CD copy protection...

vovan · March 17, 2003, 22:56

I have this question:

Some of the games on my laptop exibit a certain strange behavior from time to time. More often than not, they work fine, but sometimes, when I start a game, either by directly running the executable or through the autoplay of the game's CD, it starts just fine at first, but as soon as the screen turns black, it minimizes. The game is still running, but when I try to expand it, it just minimizes again.

This first happened last fall, when I bought Syberia. It did that a couple of times, but worked perfectly thereafter, so I forgot about the glitch, dismissing it as some fluke.

Now, I've been playing WC3 a lot recently, and it has started doing that to me, too. I bought the game when it first came out, and played it a lot on my desktop. Now, I've been playing SP a lot recently, too, and it worked just fine. But yesterday, it did that - minimized right after the launch. Worked fine after a reboot. Today it did the same. Reboot didn't help.

Now, I tried playing SimCity4, and sure enough, it happened again! Only it's never happened with this game before.

So, the question is: could this be caused by the CD drive dying and not recognizing the copy protection properly, or is it something else?

Thanks for any help.

EDIT: Oh, and to answer the question you might have right away: all the games are legal. No rips or anything.

Asher · March 17, 2003, 22:59

Edited by Ming...

If the crack program is NOT authorized by the Game company, it is illegal. It's that simple.

Apolyton does not support or condone the illegal use of Game Software.

If you continue to discuss using cracks to get around copy protection the posts will be deleted, and you will get restricted.

Skanky Burns · March 17, 2003, 23:00

Agreed.

Inverse Icarus · March 17, 2003, 23:01

many games (wc3 included) have issues with Laptop CDROMS (mainly CDR / DVD). Infact, when wc3 came out, it didn't run at all on [edit: certain] laptops.

Urban Ranger · March 17, 2003, 23:02

Copy protection is a royal pain in the arse. Offenders should be hung by their balls (if applicable).

Inverse Icarus · March 17, 2003, 23:13

Quote:

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Copy protection is a royal pain in the arse. Offenders should be hung by their balls (if applicable).

and what if n/a? nipple clamps?

Traianvs · March 17, 2003, 23:17

well usually it is applicable as most game programmers are of male human species

Btw the problem you have seems more like a driver problem or something with a ****ed windows or so

start with defragging and cleaning up your HD, also download the latest drivers for your graphics card (because the games you mention are quite recent, btw you do have a new directx version right!!?) if that doesn't work i suggest reinstalling windows... which you should do once in a while anyway so you could take this opportunity

My personal experience tells that these kind of things have something to do with either windows or graphics card drivers, but i'm sure that there are techno nitwits here that probably know a better solution to this

Urban Ranger · March 17, 2003, 23:20

Quote:

Originally posted by UberKruX
and what if n/a? nipple clamps?

Nah, I am lenient wrt to women

I'll just blame it on her superior or subodinates, whichever is applicable.

vovan · March 17, 2003, 23:21

It might be the graphics card, but if that is the case, I would imagine this would happen all the time, and it only happens very rarely so far.

As for cleaning up the hard drive and reinstalling windows - I am planning on doing it this summer. I am currently spending lots of time doing actual work on my laptop, so a couple of days of it being out of order due to reinstalling the OS and all the programs would be out of question. But during the summer days, I'll have plenty of time to do that, hopefully.

As for drivers, yep, they are all new.

Traianvs · March 17, 2003, 23:35

eh, on my computer reinstalling wonwids just takes like what 1 hour or something

also, defragging yer computer.. easy, just let it run the programme at night, and when you wake up all the work is done

And no it doesn't have to happen all the time, anyway what else could it be ffs? no idea, unless more information is given...

Perhaps a virus

, I had one that crashed my programmes more and more as time passed, so after a month i could hardly start up windows

, and shortly thereafter my whole computer was fooked LOL!

Funniest virus I had though was a virus that flipped my screen colours

Everything white turned into fluorescent orange

, lol, pretty horrible to work on yer computer with that stuff, fortunately, I managed to get rid of the virus => reasonably softie virus

arfg timez for mbed, too jmuch beer!

vovan · March 17, 2003, 23:40

Quote:

Originally posted by Trajanus
eh, on my computer reinstalling wonwids just takes like what 1 hour or something

Well, that's if you only have to install windows... I also need:

Office
Visual Studio
MS SQL Server
Maple
and on and on. It will take a couple of days to reinstall all the crap I have to use in class.

