You didn't install DirectX 9 just recently did you?

...I did....why does that break DOS or something? 😒

Originally posted by Snake785 ...I did....why does that break DOS or something? 😒

You said they were working before, but not now (freezing up). That implies some kind of change. You said it happens regardless of your two sound options (Native XP/VDMSound). That means it's not VDMSound.

One of the notes for DirectX 9 states the following:
The DirectX 9.0 runtime cannot be uninstalled. We recommend Windows Me and Windows XP users create a "System Restore" point before installing.

That implies that Microsoft is not confident of it stability on Me/XP.

Lastly, someone else on this board had a similar experience shortly after installing DirectX 9. It was cured by using a System Restore.
showthread.php?threadid=990

Ah, I see. Ok, I hope I made a restore point before I installed DX9...but I installed a LOT of stuff (like other drivers) after I upgraded (I recently formatted), wouldn't those settings be gone as well? I never really used a restore point before as I never needed it...

Edit: well since I reinstalled I didn't really test any DOS games before the upgrade to DX9 so I'm not sure that it did work before but it did on my older installation with DX 8.

Hmm...I just tried playing Raptor: Call of the Shadows and it worked great. Even when using VDMSound (and very quick I might add 😀 ). So I'm guessing that it's some sort of problem with Descent... 😒

*edit* Hmm...now Descent is working (pretty good speed too, I'm gonna try speedset to get the midi to play faster)....how odd...I guess Raptor somehow had something to do with it?

I highly doubt Raptor had anything to do with it. It could have been something that stayed running in the background that did not run on reboot. Or something. 😜

Sounds like a fluke issue. Sometimes things will just flake out, then mysteriously start working later. This is one constant that I've seen in computers. It seems unaffected by the level of technology.

Sounds like a fluke issue. Sometimes things will just flake out, then mysteriously start working later. This is one constant that I've seen in computers. It seems unaffected by the level of technology.

True, When debugging on some now working games. I ran into the fact that some games rely on settings which are only set if you had just booted up. (memory being zero and such)

So rebooting might help some games.

Not in my case, I never rebooted. But then again it probably was something that was running the background and it got unloaded at one point, also freeing up memory.....