Zatx said:
Quote:
**Edit** I installed EQ Classic on my brand new dell with onboard video (at work desktop). It does not work. I get the above error message.***
**Edit #2** I looked up the specs of your system here http://docs.us.dell.com/support/ed...n/index.htm and you only have an onboard video driver. You would need to go buy a video card.
This is not true. I have been running EQ on 2 different PC's for the last 3 years. The first one I played on had 850MHz AMD processor, 768MB RAM, and the motherboard had an onboard 64MB video processor. The Dell I am playing on now has a 3.0GHz Intel P4, 768MB RAM (swapped RAM, hehe), with onboard 128MB Intel Extreme Graphics 2. And if you really want to go low-tech...7 years ago when EQ was pre-Kunark, I played on a Compaq with 350MHz processor, 64MB RAM (not upgradeable), and 16MB 3Dfx Voodoo2 card.
All of these had separate video cards, except the Compaq which was using the video card ALONG with the onboard video...but is 16MB really anything to be writing home about? The key to playing on all of these machines was the allocation of the computer's RAM to be used as video RAM.
You can't change this from inside the Windows program (whichever version you run). It needs to be changed in the system BIOS setup of your computer. When your computer is booting up it will have a screen of some sort (usually black background) with some text and numbers on it and scrolling, or a loading bar, or something similar. And on this scren somewhere there will be a line of text that says something like "FOR BIOS SETUP PRESS <F12>". (It may be another key, but usually a function key or the delete key). You need to press this button before Windows loads up.
When you press this button it loads up the System BIOS setup utility for your computer. If you son't know what BIOS is, don't mess with ANY of the settings in here EXCEPT for the one that you need to for your video. Doing so can cause an irreversible error or permanent coruption of your hard drive.
Navigation thru the menus are self-explanatory, but there is a key at the bottom of the screen for reference. Since I am on my computer now, it is hard for me to say exactly which options you will be looking at, and which order they appear, so at this point you need to navigate thru your menus until you come across the option for allocating RAM to onboard video.
This will have a few options, and will be limited by the amount of RAM you have in your machine, and by the maximum amount the onboard video will handle. PUT IT TO THE MAX. Even if you have 128MB of onboard video (usually the max for onboard) and only 256MB of RAM, that leaves you 128MB of working RAM for the computer to run Windows and EQ. You might want to ease up on a few of the Luclin models for smoother gameplay, but it will work.
So after you have allocated the RAM to the video, exit and SAVE the settings you just changed and restart your computer. Congratulations you can now play EQ!
OK maybe not yet...you still have to make sure your drivers are compatible, you may need to download DirectX files, you may need to repatch EQ or do a complete file chack again. But the point I was trying to make is that you don't HAVE to go out and buy a new graphics card to play EQ.
Good luck to you welcome to the game (when you can play, of course).