Another region view glitch (hardware rendering)

[mayorplease 116]

I was playing on software rendering, but wanted to use some HD content.

Now this is what I get when saving and exiting to the region:

New region, no terrain mod, no tree controller.

This is my system:

- Laptop

- Core2Duo P8400 @2.26Ghz

- Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT (No Intel onboard graphics)

- 4GB RAM

- Win7 64bit

- Simcity 4 Deluxe GOG Version

This is what I tried so far:

-Edit graphic rules and video cards files

(according to this thread: )

- Change around stuff in the Nvidia Control Panel

I tried disabling everything, the "let the program choose" option and enabling most of the options.

- This is my shortcut to sc4:

"D:\games\SimCity 4 Deluxe Edition\Apps\SimCity 4.exe" -intro:off -CustomResolution:enabled -r1280x800x32 -d:DirectX

Always the same result

Everything else works fine on hardware rendering, game runs fast, only this bug

Running in software mode, the region view updates just fine, it must be something with the hardware mode.

Any Ideas?

[Prophet42 1,503]

It is strange that this only happens in region view.  While playing a city, everything is okay.  Instead of using -d:Directx you could try using -d:OpenGL.  Either one can be used for hardware rendering.  The only other option is to try to find an older driver for your graphics card and see if that resolves the issue.

[mayorplease 116]

It is strange that this only happens in region view.  While playing a city, everything is okay.  Instead of using -d:Directx you could try using -d:OpenGL.  Either one can be used for hardware rendering.  The only other option is to try to find an older driver for your graphics card and see if that resolves the issue.

Thanks for your answer Prophet

Yes everything is fine while inside a city tile.

It only happens when saving and exiting to region.

And it happens with every tile I open, not only this one in the screenshot.

The image gets rendered ok I guess, because when I make changes to the tile they are updated in the region view. It's just this ugly black border that gets somehow thrown in there

I tried using -d:OpenGL, too, but that didn't work at all. The city would not render and only show me a completly white tile.

And if I switch back to software rendering, open the tile again, save and exit to region. Guess what, everything is fixed.

About using an older driver. I am using the Geforce 340.52 driver right now, which is the latest one. I play other games as well, so not sure if I really wanna go that route. There must be a way to fix this, at least I hope so.

[rsc204 21,866]

I'm using the same driver with Win7 64bit, albeit with a GTX 750ti, I am not having any problems, so I'm not sure if that driver is really the cause or not.

 

So far as I can tell you've set everything up correctly, this region-view glitch is a strange one. It could be that the drivers between different cards are not the same even though they carry the same driver revision, or perhaps there is some feature that card lacks, although if anything I'd expect a newer card to be more likely to have problems than older ones due to SC4's needs to support legacy standards.

 

Perhaps it's worth trying a different resolution, it could be that the one you are using has some problems, perhaps a standard resolution like 1280x720 or 1024x768 might be a good place to start? What options you have really depend on your laptop displays ability to use them.

[mayorplease 116]

I'm using the same driver with Win7 64bit, albeit with a GTX 750ti, I am not having any problems, so I'm not sure if that driver is really the cause or not.

 

So far as I can tell you've set everything up correctly, this region-view glitch is a strange one. It could be that the drivers between different cards are not the same even though they carry the same driver revision, or perhaps there is some feature that card lacks, although if anything I'd expect a newer card to be more likely to have problems than older ones due to SC4's needs to support legacy standards.

 

Perhaps it's worth trying a different resolution, it could be that the one you are using has some problems, perhaps a standard resolution like 1280x720 or 1024x768 might be a good place to start? What options you have really depend on your laptop displays ability to use them.

HOLY MOLY... So after HOURS of playing around with the settings (yes, tried different resolutions, too - didn't work) I went and downgraded my drivers.

Although I play other games, which would benefit from up-to-date drivers, I decided that SimCity would be worth it

So after countless searches I stumbled upon a post on SC4 Devotion. The guy there basically said that drivers past 314.22 would cause him glitches in the game.

Long story short I am now running the 314.22 driver and the glitch is GONE! :)

Can you believe it? I am really happy now!

Finally I can run the game in all its' glory and use some of the HD plugins I was so eager to try out, but couldn't

To recap for anybody else having this issue:

Card: Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT

Driver: 314.22

-> glitch gone

[lowietje123 0]

OH MY GOD.

I have the exact same glitch. Tried everything but now I can read here on this topic that downgrading my videocard should deal with the problem.
I also have a 9600 GT.

I'm going to try this now!

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Everyone please note:  Getting new drivers for a computer (updates) is no guarantee that your new environment works the same as previously.  When you are dealing with a program that's been around for long time, its interface calls may be denigrated or even changed and become incompatible with the new drivers.  Hardware/software people have no obligation to keep old features and maybe even bugs around when they are working on new code, especially for a new device or interface.

 

Beware of new versions of your software base, even something as small as a device driver, when dealing with legacy code.  Programmers these days are often unaware that 'modernizing' something will clobber a legacy program like SC4.  This is becoming more and more prevalent, and we are having to take more and more exotic work arounds to keep this old horse alive.

 

Since EA has shown no desire to do any maintenance of any kind on the SimCity 4 Deluxe code beyond getting it to version 1,1,641 with some minimal effort, don't be surprised if one day it doesn't run on your new machine at all.  They won't release the source code either.  After the general faux pas with SimCity (2013) reboot of the franchise, we can expect more garbage for consoles, but nothing for users of the old series of SimCity programs.  EA are somehow convinced that the old code is untouchable and cannot be updated.  Maybe it has something to do with the quality of the programmers they've been hiring.