[How To] A guide to fixing vista issues.

[shouri]

Well I did something similar on a quite old forum and people responded quite favorably to it so I decided I would impart my knowledge here. Update: I've been stickied muhahaha, step 1 in taking over the world: Complete! *ahem* Moving on!

Before you post here, please read the "Read THIS first" spoiler a bit below.

Important info is in spoilers, 'cept for the first spoiler. Else would be my rantings/intro to each section. So if you're just here for a quick fix and don't care for reading... then stop reading this sentence and jump down to the spoilers.

How I learned about these fixes

My god... it all started in the technical help sections of the OdinMS forums. I decided to check out their forums because I thought that they were doing some interesting work and I came across someone who needed help with Vista compatibility issues. So I went in and hoped there was something I could do.

I had him carefully explain the problem his computer was having. Afterwards, I asked him about the specs on his computer. Basically, we tried everything I could think of since his problem was very troubling for many users and no one had come up with a working solution at the time.

I decided to write a "[How To]" (see topic) so that other people with the same issue could find their answer (and trust me, there were a lot of people). As a part of that [how to], I asked people to post other issues they were having and I basically repeated the same process for each new issue with no previous solution. In fact, one of the issues was about the mortal blow -> DC glitch in aqua. I actually managed to find a working solution for it. But I'm SO pissed that the OdinMS forums got screwed over and that I didn't save a copy of it >>.

Ahem, anyways, yeah that's about it. It was simply
them: i have this problem
me: okay can you explain it in detail?
them: ~explanation~
me:Hmm, specs please.
them:~specs~
me:Hmm, okay lets try this: *********
them:~attempt 1~ hmm, nope still have the issue.
me:Hmm, okay... what if we: ******
them:~attempt 2~ Sweet it worked. Thanks :3

The I helped with the MB glitch... well lets just say we got it fixed by attempt 5. Mainly because no one knew what the was causing the problem. Once again, totally forgot how to fix that issue T.T

Note: It is most likely not tied to the current Mortal Blow glitch I'm hearing about.

Key Notes

-Vista has issues, we know... I want none of this "upgrade to XP" crap that you guys go shoving in peoples faces... please. Yes XP has less issues, but some of us actually like Vista. And then there's those who are just plain stuck with vista... luckily I (as well as others) am/are here to help.

-From the feedback on the previous forum: Though two people may SEEM to have the same problem, the solutions required may in fact be different. So don't give up just because the solution that worked for someone else didn't work for you... maybe you just have a different issue.

-I call the windows icon at the bottom left of vista the "Start Menu" out of habit from windows xp... so yeah

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Issues/solutions:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
There are tons... meaning that there can be a ton of different symptoms but generally (and thankfully) from my experience, the solutions generally fall into a few categories.

Oh and once again... If the solution does not work for you, then please do not begin complaining about it. Like I said before, sometimes similar looking problems have different solutions... here goes!

Everyone Read THIS First Please

Vista has compatibility issues... once again, we know. Especially issues with graphics.

Before I can begin to attempt to assess your issues, I'll need info on your computer. Among which include if you have vista sp 1 on your computer, as well as some other basic info. Here's how you can help me to help you.


Thankfully, a ton of the issues were fixed with the release of Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1). Here's how to check if you have it and how to update to it if for some reason you don't have it.

Note: Almost all Vista Comps sold within the last year have SP1 installed on them as far as I know. So hopefully this wont be an issue.


1) open start menu

2) right click on "computer"

3) click on properties

4) you should see that the first section is called "Windows
edition"

5) If the words "Vista Service pack 1" is found anywhere in that section, go to step 7. Else go to step 6.

6) Google search "vista service pack 1" and the second link should be the microsoft link to get SP 1. Or just click here: Vista SP 1 microsoft page link. Follow directions and yada yada. Make sure you restart after installing SP1. Note upgrade to SP 1 can take up to 3 hours.

7) If you already have SP 1 then dont worry about it

Other stuff you should tell us:

Please tell us the information under the "system" section from the part which you reached from "3)" above. You can leave out the "rating" part. Oh and of course, please describe your problem as thoroughly as you can.

Furthermore in the start menu, you should have the "Run" button you can click on. Click on it and type in "dxdiag" <- no quotes. Change the tab at the top to "Display" and tell us what's on the first entry: "Name: ~~~~"

Okay with that out of the way... let's start with what made me decide to type this thing up all over again from scratch >>

Opeth, I'm looking at you.

