Black Country

[Easilyconfused]

I must admit I have had a couple of crashes too. The first I believe was caused by not reading the advice to close the activity briefing immediately. Not sure where that is but I have seen it written (this is why the activity briefs are included in the Docs folder). I left it loading whilst answering the phone and then it crashed to desktop immediately.

I believe the other crashes were caused when I left Firefox running minimised to taskbar downloading some software updates for work and then started BC1 and a 2nd time when my wife sent a print from her laptop up to the wireless printer that is queued off my PC and the wonderful HP printer software spawned a status window telling me the ink was low. I have not had any crashes when I use Enditall2 to kill all the unnecessary processes like the HP printer status software.

[NeutronIC]

If you're getting crashes there are a few common things to try:

1. Reduce the sound detail level to medium or low; chances are it will make a big improvement but won't be too appreciable.
2. Make sure you immediately close the F11 view - the problem with MSTS is that while the F11 view is up and the game is paused, all the internal sound engine bits keep moving and queuing up requests to play sounds continually - if they get too big then bang it all explodes when the thing starts up again. Just keep that F11 window off your screen and get rid of any other windows that pause things as quickly as possible. There are briefings on the disc to help you no longer need the info on the F11 window so read and print before you start the activity.
3. Try reducing graphical detail.

Every activity was run at least once without crashing before the disc was cleared for production, and testing was done on a moderate spec (i.e. not big) machine, so I can certainly assure you that they *should* all complete correctly.

Matt.

[mickrik]

HI There,

My activities (4 of them) were prepared on a modest spec machine,

AMD 64 Dual Core 3.2ghz with 3gb ram + an old Nvidea 7300 500mb graphics card. I deliberately tested every where I went with the settings maxed out BUT I always swich off shadow details. I find it makes a big difference.

This is a resource intense route, swich everything off that is not neccessary, and make lots of saves.

Mickrik

[Tonysmedley]

I am now getting completely confused with BC1. I know I am old, but I am still mentally very fit; and I read and comply with instructions.
I have installed BC1 in three different locations on my PC:-

1) On drive ‘ C’ as an independent route completely in accordance with the instructions. Although my main MSTS is on drive ‘I’ the installer correctly located the MSTS files and copied them in the .bat routine

2) On Drive ‘I’ as an independent program outside the Program Files where MSTS is stored

3) On Drive ‘I’ but included in MSTS as a normal route, copying over the BC1 files as recommended in the BC1 ReadMe

I can therefore run or attempt to run BC1 in any if the situations which have been discussed.

Starting the program in either of the scenarios 1 or 2 has the same result. If the Train icon is selected a message appears concerning a missing path. If this is OK’d and an activity is selected, an error message 76 comes up with a missing path and any attempt to proceed further results in the program closing.
If the ‘Run Route’ option is taken the program opens normally followed by either of two alternatives; the Drive A Train window is greyed out, or if it is not greyed out, selecting an activity to run results in an eventual Send/Don’t Send.

If the route is opened on MSTS there are two options., use or don’t use Train Store. If Train Store is opened, all the activities are listed but clicking on any of them has no result. Selecting Explore mode allows only one start point, which I created in Activity Editor, but the route will run

I have only tried checking the MSTS route with Activity Analyser, being reluctant to alter the settings for that program so that it only points to MSTS. All the activities are listed as .act files in AA, but it shows a long list of missing Service files although there are 605 such files in the MSTS>Routes>BC1>Services folder.

Reluctantly I give up for the time being, hopeful that there will eventually be a fool proof way of making this marvellous route work. Until then it is back to Burton-Derby and Cannock Chase which have never given me any trouble.

I installed Port Stanley, Bernina and Jagstahlbahn mini routes some rime ago, which required no strange procedure to install and ran “out of the box” .

[Easilyconfused]

Starting the program in either of the scenarios 1 or 2 has the same result. If the Train icon is selected a message appears concerning a missing path. If this is OK’d and an activity is selected, an error message 76 comes up with a missing path and any attempt to proceed further results in the program closing.
If the ‘Run Route’ option is taken the program opens normally followed by either of two alternatives; the Drive A Train window is greyed out, or if it is not greyed out, selecting an activity to run results in an eventual Send/Don’t Send.

If the route is opened on MSTS there are two options., use or don’t use Train Store. If Train Store is opened, all the activities are listed but clicking on any of them has no result. Selecting Explore mode allows only one start point, which I created in Activity Editor, but the route will run

Tony,

How are you starting MSTS ? Are you clicking on the Black Country icon on your desktop or your regular MSTS icon ? You are supposed to use the Black Country icon on the desktop then you should see this :

then this :

[rlmathers]

Just to let you know I have just checked the size of my current MEP route including stock and it is near enough 5GB. I can't imagine anyone wanting to download that lot!!!

Mick Clarke
MEP Author

Come on Mick, be fair, no stock, no activities, no paths, no service files, how big is the actual route?

