Screen has gone black

[Fox]

Played tonight for a couple of hours and everything worked fine.  Was selecting something off the clipboard while in flight and everything basically turned black.  There were a few things that could faintly be seen, but not enough to even use the mouse.  I used alt tab to go to the desktop and everything there was also black.  I closed Aces High by right clicking on the Aces High tab on the task bar and selecting close and instantly the desktop was back to normal.  I rebooted the computer and restarted Aces High and the problem still exists.  The opening screen is so dark that I cannot see any of the buttons to try to change any settings.  I tried to run the film viewer to see what it would do and it locks up when trying to open a file. 

Any ideas?  Do you need me to post the specifics of my computer?  I would post screens shots but have never done so and am not sure how.  Thanks

[Fox]

I forgot to mention, I was running the hi resolution pack at the time of the problem.  When the problem happened I was flying to an enemy base and was adjusting the sliders that control detail and distance you can see things. 

After the problem last night, I reinstalled the new hires pack but it didn't fix anything.

[Pyro]

Go into your Aces High\Settings folder and open up the file video8.cfg in notepad.  See what the gamma value is set to.  If it's not close to 1, change it 1 and see if that takes care of it.

[USCH]

I have the same problem and have looked at the video8.cfg and gamma was at .89 i changed it to 1.0 and it did reset in game but did not help the problem....

In researching this problem i have found that ANY time you change anything in the settings (advanced or not) and click OK it will go black just as Fox had said.

I have tryed changing one thing at a time and then hitting ok and it seems to not matter what i change it always goes black.

132353,VideoVersion
1280,Width
1024,Height
32,ColorDebth
1,DeviceCnt
DVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVD VDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDV DVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVD VDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDV DVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVD VDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDV DVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVD VDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDVDV DVDVNVIDIA GeForce 6800 S
0,MaxFPS
0,PixelShaders
0,VertexShaders
512,MaxTexSize
0,OptionFlags
0.98,Gamma
86,MaxFieldOfView
0,AntiAliasType
0,AntiAliasQuality

System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 12/3/2009, 14:33:17
       Machine name: JASON
   Operating System: Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp_sp3_gdr.090804-1435)
           Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: alienware
       System Model: alienware
               BIOS: Phoenix - Award BIOS v6.00PG
          Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 FX-55 Processor,  MMX,  3DNow, ~2.6GHz
             Memory: 1024MB RAM
          Page File: 211MB used, 2250MB available
        Windows Dir: C:\WINDOWS
    DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
     DxDiag Version: 5.03.2600.5512 32bit Unicode

------------
DxDiag Notes
------------
  DirectX Files Tab: No problems found.
      Display Tab 1: No problems found.
        Sound Tab 1: No problems found.
        Sound Tab 2: No problems found.
          Music Tab: No problems found.
          Input Tab: No problems found.
        Network Tab: No problems found.

[Fox]

The gamma setting in the video file was .98.  I changed it to 1 but the problem didn't go away.  So, I downloaded the full version and uninstalled the game.  After reinstalling I then copied by settings (and other) folders back and had the problem still.  Through trial and error I was able to determine that the problem was in the old video file.  With a new video file all is working fine again.  Do you want me to email you the old video file that was causing the problem?

[-sudz-]

Yes - please send to sudz@hitechcreations.com

Thnx

[USCH]

so deleating AH and reinstalling fixed it? (if im reading correctly?)

[Fox]

Yes, reinstalling fixed the problem.  Be sure and copy your settings, terrains, skins, etc folders before you unistall so you don't loose them.  After the new install, copy them back.  The problem I had was with the video8 file in the settings directory.  If I copied the original video file back to the new installation, the problem would occur again.  So I copied all of the settings directory back except for the video file and everything worked fine.

[Pyro]

No need to reinstall.  Just delete the video8.cfg file from your settings folder.