Black Flickering Screen/Outright Crash

Here's the description from the mapler with the issue:

Whenever I'm on screen with a bunch of other Maplers (like 20+) the screen flashes to black every second or so, and continues doing this until I leave the area. It also does this at Zakum whenever he used some form of attack. It's rather annoying and I couldn't play to my full potential. Also, if I'm just sitting in Henesys the background will kind of spazz out and remove some of the imagery (like houses and whatever.)

EDIT: Forgot to mention Vista will just outright crash MS whenever it feels like, forcing me to open up task manager and close MS.

Solution 1

You badly need to update your display adapters.

Follow these steps if you don't know how to update your display adapters using the internet :3

1)Start

2)Control Panel

3)Device Manager

4)Click on Display Adapters

5)Right click on your display adapter that appears there... for example "Intel(R) 82945G Express Chipset" or something to that effect. Note, not all of you have intel chipsets obviously, so just go with what you find there. In the case you find more than 1 thing there and are confused on what to choose, post the options here and we'll let you know.

6)Click on Update Driver Software

7)Select the top option

8)Hopefully the rest wont be too hard, ask if you need help.

This next issue is by far THE biggest issue that occured in the previous forum, and a HUGE pain to fix... though only because of this next reason. If I recall correctly this same issue had about FOUR issues/solutions. Yes, a whole freaking FOUR(ish) separate things about vista could cause this problem. It sucked... majorly. Unfortunately I can only remember two of the solutions off the top of my head... I wrote the original article on fixing this issue on OdinMS's technical help forums. So yeah.

Microsoft Visual C++ Runtime Error

Mentions something about the program aborting abnormally.

Pic of problem

This problem traumatized more than half of OdinMSs forums... such lols were had. But yeah, I spent quite a long time researching this cause I felt like helping them.

The wtp? Solution

Can you believe how many people didn't have SP1?
Instructions for this are found in the spoiler "Everyone read this first please."

The "Are you kidding me?" Solution

This got an "Are you kidding me?" out of me when I found out that this solution worked for someone >>.
The problem was with User Account Controls (UAC)>>

Apparently the person installed MS while having UAC set to off but currently had them on.... or vice-versa I really can't recall. But! The point is that you should check if changing your current UAC settings fixes the issue. You can always easily change your UAC settings back so don't be afraid to try this one out:

1)Click on your Start menu

2)Click on Control Panel

3)First switch to classic view by clicking on "classic view" on the left side. (otherwise you'll have to do more clicking later) Locate and click on User Accounts... it should be an alphabetized list so finding it should be easy.

4)At the bottom you should see "Turn User Account Control on or off"

5)Remember that the point is to change your current UAC settings.

--So if the box is unchecked your UACs are off. Check the box and hit ok.
--Or, if the boxed is currently checked, uncheck it and hit ok.

6)You will be prompted to restart your comp. If not, restart your comp now.

7)Try MS now. If you're still getting the issue you may revert your UAC settings but following these same steps.

The "Admin" Solution

You do not have the authority to play MS! Or at least these people didn't.

The solution was simple:

Right click on the maplestory icon and click on "Run as Administrator". Worked perfectly fine thereafter for certain maplers.

This next one affected a ton of GMS maplers who went to zakum.

DCing when Zakum dies, or after killing a certain phase.

So the arms/body 1-3 are just about to go down and you're ready to move on/see the rewards, but much to your dismay you the black screen of death T.T~

The "solution" that you guys might remember was as follows:

-Before you finish each stage, open up your menu and change the graphics settings down 1 level. Repeat this right before each next phase is done with.

Horrid but thankfully this has a much easier solution.

Easier Solution

Go get Vista Service Pack 1 for the love of god. Instructions for this are found in the "Everyone Read This First Please" spoiler. Everyone that came to me with this issue didn't have SP1. So a few hours later, they were back to playing MS DC free (at least DCs caused by zakum changing forms).

Apparently another common problem:

error code: 10093

And after I D/C it says "error code: 10093 (Either the application has not called WSAStartup, or WSAStartup has failed.)

