Also make sure disc 2 is inside, not disc 1.

[DCMetro34 577]

Can you disc drive play other games? Could be the disc drive or maybe a scratched SC4 disc....

DC 

[joshriddle 29]

I just remembered. Try entering task manager, and if SimCity 4.exe is running, kill it and try again. I remember that from another thread.

If none of these are the issue, make sure you have the necessary patches installed. If you do and none of these are it, then you may have to reinstall the game.

[hansenawesome15 9]

I've had the same exact problem on my old computer that ran on XP. Now on my laptop with Vista, and I no longer have that problem. What I did was restart the computer. Sometimes I would just log out of that user and log back in.

[Lightning4564 0]

Ok, so, yes, I have already tried running in compatibality mode. Disk can't be dirty, because when I tried reinstalling it and it auto played, it worked fine. All plugins were there ( NAM and Real Highway needed to be reinstalled ) and it was fine. Exited out to install it and some more plugins. Click on icon and the little blue circle spins near my cursor for about 2 seconds, then quits and does nothing. Yes, it is disk 2, not disk one. Will try task manager.

***

Tried it, but the disk isn't even spinning in the drive, let alone task manager showing anything. For some reason, though, it lets me access the files on the disk. ???

[IchimaruOO 8]

Did you get malware?

Did you by any chance install some new stuff that may be messing with SC4?

Did you update/install any antivirus, dl-manager, whatever that runs in the background and may interfere with running the game?

If so, try turning off real-time shields, end unnecessary processes, uninstall... (carefully)

[Xpat 0]

Tried another account? It seems to dislike the user account with me but runs happily in an admin account (not that I'm happy about having to use an admin account to play games - not what it's there for at all).

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Because of the wide range of problems, take a look at your user account file system.  Does it need to be cleaned up?  Is there a quota set on the disk space for your user account?  If so, you may simply have run out of space, since you can run as Admin.

If nothing turns up on a virus scan, and you are sure your fire wall is OK, I would run general disk maintenance (defrag then chkdsk) on the drive that has the game on it.  If this doesn't solve your problem, I would have to get my hands on your machine, so you should probably consult your local digi-nerd before going beyond this.

One other thing has run though my mind.  Check the CD for dirt and scratches.  And clean the lens on your CD drive (you can get a lens cleaning kit from your local computer supplier).  If the cd is dirty, clean it with a dry, soft cloth.  If it is scratched, consult the various methods on the web for fixing them.  If the substrate (metal foil) is damaged, your disk has had it.

The other action I would take as soon as I could afford it would be to upgrade to Windows 7 as soon as possible.  There is also the possibility of going to Linux (dual boot, of course), and running under the wine windows interpretation software.  Version 1.2 runs SC4 quite happily, and I am currently running on 1.3.2 (beta) quite happily.  If you want a windowed environment on Linux you can use SUSE or UBUNTU.  I am currently on UBUNTU 10.04.1 Long Term Support release, but am testing 10.10 which is due out in October.

[Lightning4564 0]

thank you everyone for your help. i think that it is probably either the account or a dirty disk. i will try that as soon as i get off my wii here

oh, and noony moose, is linux really that good?

[Lightning45644 0]

HI, guys, it's me, Lightning4564. Account password and email password got lost, so I'm on my backup account. I want to thank you all for your very helpful information. I finally got it to work. It turns out that it was both the user account that I was using and the disk needed to be cleaned. If the a mod wants to close this, they can.