Monitor problem or smth else?

[skyviperpl]

Hello!
I'm having a problem with episode two - i have a little bit old monitor CRT 17". When i start the ep2 aplication, the valve logos appear, but then i hear the game sounds from menu, but the monitor goes blank and shows info out of range.

My spec. is:

C2Quad Q6600
GF8800GTS
2GB DDR2
Abit IP-35
Windows XP SP2

Is this caused by monitor, or maybe gfx drivers, directx maybe?? Please help!

 

[kamikazeCow]

Sounds like the game is running at an unsupported resolution. If you can, make a short cut to episode 2, and right click on it and select properties. In the target box, add "+szx 1024 +szy 768" to it without quotes (ie. "episode2.exe" +szx 1024 +szy 768) If that doesn't work, id try updating drivers.

 

[Vesh]

If it's a res problem, that'll do ya right. Alternately, if it's a strict refresh issue (ran into that recently is why I'm bringing it up), try running dxdiag and going to the More Help tab and forcing the refresh rate to 60hz with Override. After that, try running the game.

 

[heer0]

Yes, this is a resolution-refresh rate problem. Most CRT monitors support the safe for eyes 85 Hz up to 1024x768, any higher resolution will drop to 60 Hz which you don't want. There are some models that could do 100Hz on 1024x768 but these are rare.

The problem here is that the game is forcing a resolution/refresh rate not supported by your monitor. For the game to do that there should be a misconfigured monitor driver, try reinstalling it.

 

[skyviperpl]

Thanks to you all guys for so quick help.
Adding the commands didnt gave effect so i tried 2nd solution and it helped!!:bounce: The game set the resolutionn to 1280 X 1024 (no way to set this res with 85hz on my monitor) When game launched i changed the res to 1024 x 768 and everything is now fine
Now i can play EP2.
Once again thx !!!

 

[heer0]

What you practicly did is setting the max resolution your monitor is capable at, the RR dropped to 60Hz (max RR at this res) so game worked fine, then when you lowered the res the RR remained 60Hz. Not very neat, but still working solution.

 

[Vesh]

True. That's really only stopgap until you can force proper working refresh rates for each of the resolutions you play/work at. After that, turn off the override. (Sixty will ruin your eyes.)

 

[heer0]

Yeah, 60 Hz is dangerous (even if some say it's not). At 60Hz you don't see the flicker of the screen, but your brain does. The least that could happen is to get yourself a headache, but continuous exposion can damage your eyes, really.
85Hz and above is a safe RR for CRT monitors. Btw, LCD (TFT) monitors work a different way so they have a standard RR of 75 Hz, which is not dangerous because of the fundamental differences in the way they display color information.