Solution Thanks to PKProStudio

Common problem if you use Vista. Run command prompt as admin and type in 'netsh winsock reset'. Restart the computer and it should work fine.

To run the command prompt as administrator do the follow:

1)Click on your start menu

2)Click on all programs

3)Click on the accessories folder once to expand it

4)Right click on the command prompt and select the option to run it as administrator

5)Type in "netsh winsock reset" as PkProStudio suggested.

6)Restart your computer

HackShield Initialization Error :0x00000203(515)

1. Click Start > RUN > type " regedit "
2. Under " HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE "
3. Go to SYSTEM \ CurrentControlSet \ Services \
3. Right click EagleNT
4. Select Permission.
5. Click Advanced.
7. You'll be in the permissions tab. There's a table here. Look at the tab labeled "Type"
8.Remove all entries with a " Deny " type.
9. Click OK.
-----
Someone was able to play by doing these first nine and wasn't require to do the rest of these. So stop here, hit OK and give things a try.
-----
10. Back to Permissions
11. Check " Groups or User Names "
12. Untick Deny and Tick Allow
13. Apply, Okay and Restart


Credit to MODfiend of gamezneeds.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dealing with Lag:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So yeah, this section deals with the fixable causes of lag and how to deal with them.

Graphics cards and RAM

Sometimes your graphics card sucks up too much of your RAM for its own good (here's looking at you... uh... well... most of the laptops that are cheap have this issue). These graphics cards are known as integrated graphics cards. On the other hand, dedicated graphics cards will not bug your RAM at all :3 This is a good thing to keep in mind when you're selecting a higher end laptop.

Anywho, so if you're going to be playing a game that's gonna stress your graphics card we should make sure that it doesn't attempt to hog too much of your RAM.

note: If the graphics card is crappy enough even the simplest of games alluding to high end 2d or low end 3d graphics will stress it.



let's get you some extra RAM for your programs to use, the nonpaying way :3

Hopefully you have an extra 4 gigs of hard disk space on your laptop you wont miss. One great solution to your lack of RAM is to allocate some harddisk space to act as RAM. Yes, you CAN do this. It can also be done by inserting a clean or freshly format flash drive and selecting the option "speed up my system using windows readyboost". <- I'll go over this one in a bit.

Here's how we do it the hard disk way:

1)Start Menu

2)Control Panel

3)Make sure you view the control panel in "Classic View" found on the left.

4)Performance Information & Tools

5)Where is says "Tasks" on the left. Locate and click on "Advanced Tools"

6)Click on "Adjust the appearance and performance of windows"

7)Click on the "Advanced" tab.

8)In the "Virtual Memory" section, click on "Change"

9)At the bottom of the pop up you'll see "Total paging file size for all drives" Take note of the number next to the word "Recommended". We'll use my number as an example: 1519mb.

10)Make sure that the top box is unchecked. "Automatically manage paging file..."

11)Below that, make sure that the option for "custom size" is the one filled in.

12)For "Initial size (MB)" Take your earlier recommended number and double it and type it in there. In my case, I typed in "3000" <- note I didn't put "mb" in there, just the number. For the "maximum size" option, triple your recommended number... "4500" is what I put in.

13)Please note that this amount is going to be removed from your current remaining harddisk space, so you'll be losing out on about 5 gigs of storage. But, you get free ram, sort of.

14)Make sure you hit ok. :3

Or, you could just go out and buy some better RAM for your comp. And the graphics card isn't too hot either, but hopefully that wont be too bad of an issue.

The Flash Drive Method

If the window that gives you the "speed up my system using windows readyboost" does not automatically pop up, then we'll have to do this manually. Note that you'll need to keep this flash drive plugged in so long as you wanna use it as RAM. Also, please do NOT remove the flash drive without safely ejecting it. You'll need to close most programs before doing this. And lastly, just like with the harddisk method, the space on the flashdrive becomes dedicated to RAM; meaning if you dedicate the whole flashdrive's size to RAM, you cant store anything in the flashdrive anymore. Until you reduce the size of "dedication".

Steps for manual opening of the readyboost menu:

1)Start menu

2)Computer

3)Locate the flash drive and right click on it

4)Properties

5)Go to the "readyboost" tab

6)Set it to "Use this device". And in this case, I'd go with the recommended amount, unless you want to save up some space for other stuff on the flash drive; which I don't recommend.

