Posted September 17, 2011
I already solved this problem myself, but thought I'd note it here in case others run into it as well.
I installed Spellforce PE in Win7 (64 bit) as well as in XP (32 bit). Both versions ran, but under Win7, the screen was oddly garbled. The image was cut into lots of small vertical stripes, and each stripe was mirrored horizontally.
As I found out, this error only occurs:
- in Windows 7
- under certain resolutions, especially those with 16 bit color depth
- if the display mode "Landscape (flipped)" is activated (which rotates the screen by 180 degrees - I have this activated because my monitor actually gives a better picture when turned upside-down, because I look at it from below)
The game starts with 16-bit color depth, with a garbled screen. So all that needs to be done to fix it is to disable landscape flipping in the Win7 display settings (so that the text on the screen becomes readable, albeit upside-down), and then go back into the game, click on Options -> Video, and choose a resolution with 32 bit color depth. Afterwards the landscape flipping can be re-enabled.
This problem is not limited to Spellforce. I noticed garbled screens with other games as well. The problem seems to be that in Win7, the operating system performs the display rotation (not the GPU, as it was in previous versions of Windows), and the respective algorithm seems to run into problems with certain resolutions, especially 16-bit ones. The program in question is also a factor, perhaps they use a special non-compatible way of setting up the screen.
Since there are also games that _cannot_ be set to 32-bit mode, I'd be grateful for any advice regarding those games. (And yes, I know that "turn your monitor" would work, it's just that I'd prefer a software solution over permanently treating my monitor like a steering wheel ;) ).
I installed Spellforce PE in Win7 (64 bit) as well as in XP (32 bit). Both versions ran, but under Win7, the screen was oddly garbled. The image was cut into lots of small vertical stripes, and each stripe was mirrored horizontally.
As I found out, this error only occurs:
- in Windows 7
- under certain resolutions, especially those with 16 bit color depth
- if the display mode "Landscape (flipped)" is activated (which rotates the screen by 180 degrees - I have this activated because my monitor actually gives a better picture when turned upside-down, because I look at it from below)
The game starts with 16-bit color depth, with a garbled screen. So all that needs to be done to fix it is to disable landscape flipping in the Win7 display settings (so that the text on the screen becomes readable, albeit upside-down), and then go back into the game, click on Options -> Video, and choose a resolution with 32 bit color depth. Afterwards the landscape flipping can be re-enabled.
This problem is not limited to Spellforce. I noticed garbled screens with other games as well. The problem seems to be that in Win7, the operating system performs the display rotation (not the GPU, as it was in previous versions of Windows), and the respective algorithm seems to run into problems with certain resolutions, especially 16-bit ones. The program in question is also a factor, perhaps they use a special non-compatible way of setting up the screen.
Since there are also games that _cannot_ be set to 32-bit mode, I'd be grateful for any advice regarding those games. (And yes, I know that "turn your monitor" would work, it's just that I'd prefer a software solution over permanently treating my monitor like a steering wheel ;) ).