Stealth Ati

July 24, 2009 3:41 am | Video Cards

I Cant get Command & Conquer first decade to work, something about D: is not a valid Win32 exe or something

As Said "not valid Win32 application" It won't autoplay either, Help, Anyone? its a dell 2005 I think with a ati Graphics Card known as stealth.

I just got Decade and I'm having some issues with running Red Alert 2 and Tiberian Sun-the two games I most wanted to play .

If you're having installation issues (ie, not yet installed), try copying the entire files to your hard drive and installing from there. You'll need to keep the CD or DVD in your drive while playing, so that might not be a total solution.

Note that CD-ROMs and DVD-ROMs are pretty cheap now and don't have an infinite life. I busted two on my 2002 eMachine, mostly playing GTA3. If you have any other issues with the CD-ROM or DVD-ROM, might consider buying a new one ($25 on newegg.com) and installing it yourself (takes 10 minutes). The first sign of my CD-ROM going bunko was that autoplay stopped working.

It could also be an issue with your operating system. I guess if it's a 2005 you have XP SP1 at least? Try downloading SP2 (Service Pack 2 from Microsoft.com) and see if this helps. If you already have SP2, check your D: drivers, which you can download from the manufacturer's website, although Dell should show some support here.

Video Card shouldn't make a difference with installation. Given the error message, I don't think it's a video card issue. Still, wierder things have happened.

If CnC:FD is installed but won't PLAY, it should be noted that the CnC games seem to favor NVidia chips. ATI can cause some issues. But there should be some sort of work-around, again check the manufacturer's site for driver updates. Also, how old is the video card? ATI Stealth is the type of chip in your card, but if it's the original it might not support later versions of DirectX. Vista right now supports 9 and 10, and I think the CnC games are meant to be played on 8 and above, but I know some of the ATI Stealth chips that are still on the market only support DirectX 7. Again, that shouldn't be causing the issue given the message you're getting - usually I get a DirectX-related message if my system hasn't been up to spec. But it's a thought.

Hope it works. CnC:FD has issues, but it's a great gaming set.

When I first installed, all the games except Red Alert 2 (and expansion), Tiberian Sun (and expansion) and Renegade worked fine.

After I set the programs to "Run as Administrator" and "Run in XP SP2 Compatibility", Renegade worked.

I've downloaded the patch but haven't had the chance to play (new house - too much work to do), but I'm optimistic I can get these last two to work.

My specs:
AMD Athlon X2 64 5600+ (2.87 Ghz)
3 GB RAM
Vista OS x32
NVidia 6150/128 MB chip on Mobo (no separate card)