Notedly, a 4 gig flash drive costing $30 vs a 4 gig flashdrive costing $100... the difference? the $100 one is FASTER. So sure the cheap one will work perfectly well, but it wont be as fast as if you had just taken those $30 and invested it in physically buying more RAM for your laptop :3 Make of it what you will.

[KajitiSouls]

This isn't a bad guide to have =)

One problem that I am currently experiencing on my Vista Laptop is pretty serious. Out of nowhere (*cough* randomly) MapleStory's graphics will l4g behind slightly, meaning anything I do for input happens on the game about .2 seconds later. The FPS also goes down a little bit. Identifying when this glitch happens can be anywhere between subtle to "in your face". Anyways, roughly 10-30 seconds later my computer will completely seize up and freeze indefinitely until I either do a hard reset or cut the power somehow. Not fun.
EDIT: this glitch is GMS v.65. It has never appeared before.

As of currently playing MS in windows mode vastly reduces the probability that the glitch will strike. I know of another player, a friend-because-of-class, who has this same issue. And Kasuhitomi has admitted to having this problem also.

My drivers are up to date, I've done defrags and whatnot, disabled Toshiba Flash Cards (lolwut duz dat du), and pretty much anything else I could think of.

AND FOR THE LOVE OF JEBUS THIS ISN'T FROM OVERHEATING!!!!!

Oh yeah, just in case you want the specs, my Laptop is a Toshiba Satellite A135-S4527. Pretty standard, not really meant for games and stuff xD

Something else for shouri

When I was typing up my LOLPALLY guide for the guide-writing event, I saw how huge it was and thought to myself "What if sp.net went down the tanker?" I didn't believe I would re-write the whole entire thing after all the extraordinary effort and zeal I put into the guide. FFS, it takes 3 posts to display the whole guide, not including the massive abuse of BBC tags I've written (which caused the server to produce fatal errors when it was downgraded xD). Just for extra safety, I even saved all of the images and "pirated" other images that I've found over the internet, so even those were backed up onto my hard drives.

And look what happened to the sp.net database. I was so friggin' happy I saved all those images. It was literally hundreds of images.

So basically if something takes a long time to produce, write, compile, make, w/e, save a backup of it if you can! Never know when the unexpected will strike.

[ThatSkyGuy]

I do have a problem with MS. I can never get on. Yeah this is Vista SP 1.

http://i303.photobucket.com/albums/n...g?t=1236115024

2 gigs of ram
AMD Sempron proccessor SI-40 2.00 GHz
32 bit
3.5 rating thingy.
HP G50 Notebook PC

EDIT: It says loading instead of play with the download manual patch bar on the bottom

EDIT 2: I also think this a nice guide. I request a sticky.

[Mark]

This man is a genius. Listen to him.

[Manda]

I know a couple more ways to prevent Zakum DCing.

1) Zak in windowed mode, and before the fight, ensure that the windowed mode box is ticked. During first body, change your graphics setting to the lowest possible setting, and tick the windows mode box again (as the tick won't be there).

2) Alt tab quickly during first body.

Unfortunately you need to rely on a healer while doing both of these, but I let whoever's in my party know that I'm fixing something for 3 seconds at the most and they don't get annoyed.

[Teppi]

my system

i sometimes get dc while horntail is summoned or when 3rd body of zak appeared or zak die............the Windows Visual C++ appears and lag me out.......yeah

[shouri]

Oh noes too many problems at once T.T

My brain's gonna explode ><

Let me remind you guys that most of the solutions I came up with were done through trial and error of different possibilities that could be affecting gameplay. So I don't necessarily have an "insta-fix" ready for you guys.

Where to start... in order?

Kajitisouls, I'll need a bit more info. More specifically, the info you see in the post above this one. I have a possible solution that I want to try with you involving your memory and if that doesn't work we'll go with nate's algorithm, but before I explain either I'll need that info.

ThatSkyGuy, so upon first glance it seems to me like you have an internet issue more than anything 0.o The "play" button is stored on your computer somewhere in the MS folder so that's why you can still see it, but the other content requires that you be connected to the internet. You can verify this is you try to open MS without being plugged in to the internet. However, since I'm pretty sure you're trying to open the game while connected to the internet, I need you to answer the following:

1)How long ago did you get this laptop?
2)Do you have user account controls enabled or disabled?
3)How's your internet? You can get a gist of how fast it is at "speedtest.net". The sticky in tech help suggests that you pick the san jose server in california for a good result.