[Tonysmedley]

I have tried opening Black Country both ways,. In my note I should have said Black Country icon and not Train icon,;. The results of using that are as I described. Just for interest I re-installed Bernina, a mini route. It was a "piece of cake"; no problems, all activities run straight away!.

[Easilyconfused]

I have tried opening Black Country both ways,. In my note I should have said Black Country icon and not Train icon,;. The results of using that are as I described. Just for interest I re-installed Bernina, a mini route. It was a "piece of cake"; no problems, all activities run straight away!.

Is Spalding anywhere near Peterborough ?

UKTS are at the Peterborough show at the weekend. We could see you there and show you on our show laptops how it is supposed to work.

If not then I will try to help you in the morning but my bed is calling me now.

[systema]

Come on Mick, be fair, no stock, no activities, no paths, no service files, how big is the actual route?

I was just trying to give an idea of the size of the total package. The route on its own is 3.25GB, the stock is 1.8GB. The totals exclude activity related items but these only total about 18MB. There will be about 100 activities included.

Mick Clarke
MEP

[Davison3]

Hi all, i'm getting exactly the same results as Tony [the old one], with an error 76 displaying when i try to run from the BC1 icon and crashes when i try to run from my installation attempt to the MSTS installation via train store. I have done 4 installations so far, each more frustrating than the last and i have followed the instructions to the letter. I have successfully moved other routes about and created activities etc but this driving me to distraction as there seems to be no rhyme nor reason for it not working unless the disc is corrupt. Can any one help Tony and myself before the whole lot goes in the bin!!!. As for my dismay at reading that Mid-east is likely to be presented in the same manner, well you can imagine my comments regarding that.
Hopefully some kind soul can a little light into our collective darkness.
Dave

[Easilyconfused]

It seems I have been answering the same questions multiple times by support ticket and email.

Error 76 is caused by not having followed the instructions to the letter. Please refer to the mini-loader.pdf file in the \bc1_MiniRoute\Train Simulator\ROUTES\BC1\Docs folder. You have not pressed the red button to confirm the route before trying to select and run the activities. I have just been into my installation and deleted the .ini file that is created when you press that button and then gone back into the mini-loader and tried to run an activity and got the same result - error 76.

If you are getting error 76 then do not try to "knife and fork" the mini-route into your regular MSTS installation - that is for advanced users. You should not have installed the mini-route to your regular MSTS folders either.

[rufuskins]

It seems I have been answering the same questions multiple times by support ticket and email.

Shouldn't that be telling you something!

Ruf

[Lad491]

Shouldn't that be telling you something!

Yes that people just jump in and try and get started without reading, and possibly re-reading, the instructions fully so they are clear what to do

[rufuskins]

It's very easy to assume that everyone makes the same mistake, and a little patronising to say that it's our fault.

I don't dispute that that has occured before, but I repeat my earlier point that the main mistake in my opinion was NOT to warn people before its issue that BC1 was to be set up in this fashion, and thereby giving us the opportunity to understand "mini-loader".

I can't help feeling that some may be put off future SUPER routes because of this.

I very much hope that we have ALL learnt some lessons from this episode, and I mean both sides of the discussion. I certainly have, and I have decided on a significant change in my approach - witness my earlier post.

I still hope to help out at Rawtenstall although I have heard nothing from the UKTS DIT Team, and it is unfortunate that the original road shows have had to be restricted to down south. I would have liked to take the opportunity to be shown what's what, but I am not in a position to travel to places such as Peterborough.

I was therefore dependent on the forums for help and advice which was freely given as I have mentioned before - all very much appreciated.Somehow this thread seems to have adopted the approach that we the users are at fault.

I have also said that I feel extremely guilty in making my comments because Bigant has spent many hundreds of hours producing this excellent route, and allowed us all to get the opportunity to experience MSTS in all its glory.

Enough of my thoughts, Ruf

[SDtrains]

Ruf wrote

I don't dispute that that has occured before, but I repeat my earlier point that the main mistake in my opinion was NOT to warn people before its issue that BC1 was to be set up in this fashion, and thereby giving us the opportunity to understand "mini-loader".

"

My issue here is not that I had a problem getting my head round mini routes, but quite the opposite. I had 'evaluated' mini routes quite some time ago when I had my routes divided across four seperate MSTS installations (N,S,E & W- geographic logic!). This situation alone caused some duplication of stock and I realised that I was in need of an HDD with greater capacity to continue. By putting every route into a mini route would make the situation worse, not better. I decided to put everything into one installation and use Trainstore - a situation which seems to work acceptably, and has survived Tsection and Bin patch upgades. Now, I have the better part of 20Gb of stock, Most British routes published in MSTS and four 'Super routes' of my making, the prospect of using mini routes is somewhat obtuse. 'Black Country' has survived the transition to work under Trainstore in my installation, and is ( If I am permitted to carry an opinion in the current scheme of things), thanks to Don's good work, a superb upgrade to the original 'Cannock Chase' series. I have kept the original mini route installation for future reference but I think it will probably find it's way, zipped up, into my route archive.