Windows 10, crashes DURING mission. (On skip and enemy near)

[Ace_Pilto]

Hello,

I've successfully navigated the rather... intricate... installation procedure for ETO Expansion (Latest version), the program runs, I everything works but when I fly a mission the game crashes whenever I press skip or if I near my target. (I think it is the spawning of enemy planes that is causing the problem)

Could anyone be so kind as to suggest a solution please?

[Daiwilletti]

Hello,

I've successfully navigated the rather... intricate... installation procedure for ETO Expansion (Latest version), the program runs, I everything works but when I fly a mission the game crashes whenever I press skip or if I near my target. (I think it is the spawning of enemy planes that is causing the problem)

Could anyone be so kind as to suggest a solution please?

Greetings,
congratualtions on installing ETO. Agreed it is complex. One of the commonest forms of corruption is when one selects a new era but the spawn setting does not match the new era. Have you tried several eras? Are you flying in QC, Mission or Campaign mode when you encounter the problems?

As you surmise, spawning could easily be the problem if the spawn settings call for planes which do not match the era. If you fix the era/spawn match, you may still have problems if the AppData has a mismatch. The uisel.xml file (ie user selections) in the AppData pathway contains the last settings for your Quick Combat, Missions, and campaigns. So it is often worth deleting the uisel.xml file, and restarting ETO in the default settings for Era and spawns.

cheers,

D

[Ace_Pilto]

Ok, that makes sense, thanks.

I hadn't tried changing the era but I did notice some odd behavior with the switcher when I tried to use it. When I ran it as admin it didn't let me choose the era at all, it skipped straight to the second screen, running by simply double clicking let me choose the era but I never saw any files being copied, the program just instantly terminated. Also, both the era selector and the spawn changer never displayed any text to confirm that it was copying files, quite often I'd glimpse "access is denied" but they didn't run for very long.

If I'm correct, both of these programs should display some files being copied?

I'll try installing outside of Program Files (x86), in C:\games directory perhaps?

[Ace_Pilto]

Ok, the problem I'm having is with the .bat files not executing correctly.

If I install ETO to any directory outside "Program Files (x86)" it will not install correctly and I can't get past the stage where I have to install MultiCFS3. (Because the .bat file tasked with creating a directory will not execute correctly.)

If I install to "Program Files (x86)", making all of the requisite edits, the .bat files tasked with switching spawns and eras do not work correctly. Windows 10 refuses to execute them correctly presumably because of some security update). Can I edit them to be compatible with Win 10 or is there some way I can manually extract and copy the data myself via a utility like JSGME? (Which would make a lot more sense than using .bat files tbh since they are inherently unreliable with Win10's perverse UAC rules)

[Ace_Pilto]

Ok, I got it working.

What I did was install into Program Files (x86) (So that the multiCFS Utility would work) and then after it was installed I cut and pasted the entire install to "C:\CFS3 ETO Expansion". (Changing all of the requisite pathing for .bat files and shortcuts appropriately.)

By the gods, what a nightmare. I must have attempted about 10 installs before I got it all working, Now I can finally take a gander at how CFS3 looks with a fleshed out planeset and Ankor's DX9 shaders.

[Daiwilletti]

Ok, I got it working.

What I did was install into Program Files (x86) (So that the multiCFS Utility would work) and then after it was installed I cut and pasted the entire install to "C:\CFS3 ETO Expansion". (Changing all of the requisite pathing for .bat files and shortcuts appropriately.)

By the gods, what a nightmare. I must have attempted about 10 installs before I got it all working, Now I can finally take a gander at how CFS3 looks with a fleshed out planeset and Ankor's DX9 shaders.

Thanks very much for posting your solution, its always useful to hear about the the solution, sometimes only the problem is posted. Wow that does sound tricky. Was the installation guide sticky in this forum any help with installation? Are you using Windows 10? Sounds like you needed a whole lot of administrator privileges set up for the bat files to run (must confess its ages since I installed ETO, mine is running ok (touch wood!).

But I usually avoid installing any CFS3 version on the C drive. I used to put in a partition, nowadays I run a stand-alone SSD drive for all installs of CFS3. Separating CFS3 from Windows seems to help the speed at which info shuttles back and forth. Not that with modern hardware it makes much difference, I suppose, but with older slower gear it was noticeably quicker to separate the installs from Windows.

The very latest version of Ankor's shaders uploaded this month by Majormagee includes some automatic fixes for a couple of common problems - having to re-run cfs3config, and having dual pass render switch itself on within configoverrides.xml

NBB check out the knowledgebase sticky above, IIRC it has some good tips for settings for cfs3config settings (amongst a lot of other stuff). Having good config settings is really important for the visuals which can be achieved with the new shaders.

HTH,

[Ace_Pilto]

Thanks, I perused the knowledge base. It's a bit hard to find relevant info in there but I'm sure it's worth the effort of going through more thoroughly.

As for the install, I found it very useful but a bit out of date in places. Eg: Being asked to remove files that don't exist like the allpilots.xml(name?) and being instructed to run a file remover for the 1.5 patch that isn't included in the 1.5 archive I downloaded. Nevertheless the guides gave me enough of an idea of how things roughly worked and what was important and it explained what could go wrong fairly well. It's a very finicky mod to install, I think you're wise installing to a different drive. I play WoFF and got interested in CFS3 again after seeing some videos of a modded CFS3 install after seeing them at SimHQ where they were posted in anticipation of Wings Over the Reich.

Anyway, it's good to see such comprehensive mods already exist for CFS3.

[Daiwilletti]

once you get ETO running with new shaders and a good config setup, it is enormously satisfying. Some of the new addons set new standards - spitfires, typhoons, Me 163 anyone?

[Ace_Pilto]

Do the aircraft in ETO use this 1% flight model I've read about? I'd definitely be keen to try some modded FM's.

[Daiwilletti]

Gidday, IIRC when ETO was released the latest and greatest was the 1% AvHistory v4.00 FM. Since then there have been some aircraft released with very specific carefully prepared Flight Models. I've no idea how to compare them with the v4.0 series? Hopefully one of the gurus (such as greycap, gecko etc) will respond.