Manda, those methods do indeed work, though they're hopefully not needed anymore thanks to vista SP1. Vista SP 1 did fix the issue of the changing forms -> DC. However, people still CAN have lag issues when summoning or when the body is changing forms that can cause them to DC. Similar symptoms different solutions ^^. Once I get back from tutoring people tonight I'll show them how they can help with their lag as well :3

Teppi, so you get the "Microsoft Visual C++ runtime error"? (almost) exactly as it appears in that pic I included?
This error has almost nothing to do with your comp specs thankfully. By the way, you have a dam good computer >>. I'm using a dual core processor on 1 gig of ram :3 Anyways, did you try running MS as admin? If that doesn't/didn't work for you, there's one other solution that I remember worked for some people: Run MS in compatibility mode for windows XP. <- I'd hate to know that people actually have to do this, but I'm still now quite skilled enough with vista to fix this problem without having to do this T.T.

Oh yeah, note to everyone, I'm okay with vista. I mainly seem to be good because I literally spent several days with people from the previous forum attempting different fixes and well as going through google search for people with similar problems and their solutions. I'll emphasize again... days.

I'll be back later to see what I can do :3 Gotta go tutor now.

[ThatSkyGuy]

ThatSkyGuy, so upon first glance it seems to me like you have an internet issue more than anything 0.o The "play" button is stored on your computer somewhere in the MS folder so that's why you can still see it, but the other content requires that you be connected to the internet. You can verify this is you try to open MS without being plugged in to the internet. However, since I'm pretty sure you're trying to open the game while connected to the internet, I need you to answer the following:

1)How long ago did you get this laptop?
2)Do you have user account controls enabled or disabled?
3)How's your internet? You can get a gist of how fast it is at "speedtest.net". The sticky in tech help suggests that you pick the san jose server in california for a good result.

Well I had this laptop since Christmas :3
Disabled (That thing is annoying)
Sure,


EDIT: I also have CA Internet security and a cable modem if that helps.

[shouri]

Well I had this laptop since Christmas :3
Disabled (That thing is annoying)
Sure,


EDIT: I also have CA Internet security and a cable modem if that helps.

I'm not that great with processors, but from your earlier post I went and researched it. I'm seeing, single core processor, and integrated graphics. Integrated graphics = the graphics card uses up your RAM instead of having its own <-- kinda dumbed down from what the explanation on wiki stated, that's what I got out of it. I highly doubt either of these is the problem though. From what I did read though, I understood that its not that great of a graphics processor for gaming though. But lets not worry about that part yet.

1)Can you play any other full screen games? Or is MS the only one giving you trouble?

2)There's the possibility that its just taking forever to load. So we could always try some maintenance on your computer. Disk defragmentation comes to mind.

3)I see that you have the "play" button available in the picture you first posted. What happens when you click it? Can you even click it?

Edit:
Uh... I'd hate to be the bearer of bad news... but I went and did a bit more research.

This site should give you the gist of it
Bad News T.T

TL;DR: Though your specs are slightly higher it seems that your graphics card just isn't really meant for gaming... at all. I'm hoping this isn't an absolute though. Apparently, some of those people were still able to play games like Call of Duty 4 on the lowest possible settings though.

If you have about 4 gigs that your comp can do without, I might be able to come up with something to ease the burden your processor has on your RAM... but I'm not sure if that'll fix it ><.

[KajitiSouls]

Giving you the model number wasn't good enough eh? (that screen above doesn't actually have the last 5 digits) I'm very sure you can get better specifics if you looked up the model number online.

I managed to find a "compromise" between me and my computer so now I can play windows mode with relatively no l4g. Yay! It does not prevent the glitch entirely though >_>

[shouri]

Giving you the model number wasn't good enough eh? (that screen above doesn't actually have the last 5 digits) I'm very sure you can get better specifics if you looked up the model number online.

I managed to find a "compromise" between me and my computer so now I can play windows mode with relatively no l4g. Yay! It does not prevent the glitch entirely though >_>

*dramatic half sorrowful voice* KajitiSouls, your laptop is crying out to you. It weeps as its forced to handle many tasks at once. The pain!!! The suffering!!!

