Battlefield 1942- Registry Error?

[Lead_Pilot]

OK so I recently bought Battlefield 1942: The Complete Collection. My PC if more than capable of running this game. The demo plays fine too. I played the game for a few days when I bought it (from Best Buy, legally) and then had my PC rebuilt. After I reinstalled it...it wouldn't start up. The disk spins in the drive but it just won't start.

It's hard to explain. After I click on the shortcut...nothing happens. No black screen, no error messages, nothing. And I don't have anything big running in the background either. My system specs:


Operating System: Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp.080413-2111)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: n/a
System Model: n/a
BIOS: Award Modular BIOS v6.0
Processor: AMD Athlon(TM) XP 3200+, MMX, 3DNow, ~2.2GHz
Memory: 1024MB RAM
Page File: 161MB used, 1764MB available
Windows Dir: C:\WINDOWS
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
DxDiag Version: 5.03.2600.5512 32bit Unicode

So just to clarify...this is a legal version, NO-CD patches weren't installed, no Key-gens, etc.

Man this has got to be the strangest problem I've had with a game yet. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

Also, I forgot to mention this but I've tried reinstalled the game around 4 times so far. So I don't think it's a corrupt installation.

[RogueKnight]

Right click shortcut>properties>find target> and run the .exe from there and see if it works.

[jedikiller32]

Ctrl-Alt-Del, go to Processes in Task Manager, and make sure that there is in fact a battlefield.exe or whatever it's called being loaded. Also do what DRK said.

[Lead_Pilot]

The shortcut targets the .exe file so I don't think that's it. I also tried starting the game with the .exe in the main directory and nothing helps.

Any other advice guys? I'm trying a registry cleaner and what not but nothing seems to help. And other games work just fine. I know it's not the disks because I installed it on another PC I have and it works fine.

Strange...

Also I checked the processes in Takes manager and battlefield.exe isn't even listed when I try to start the game.

[ecko_66]

(Uninstall game) > Start > Control Panel > Switch to classic view (if not already) > Administrative tools > Click System tools > Click Device Manage > Click IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers > Click on the channel that your dvd drive is on > Click Advanced Settings > Switch the transfer Mode of devices 0 and 1 > Restart your computer and try again (effects don't take place until computer is restarted) > Install game > After it works or doesn't work undo the changes and restart your computer again.

Hope that helps, If I recall correctly this is what I did when I had a similar problem.

Ecko

[Lead_Pilot]

So when I've got to IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers, I see the primary and secondary channels, and VIA Bus Master IDE controllers.

The primary channel says: DMA if available (for transfer mode). The Current transfer mode says: Ultra DMA Mode 5 (this is all under device 0)

Transfer mode for device 1 is the same.

Secondary IDE channel is the same except the current transfer mode says Ultra DMA Mode 2.

So here's the thing: I don't know if the DVD drive is the primary or secondary channels. And besides that...I've got no clue as to what I've just typed. If you do, that's good!

If this sounds confusing I'll post a screenshot. In any case...should I change the primary and secondary channels? And overall...what will this do?

Thanks again.

[ecko_66]

On my computer there is an option besides DMA called PIO.

It changes how your reader reads.

But since you don't have that option I'm out of options...

[Lead_Pilot]

Actually my PC did have PIOS as an option. I uninstalled the game, changed primary and secondary channels to PIOS mode, and reinstalled the game. Nothing seems to work.

I've also emailed EA tech support. Who knows if they can even help or not, but regardless thanks for trying!

Any more advice guys? I'm clueless

EDIT: OK guys I found a problem...but I have no idea as to how you can fix it.

I was using a registry cleaner and something came up:

Application Paths Issue:
YourApp.exe-C:/Program Files/EA Games/Battlefield 1942/Mods/Xpack2/BF1942.exe
YourApp.exe-C:/Program Files/EA Games/Battlefield 1942/Yourapp.exe

The Registry Key is HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/App Paths/YourApp.exe (BF 1942.exe)

So I think I've narrowed the problem down but is there a way to fix this? Registry cleaner didn't help it seems...at least it identified a problem.