Possible Problems with Windows 11 25H2?

[Digicoma 18]

Hello,

I have been using NAM for several years and know and use the 4GB patch (as there is no other way to play NAM.  I use other mods as well.  I fully use Ulisse Wolf's Performance and Graphics list to configure my PC.  I have played SimCity 4 Deluxe modded with the sage advice from Simtropolis users for years now.
Please bear with me as this is a long entry.  I have tried to include every step I have taken as well as its result.

A few weeks ago, after having dealt with general slow-down and bog of my PC's performance to my liking (completely unrelated to SimCity 4 Deluxe) and I decided to format the drive, reload Windows 11 Pro and start installing programs again to get up and running.  SimCity 4 Deluxe was at the top of my list of course because it is my favorite game.
As a rule I try to format and start reinstalling my computer programs from scratch once a year just to keep things running as smoothly as possible.

Sadly though, SimCity 4 Deluxe would no-longer work and I have looked at the variables that were different this time from the last time I loaded up everything.  

Before I get started my specs are:
CPU=AMD Ryzen 5950X

GPU= AMD Radeon 6950XT

RAM= 128GB.

I have more than two terabytes free space on my NVMe drive.

 

I am having no other issues with my PC.

Right off the bat I want to point out that a major difference is now I am using Windows 11 25H2 as that is the version that now comes as default.  I don't know if this is the culprit; but I am kind of surprised because 25H2 is not that strong a departure from 25H1.  Nonetheless, I can't rule it out.  There was also a very recent update to JAVA.  Again, shouldn't be an issue; but I'm not ruling anything out.

I am using the exact specifications outlines in how to run SimCity 4 Deluxe for an AMD card as opposed to Nvidia, etc.  I have nothing running.  It is pure default.

I outlined the steps I took and noted when it would last work patch wise.

I installed the 4GB patch, launched SimCity 4 with it, all was well.  - I then backed everything up.

I installed the SC4CPUOptions, launched SimCity 4 with [Admin] set to TRUE and [Priority] set to AboveNormal, all was well, I then backed up separately in my Documents\SimCity 4 folder.

Then I installed the SC4GraphicsOptions with the only following modification.  I switched [WindowWidth] from 1920 to 2560 and [WindowHeight] from 1080 to 1440.  When I launched it, the game seemed to start, then crashed to desktop.  If I switched it back to 1920x1080, it would work.  I own a 2560x1440 monitor.  It worked fine with my old install of SimCity 4 Deluxe with my mods; what has changed, I don't know.
I backed up the Documents\SimCity 4 folder separately just in case I would need something to cite.

Then I installed and ran SC4Fix in 1920x1080 and it launched fine.  I backed things up separately.

Then I installed SC4AutoSave, launched SimCity 4 it, all was well.

Then I installed the just freshly updated DgVoodoo 2.  Again, I was running in 1920x1080 still.  No problems.  I backed things up separately.

Then I installed Transparent Texture Fix DLL.  I launched SimCity 4 no problem.  I backed that iteration up separately.

Then I installed SimCity 4 Disable FPS Limits, launched SimCity 4 no problem. I backed that iteration up separately.

Then I installed Region Thumbnail Fix DLL, launched SimCity 4 no problem.  And I backed that up separately.

Following that I installed the latest version of NAM49.  I launched SimCity 4 no problem, I backed that iteration up separately.

Finally, I installed Pegasus CDK3 Collection. I launched, had no problems, and backed that up as well separately.


At this point I was disturbed that the game wasn't running in the 2560x1440 mode it used to, but, I thought I'd play a while, then make an entry here about it.  So, I launched the game, set up a region, then tried to go into the game.  The game when through it's normal launch up sequence with the region highlighted and the randomized words appearing at the top.  It seemed though to be taking a longer than usual time.  Then it crashed to desktop again.

I tried it just using the Timbuktu region, but the same thing happened again.

 

Something has gone awry, and I'm not finding any information as to what that could be from general research.  Believe me, I am looking.   I figure it's either something boneheaded I did, or something has changed and is affecting my sort of setup.

To be sure, I have tried over and over and over after blowing everything away, even doing registry cleaning after that.  Nothing I do is fixing this problem.   I have tried installing things in different order (save the 4GB patch which must always go first), yet nothing changes.

I would appreciate any advice from those who might be aware of a workaround, or are aware what the issue is, and to let me know people are working on the problem.
 

Any help you could give would be most appreciated. 

 

[Ulisse Wolf 4,461]

Follow this tutorial

 

[Kel9509 1,484]

When you say it launched fine, do you mean that your cities loaded?  Or only that you were able to get to the Region screen?  At what point did loading cities fail?

[Digicoma 18]

When I say launched I mean I was able to get through the loading screen and to the interface where you can create regions, start the game, etc.  At no time was I able to successfully get the cities to come up.   An error on my part is that I waited to try to get the cities to load until after I had installed the whole thing.

At this point I need to go through and do everything that I did, but instead go ahead and load cities at each stage.  Only then will I know where things truly failed.

Thank you for your question. I will go ahead and do that.  When I find the stage where things fail, I will report back.

Thanks again!

[rsc204 21,867]

13 hours ago, Digicoma said:

Then I installed the just freshly updated DgVoodoo 2.  Again, I was running in 1920x1080 still.  No problems.  I backed things up separately.