Okay okay that's enough. But seriously, you're laptop is getting overworked when you play MS. A single core processor (or even a slow duo core processor) and 1 gig of ram can mean trouble for computers running vista. The fallback would be having a great graphics card. However, I looked at entire list of specs based off of the model number and it seems you're looking at a non-gamer's computer.

Let's fix that shall we? :3

First off let's get you some extra RAM, the nonpaying way :3

Hopefully you have an extra 4 gigs of hard disk space on your laptop you wont miss. One great solution to your lack of RAM is to allocate some harddisk space to act as RAM.

Here's how we do it:

1)Start Menu

2)Control Panel

3)Make sure you view the control panel in "Classic View" found on the left.

4)Performance Information & Tools

5)Where is says "Tasks" on the left. Locate and click on "Advanced Tools"

6)Click on "Adjust the appearance and performance of windows"

7)Click on the "Advanced" tab.

8)In the "Virtual Memory" section, click on "Change"

9)At the bottom of the pop up you'll see "Total paging file size for all drives" Take note of the number next to the word "Recommended". We'll use my number as an example: 1519mb.

10)Make sure that the top box is unchecked. "Automatically manage paging file..."

11)Below that, make sure that the option for "custom size" is the one filled in.

12)For "Initial size (MB)" Take your earlier recommended number and double it and type it in there. In my case, I typed in "3000" <- note I didn't put "mb" in there, just the number. For the "maximum size" option, triple your recommended number... "4500" is what I put in.

13)Please note that this amount is going to be removed from your current remaining harddisk space, so you'll be losing out on about 5 gigs of storage. But, you get free ram, sort of.

14)Make sure you hit ok. :3

Or, you could just go out and buy some better RAM for your comp. And the graphics card isn't too hot either, but hopefully that wont be too bad of an issue.

[XTOTHEL]

Well I had this laptop since Christmas :3
Disabled (That thing is annoying)
Sure,


EDIT: I also have CA Internet security and a cable modem if that helps.

uninstall CA internet security, then see if you can get on.

Also, if you are in windows vista, best to let vista deal with the page file size. Increasing the page file size doesn't give you any performance increase. Should just let windows manage it. Windows will adjust the size by itself.


Kajiti, do you have all of the visual eye candy disable for vista? Try running Vista in classic theme instead of Aero theme.

[shouri]

The research I did on vista pointed out that an increase in the paging file sized allowed vista to act as if it had more RAM than it normally did.

Third paragraph of this page for example.

[KajitiSouls]

*dramatic half sorrowful voice* KajitiSouls, your laptop is crying out to you. It weeps as its forced to handle many tasks at once. The pain!!! The suffering!!!

Okay okay that's enough. But seriously, you're laptop is getting overworked when you play MS. A single core processor (or even a slow duo core processor) and 1 gig of ram can mean trouble for computers running vista. The fallback would be having a great graphics card. However, I looked at entire list of specs based off of the model number and it seems you're looking at a non-gamer's computer.

Let's fix that shall we? :3

First off let's get you some extra RAM, the nonpaying way :3

Hopefully you have an extra 4 gigs of hard disk space on your laptop you wont miss. One great solution to your lack of RAM is to allocate some harddisk space to act as RAM.

Here's how we do it:

1)Start Menu

2)Control Panel

3)Make sure you view the control panel in "Classic View" found on the left.

4)Performance Information & Tools

5)Where is says "Tasks" on the left. Locate and click on "Advanced Tools"

6)Click on "Adjust the appearance and performance of windows"

7)Click on the "Advanced" tab.

8)In the "Virtual Memory" section, click on "Change"

9)At the bottom of the pop up you'll see "Total paging file size for all drives" Take note of the number next to the word "Recommended". We'll use my number as an example: 1519mb.

10)Make sure that the top box is unchecked. "Automatically manage paging file..."

11)Below that, make sure that the option for "custom size" is the one filled in.

12)For "Initial size (MB)" Take your earlier recommended number and double it and type it in there. In my case, I typed in "3000" <- note I didn't put "mb" in there, just the number. For the "maximum size" option, triple your recommended number... "4500" is what I put in.

13)Please note that this amount is going to be removed from your current remaining harddisk space, so you'll be losing out on about 5 gigs of storage. But, you get free ram, sort of.

