This happens when playing any game on Dosbox, my screen flips out and turns off-colour at random moments. Is there any way to refresh the screen so that the original colour scheme is restored?
Can you take a screenshot from it (ctrl-f5)?
Also please post information about your system/dosbox version etc.
Here is the error. One is the normal pic, and the other one is when it gets messed, approximately 5 minutes into gameplay. Even when I'm not on the computer, I can just wait 5 minutes or so and it will screw up on it's own! Is there a redraw or something I can do? I have to keep alt-entering for it to go away, and the speed of my computer causes it to lag like crazy when doing this!
By the way my dosbox is version 0.72, I have a pentium 4 dual core 2.2 ghz E2200 processor, an NVIDIA Geforce 8300 GS and 2 gigs of memory. It's a Dell, so I'm sure it's not the computer that is causing the problem.
Maybe weed out your tooltray
1+1=10
Maybe weed out your tooltray
So you're saying that it might be another program that is cycling, or something? And it's causing it to conflict with Dosbox?
yes. especially dvd drive monitors and such are known to mess up the palette of the screen
Water flows down the stream
How to ask questions the smart way!
A friend of mine experienced exactly the same problem on his new Acer desktop PC a while ago. I saw the screenshots that he had sent me regarding this colour problem. I must admit that they are identical to yours, Eminutia. He had the problem on Red Alert 1 and Dosbox, if I recall correctly.
He easily solved the problem by completely uninstalling all Acer craplets. Heed h-a-l-9000's advice and the others' and uninstall absolutely all redundant and prefab applications that came loaded with your Dell PC.
Hmm..check out my list of tasks, and see if you can find any possible culprits, guys!
How about you close everything you can for a start?
1+1=10
Hmm, actually, I have noticed a helpful guide on gamespot.com for optimizing a PC as well. It is not the most exhaustive resource in the world, but it might be a good starting point.
In that guide, a good utilitity is to be found that has been tailored exactly for that purpose, namely cleaning prefab craplets.
It is called the PC Decrapifier and you can download it here. Execute that application and it should prompt you to remove all the unneccesary software.
Good luck.
Oh ok, I did that decrapifier thing. Removed some redundant programs. Now all I have to do is test out Dosbox...
..and when I do I'll get back to you!! Thanks
OK I used that decrapifier thing. And it crashed my hard drive. My HAL.DLL file was missing or corrupt when I started my computer, and I had to re-install Windows 4 times before I could get things back on track. It was literally like a nightmare come true.
In this it taught me a lesson: how much of a slave I am to computers. I couldn't pet my kitty or talk to my neighbor without blowing up at them while re-installing. 😅
Luckily the first time I re-installed, I installed it in a separate directory, keeping the rest of the files intact. Then I copied it to my external drive. Then I re-installed completely formatting my c: drive. But I started downloading bullshit codecs, and the DrWatson shit started. So I had to re-install completely again! But then I wasn't satisfied with the way things were set up, and I re-installed again. But it was for the best. Now my computer runs at speeds I couldn't imagine, because I registered my chipset first before anything. And my DosBox problem isn't happening anymore. And I kept all of my old files.
So thanks are in order, I guess! 😀
Hehe even though you had to suffer hardship, I am glad it is finally working for you, and you are enjoying great performance again. Good to hear you have managed to save your data as well.
Yes, you have to remember to be careful with installing random codecs (actually anything random, for that matter) that you find on the net. If you are using them mostly for playback, a good solution is the <http://www.videolan.org/> media player, because it integrates almost all possible playback features into itself without registering a single codec in your system, and that helps. Couple it with, for example, the latest Winamp for lossless audio playback and you are good to go.
Indeed, when you reinstall or install Windows for the first time, the first item you should install driver-wise is your Motherboard chipset's drivers.
PS: And I know what you mean, computers can lead us to being a bit, well, more dedicated to them. 😉