EDIT: Oh, and as far as defragging goes... I have a 40GB harddrive. For the windows defragger to work, it needs 15% of free space, which is... 6GB or something. I don't have nearly that much free space.

Nubclear · March 17, 2003, 23:51

Edited by Ming...

"."

Urban Ranger · March 17, 2003, 23:55

Quote:

Originally posted by vovansim
Well, that's if you only have to install windows... I also need:

Office
Visual Studio
MS SQL Server
Maple
and on and on. It will take a couple of days to reinstall all the crap I have to use in class.

Ghost a fresh installation. Saves lots of time.

vovan · March 18, 2003, 00:00

What program would you recommend for a ghost? I am currently in kind of a tight financial situation, so I wouldn't want to buy something very expensive...

Urban Ranger · March 18, 2003, 00:09

I have only used Norton Ghost (surprise!

) because it does everything I need. You don't need it often (hopefully), but it is a great time-saver when you do.

vovan · March 18, 2003, 00:11

Yeah... $70 Hmm... I might get it from my college for less though, being a compSci major, and everything.

Urban Ranger · March 18, 2003, 00:23

$70 isn't bad, even though $40 is a more reasonable price. Per user, that is.

Nubclear · March 18, 2003, 00:24

Quote:

Originally posted by Tassadar5000
Edited by Ming...

"."

Ming · March 18, 2003, 00:27

I thought you would appreciate that...

Asher · March 18, 2003, 00:56

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher
Edited by Ming...

If the crack program is NOT authorized by the Game company, it is illegal. It's that simple.

Apolyton does not support or condone the illegal use of Game Software.

If you continue to discuss using cracks to get around copy protection the posts will be deleted, and you will get restricted.

Even though actually cracking it is only illegal, the crack itself is not, under the DMCA...

Why do you think those sites have been around for so long? It's for backup purposes, it's completely and totally legal.

Ming · March 18, 2003, 01:02

Only if authorized by the Software company...

So bring it up again only if you want to get suspended...

optimus2861 · March 18, 2003, 13:58

^^ Not true in jurisdictions like Australia and Europe, where making backups is explicitly allowed by their laws; the company can't prevent you from doing it, no matter what their draconian EULAs may state. (Not sure what Canada's laws are on the subject) So in those areas, downloading a crack -- for the purpose of making a backup -- is simply a means to exercise your rights under the law.

Now obviously the USA lawyers are the ones who'll hit you the hardest, so I can understand your reluctance to even air the subject on the site.

Ming · March 18, 2003, 14:00

Quote:

Originally posted by optimus2861
Now obviously the USA lawyers are the ones who'll hit you the hardest, so I can understand your reluctance to even air the subject on the site.

Just making sure this site stays up and running.
There are many other sites where you can go discuss illegal use of software... this isn't one of them

Ari Rahikkala · March 18, 2003, 14:04

We need to do like the Debian project: Start distributing two versions of Apolyton, one for the US and one for the outside world

.

vovan · March 18, 2003, 14:33

Now, now, folks, this is the OT forum, and all, but I was wondering more about whether my problem was caused by copy protection or something else, not how many version of 'Poly there should be.

muxec · March 18, 2003, 16:55

Ming why do you remove and close all my topics about CD-protections and do not close this one? I think that it's kind of antisemitism.

Advice: do not read copyright notice even if you own legal disc with legal version. It make you sick.

Urban Ranger · March 18, 2003, 22:58

Quote:

Originally posted by optimus2861
So in those areas, downloading a crack -- for the purpose of making a backup -- is simply a means to exercise your rights under the law.

In the US, a crack is a violation of the draconian DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) because it forbids circumvention of devices that enforce copyrights. Check out the case of DeCSS for details.

Ming · March 18, 2003, 23:08

Quote:

Originally posted by muxec
Ming why do you remove and close all my topics about CD-protections and do not close this one? I think that it's kind of antisemitism.

Yeah... right...

This is a problem about loading a game... discussions on illegal activity have been deleted... so stuff it

Nubclear · March 19, 2003, 00:13

Quote:

Originally posted by muxec
I think that it's kind of antisemitism.

Sarxis · March 19, 2003, 01:47

Edited by Ming...

If you want to discuss illegal ways of solving problems... take it somewhere else...

If you want to discuss legal ways to solve the problem...
Fine...

And if the illegal stuff continues, this thread will be toast.