14)Make sure you hit ok. :3

Or, you could just go out and buy some better RAM for your comp. And the graphics card isn't too hot either, but hopefully that wont be too bad of an issue.

Oh schnapps, you can do that with Vista HDs!?? o.O I luv you if it really works! (I'm not with my laptop atm)

Also, I'm already aware my laptop isn't a gaming laptop. MapleStory still advertises itself as a minimum requirements game anyways.

Just for the record, the most I've ran at once on my laptop was MS, FireFox, Flash Player 10, Notepad, and Paint.NET. Nothing strange happened, although my performance did suffer. And this was at the time when the strange glitch I've originally mentioned never ever happened.

Kajiti, do you have all of the visual eye candy disable for vista? Try running Vista in classic theme instead of Aero theme.

I have no idea what you're talking about with themes. (I'm not with my laptop atm)

Here's a general list of things I've turned off and crap when I got it new:
--Program windows no longer have transparent/opaque effects, showing whatever is underneath.
--Mini windows do not appear if I mouse over minimized programs.
--Toshiba Flash Cards no longer annoy me. I do not know what the difference is with or without those anyways.
--Windows updates and whatnot no longer run without my permission. I have yet to tell Windows Defender to stfu though o.O
--Program window buttons no longer glow via Gaussian blur-like effect.

[XTOTHEL]

The research I did on vista pointed out that an increase in the paging file sized allowed vista to act as if it had more RAM than it normally did.

Third paragraph of this page for example.

I believe that's only the case if one program needs lots of memory. Usually, system managed size is good enough.

You would get more performance from having a USB drive plugged in and have it dedicated to readyboost.

Kajit, Control Panel > Personalize > Theme > under the drop down list, select "Windows Classic"

[ThatSkyGuy]

I'm not that great with processors, but from your earlier post I went and researched it. I'm seeing, single core processor, and integrated graphics. Integrated graphics = the graphics card uses up your RAM instead of having its own <-- kinda dumbed down from what the explanation on wiki stated, that's what I got out of it. I highly doubt either of these is the problem though. From what I did read though, I understood that its not that great of a graphics processor for gaming though. But lets not worry about that part yet.

1)Can you play any other full screen games? Or is MS the only one giving you trouble?

2)There's the possibility that its just taking forever to load. So we could always try some maintenance on your computer. Disk defragmentation comes to mind.

3)I see that you have the "play" button available in the picture you first posted. What happens when you click it? Can you even click it?

Edit:
Uh... I'd hate to be the bearer of bad news... but I went and did a bit more research.

This site should give you the gist of it
Bad News T.T

TL;DR: Though your specs are slightly higher it seems that your graphics card just isn't really meant for gaming... at all. I'm hoping this isn't an absolute though. Apparently, some of those people were still able to play games like Call of Duty 4 on the lowest possible settings though.

If you have about 4 gigs that your comp can do without, I might be able to come up with something to ease the burden your processor has on your RAM... but I'm not sure if that'll fix it ><.

1.Actually now that I think about it, I can't even play La tale without some error (12007) I'll check for any other games later.
EDIT: Well I found out I can play some Full screen games like this pinball game on my comp.

2. Well I hope its the take forever to load part >_>. But when I go into task manager it says it is not responding. So, I can go witht he maintenance. Also, I did disk defragment a couple of days ago with defraggler.

3. Actually that picture is kind of old. Now it says Loading with the mushies and the manual patch download bar (It still doesn't respond.)

Sure, I can spare 4 gigs. I run CCleaner everyday so I get rid of a lot of stuff on my comp.

uninstall CA internet security, then see if you can get on.

I did get this problem when I downloaded CA... I'll try it later

[Manda]

I can't even get the SP1 installation to work, it comes up with an error message at the start. And I have an update which is related to it which won't install either. Woe is me.

[shouri]

Would be nice if we could get a picture of said error. Or perhaps a very detailed summary of the message. Including any error numbers of course.

[ThatSkyGuy]

Well I uninstalled CA (and installed avast) but it still froze.

[shouri]

Well I uninstalled CA (and installed avast) but it still froze.

In regards to my earlier question about your harddisk space, refer to my section on dealing with lag. It has the steps you might want to consider. This is of course, an easily reversible process with no known ill effects.