Skuzzy I figured it out!

[aaronr]

Hello I tried literally for months to solve an issue where I would start aces and the screen would flash and go right to desk top, yet the game would still be running in task manager. with this latest patch it acted somewhat differently. The game would start but then the full screen would be white/blank with a border etc.. I recently had an issue with IL-2 1946. I decided to get back into it after years away and found that the screen was "overdrawing" and many menu buttons couldn't be seen as they were off screen I tried everything in the book and talked to all the experts. In my desperation I tried compatibility mode and suddenly noticed several functions other then just running it in XP svc pk 2 mode (which didn't help)that I hadn't noticed before. One of these functions is 'Disable display scaling on high DPI settings' That was the magic bullet. Well I don't know if Skuzzy remembers but he helped me with my issue here and we never could resolve it and then he found I was running a modified version of Vista ultimate that had many changes one being uac disabled etc... well I have since reverted back to my original boxed MS vista ultimate and that was not the issue. out of curiosity I decided to try checking the same box for the aces .exe and what do you know! I can run the game once again.
I am now on the two week trial but I'm not sure if I will be able to subscribe because of budget issues (I am a marine electrical engineer who is unemployed because of issues in Louisiana) but I now know that if I can scrape up the funds in the future I will be able to once again enjoy one of the best hobbies I have ever experienced. Thanks again Skuzzy for your patience in trying to help this 50 something old guy try to straighten this out, I sincerely hope this info may help someone else.
Aaron Ramsdell.

[Skuzzy]

Wow, that was an odd one.

[aaronr]

Yes indeed odd, If I were working right now I wouldn't have had time to play around with it this much, I also find it odd that IL-2 46 and aces are absolutely the only two pieces of software that I've had this issue with? both Flight Sim's etc.. lol I'm sure that's just a coincidence, but it does make one scratch his head in puzzlement. The folks over at the IL-2 forum are as mystified as everyone else, and I've never heard of anyone else ever having this issue. I did suspect that since I was running a massaged copy of vista, That would be the root of my issue but Now I am running a untouched Official MS release of MS Vista ultimate. Another odd thing is that after all of this even after I got it working by checking that compatibility box the thing would revert back to 60HZ refresh rate, Yecch! I am using a two year old Sony 25" flat screen CRT graphics workstation monitor. It can go to 200+ on the refresh rate and well over 1600X1200 on resolution, so there should be no problem with the monitor not being able to keep up, I normally am using 1280X960 at 85HZ on my desktop but I have found that Aces wants to run at 1600X1200 then I seem to get 75HZ as my frame rate goes from 59 Fps to 74-75 Fps at 1600X1200, If I set the in-game settings to 1280X960 then I get the 60HZ refresh rate, I have checked the desktop settings in both the windows panel and the Nvidia control panel and both say my desktop is 1280X960X85HZ. I am running a GTX-295 OC and a duo core at 3.6 GHZ. This whole thing is very odd to me but I can only ponder and be happy as a clam at running at 1600X1200 on high texture with the texture package with no detectable stutter at all. Now I only wish I could have figured this out when I was still working long days and could afford a long subscription lol. Well I'm hoping things get sorted out with all of the oil industry and I can get back to work and play in my spare time. Seems to be the way it always is when you have the money you don't have the time and when you have the time you don't have the money lol. Well my 50 something mind never stops thinking and I have a lot of clues so I will continue to ponder this mystery. Thank you so much for helping out. When my two weeks run out I hope I can come up with a couple of bucks to stay active, as it is I am having a blast in the dueling arena re learning everything I forgot. Have a Great weekend Skuzzy.

[Ack-Ack]

Wow, that was an odd one.

We also found at where I work that DPI settings can have an affect on games if set beyond what a monitor's resolution can handle.

We had a customer contacting us about one of our recent games how it was crashing on him each time he tried to play it.  He was able to run the game fine on his laptop but when he used his HDTV as a monitor, that is when the game would crash.  His DXDiag showed he was using normal (96 DPI) DPI settings but on his HDTV he had it set to custom using a DPI setting of 192, which was beyond what the resolution his HDTV was capable of.  Once the customer was told to switch is DPI settings back to normal, the game crashes stopped.  After this, checking the customer's DPI settings has become a normal troubleshooting step for our tech agents.

ack-ack

[aaronr]

Thank you for the input, I am certain that it is directly related to the fact that on this 25" screen I am using a larger DPI to make text more easily readable. But if I go to the standard 96 it's just to small for these old eyes. It seems that checking the Disable display scalings on high DPI settings may ultimately be my easiest solution. The game seems to stay solid at 75 FPS at 1600X1200 with everything maxed out so I think I'm doing pretty good for now especially when I see folks having issues at much lower settings. I've been away for many updates and patches and this is the first time I've had a system where I could do this, and I must say at the settings I have now it looks very nice and being in a fur-ball with ten or fifteen planes everywhere seems to not hurt my fps much, although it's hard to watch such things when you're busy trying to stay alive lol.
Once again thank you very much for your input. 

[Ack-Ack]

Thank you for the input, I am certain that it is directly related to the fact that on this 25" screen I am using a larger DPI to make text more easily readable. But if I go to the standard 96 it's just to small for these old eyes. It seems that checking the Disable display scalings on high DPI settings may ultimately be my easiest solution. The game seems to stay solid at 75 FPS at 1600X1200 with everything maxed out so I think I'm doing pretty good for now especially when I see folks having issues at much lower settings. I've been away for many updates and patches and this is the first time I've had a system where I could do this, and I must say at the settings I have now it looks very nice and being in a fur-ball with ten or fifteen planes everywhere seems to not hurt my fps much, although it's hard to watch such things when you're busy trying to stay alive lol.
Once again thank you very much for your input. 

That's nice to know that Vista (does W7 have this option?) has the option to disable display scalings for high DPI settings, that's something I'm definitely going to pass to our tech guys.


ack-ack

[aaronr]

I did a quick google and found that win 7 indeed has the same function, by right clicking on any .exe file.



So it looks like it could be a handy thing.
That 'Disable display scaling on high DPI settings' is the only box I checked.
I didn't check those other two that are checked in the picture.
Hope this helps. 

[Ack-Ack]

I did a quick google and found that win 7 indeed has the same function, by right clicking on any .exe file.

(Image removed from quote.)

So it looks like it could be a handy thing.
That 'Disable display scaling on high DPI settings' is the only box I checked.
I didn't check those other two that are checked in the picture.
Hope this helps. 

It does, thank you very much.   

ack-ack

[aaronr]

I would love to take credit for being a computer savvy Guru,  but I only stumbled across it out of shear desperation, and when it worked I nearly went into cardiac arrest.