Black Shark lost its settings and required re-activation

[Galwran]

I was just about to fly the Ka-50 after a pause of a month. But when I started the game version 1.01 I noticed that the game had lost all of it's settings :( Resolution, game mode, and even key commands were back to the default. And I even had to activate the game again :cry:

 

If I recall correctly, the only change that has happened after the last time that I flew was that I installed FC2.0 (but of course in a different directory)

 

I checked the controllers directory, and looks like that my old joystick and controller files are still intact (the "last edited"-date looked right) but I'm unable to load them in game; any tips how to do this?

 

What gives? Losing an activation for nothin kinda pisses me off, but having to setup everything again would really make me mad :doh:

[Slayer]

Did you disable UAC or do anything with your user accounts? It sounds like a virtualization issue.

 

You may be lucky and still have a restore point from that time for system restore...if that doesnt fix it you can always revert back to your current configuration.

[fzfq3m]

Hi Galwran

 

Please experts correct me if I'm wrong... but AFAIK Black Shark would validate against internet once a while (about once every month) in order to check if you have a valid installation... cause something similar happend to me: I went on vacation for about a month and during that time there was a problem with my credit card and my ISP couldn't charge me for internet service, so they suspended the service... When I was back at home I tried to play Black Shark but then a message saying that it needed to validate my serial in order to play.... I just contacted my ISP, restored my internet and fired Black Shark... It took a while to start the mission but there was no message about validation and all settings were as I left them...

 

I couldn't find any reference on the forum about this but I remenber that I read it somewhere,... may be in the small manual that came with my DVD version of the shark... unfortunately i can't find it.... and I just realized that my serial is also on that manual :-(

 

Another thing that I though is that it could be caused by a driver update (just guessing),... I mean: How starforce activation reacts when there is a change on device drivers signature??? For example... I own a Geforce 9800gtx and previously it appeared on device manager as "nVidia Geforce 9800GTX" but when nVidia released an upgraded version: the Geforce 9800GTX+ they inclueded that signature on the driver and now my card appears on device manager as "nVidia Geforce 9800GTX/9800GTX+"....

 

Of course I know that starforce has this:

"StarForce detects changes to your computer hardware/software as described below, a new activation will be required. For the Russian version, each purchase includes 3 (three) activations and 10 (ten) deactivations. When released, the western version will include 8 activations and 10 deactivations. The deactivations can be utilized to save activations when altering your hardware/software. Activation will be required if the hardware/software changes exceed 12 points as rated below:

 

CPU ID: 13

Windows PID: 3

Computer Name: 3

Hard drive volume serial number: 3

MAC address: 6

RAM amount: 6

For further details on the copy protection system, please see the StarForce FAQ:

http://www.star-forc...sers/group2.php"

 

Anyway let the experts comment on this

Edited April 30, 2010 by fzfq3m

[Panzertard]

Galwran, on Vista/Win 7 64bit - if you installed in Program Files(x86)

- C:\Users\<your user>\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files (x86)\Eagle Dynamics\Ka-50

On 32-bit, remove the (x86) tag.

Thats where you should find your files.

 

Now since you lost your Ka-50 config (which is stored there) and registry for activation - it looks like someone reset or changed your Windows user-account on that PC.

You need to retrace your steps and figure out if you had the DCS and settings working on another user on that PC.

Once you find that user (unless some evil family member deleted it) you should be able to play DCS using that Windows user-account again.

 

fzfq3m, No it should not be like that, but it's not the same problem as this desperate bloke either. :)

[Galwran]

Thanks for the replies. Haven't realized yet what is the problem. When I tried to change resolution settings it get this:

[Panzertard]

Galwran, you windows user account - is not working properly to operate the DCS.

You will see that error because as a sideffect from

- You user account changed since you installed.

- your current useraccount doesn't have the same permissions.

The best option here is to try to find what went wrong with your windows user.

 

If not, then you can try to set it up with proper permissions.

 

If you dont know what I'm talking about - then reinstall the DCS - it should fix all your problems.

[Galwran]

Yeah, I'll prolly try to reinstall. But when I try to save my activation with the protect.exe it says that that my game *requires* activation and thus I'm unable to save one :/ So looks like I will be losing yet another activation upon re-installing.

 

I also might have found the source of the problem, though it still puzzles me very much. It goes something like this: I have two separate installations on my computer; one for current W7 and the one I had while I was still using W7 beta. For some obscure reason (patching?) I am no longer unable to start the installation that I made on the current W7 :P

 

So yeah, I might have messed up a bit, but I also believe that it would help to be able to select the game directory upon patch installation if you have multiple installs on the system. But I also do still believe that I have played BS without ~any changes from the current setup.

[Galwran]

Ok so complete reinstall solved this issue; now the game starts OK.

 

 

Currently I have only the original issue with the settings unsolved; It would be a bummer to config everything again.

[Panzertard]

I told you where to find those setting from your original install in my first reply. You obviously need to look in the correct system for C:\Users to find it. ;)

Go look for them.