Until dgVoodoo2 is setup (or some kind of wrapper), you’ll run into a DirectX limitation that won’t allow you to run resolutions higher than 1200px. So now you have installed it, you should be safe to switch back to the 2k native resolution.

Also I have to add here formatting and doing a new install of your OS annually is just totally unnecessary. Better to setup your base system with only the drivers and apps you really always need, then image the drive so you can restore back to that ‘snapshot’ in time without having to setup everything anew. Not to mention I have not needed to do this since WinXP, if you don’t constantly install/uninstall stuff, it shouldn’t get burdened. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. 

[Digicoma 18]

Ok.  It's taken a bit of time to get to the weekend in order to be able to test everything out, but here are my findings.

It's not that it's failing after any mod installation step in general.  It was failing at every step.  It failed if I was running at 2560x1440 and at 1920x1080.  

What is VERY strange is that I completed entering all of my mods.   I backed up the acumulation of all of them, then decided to try something out.  I deleted the entire SimCity 4 directory out of the Documents folder.  I then pasted my old SimCity 4 folder from my backup before I redid my computer.  Somehow, it worked.   Why that would be, I don't know.  
To continue my experiement, I again deleted this version of my Documents\SimCity 4 folder and moved back over the one that hadn't worked before.  It now worked upon firing it up.  I could actually get into cities.  I wasn't just launching the game.

Important in all of this is that when both the old and the new were working, it was at 1920x1080.  Perturbingly, switching either the old or the new to 2560x1440 resulted in the original problem.  The program would launch, and a second later shut down.

Again my Radeon GPU is on Default settings.  There are no other selections being made.   I can't imagine why the game wont run on 2560x1440 anymore.   

Is there anything I can check somewhere to see if there is something wrong?  Has this ever been reported by anyone else?   Again, no hardware has been changed.  This worked fine when I was running 25H1.   

Failing anything else, is there a log file I could post to have someone look over?  Maybe the problem is something obvious.   I can't imagine what on Earth could be happening, or why it's happening now, but if someone could take a look, just tell me what log files to upload and I'll get them uploaded/

Thank you all again for interacting with me about this.  At least now I can play the game, I just wish I could at my monitor's resolution!

 

 

[rsc204 21,867]

If it works at FHD but not 2k, then it is most likely that you do not have a working wrapper. Without that you simply can’t run the higher resolution as Wrappers allow you to bypass a limitation of DirectX. 2K works fine, been using it for years myself.

For testing check the option in dgVoodoo2 to display a watermark. This will show if dgVoodoo2 is actually being used when running SC4. If it’s not then you just need to configure it for the game and you should be fine. 

[Digicoma 18]

9 hours ago, rsc204 said:

If it works at FHD but not 2k, then it is most likely that you do not have a working wrapper. Without that you simply can’t run the higher resolution as Wrappers allow you to bypass a limitation of DirectX. 2K works fine, been using it for years myself.

For testing check the option in dgVoodoo2 to display a watermark. This will show if dgVoodoo2 is actually being used when running SC4. If it’s not then you just need to configure it for the game and you should be fine. 

Ive gone into the wrapper, and the dgVoodoo2 is set to display a waternark, but it is not displaying when trying to run in 1920x1080.  I'm not sure why the wrapper isn't functioning.

I'm going to look into if there is anything written on Simptropolis about dgVoodoo2, administering it (i.e. where it should be installed, how each thing should be configured and why), and any other information I can get.   I can only say I didn't used to have this problem.   I've got to believe it's user error on my part; but I don't know what I could have done wrong. 

Is there any particular thing you could point out to me to read about dgVoodoo2 or its configuration?   

If not, is there any information I could tell you that might help in diagnosing what I must have done wrong?

 

Thank you.

 

[Null 45 3,120]

2 minutes ago, Digicoma said:

If not, is there any information I could tell you that might help in diagnosing what I must have done wrong?

DgVoodoo 2 (and other DirectX wrappers) must be placed in the installation directory Apps folder next to SimCity 4.exe.

[Digicoma 18]

53 minutes ago, Null 45 said:

DgVoodoo 2 (and other DirectX wrappers) must be placed in the installation directory Apps folder next to SimCity 4.exe.

AND THAT WAS THE ANSWER!!!!!!   THANK YOU NULL 45!!!!!
What I was doing wrong is that my dgVoodoo 2 was located in my Documents\SimCity 4\Apps folder.  I believed this is where it was supposed to go. Of course, SimCity4.exe is not there.  My SimCity 4.exe is in my Steam\Steamapps\Common\SimCity 4 Deluxe\Apps folder.

I placed dgVoodoo2 in the latter and now all is working as it should.

I don't know why my head had things so out of whack.  I have done this install correctly for years until this last time around.

Aside from that, I will also take your advice to heart about install ing my OS annually.   I guess this is an old habbit going back to the Windows 9x days.   I still always felt things tended to run snappier starting all the way from scratch, but I guess that really isn't necessary anymore.  I can instead do it the way you suggest.  
So thank you for that bit of extra advice.

Have a great day!

[Jamesthe1st 27]

Not that I use Windows anymore as I hate where they are going with 11, but you can also set up Windows to be on its own partition so that if you have a problem and you need to do a restore or reinstall it only messes up that partition and leaves all your games and other data alone.