corrupt gauges, lights on, displays blank etc.

[trident 3 1]

I'm trying to run 747-400X on my Vista system, but I'm getting some strange problems. The gauges are corrupted, all lights are on, the displays are blank, the nose gear is pointed off at 90 degrees, the body gear is retracted but the wing gear is down. None of the control surfaces move.Restarting FSX doesn't fix the problem. Neither does rebooting the system.I guessed that it's a a possible problem in fsx.cfg and dll.xml but according to the 747-400X FAQ document on your website, they are correct on my system. The three entires are in the dll.xml file, and the fsx.cfg contains seven entires in the [Trusted] section.The O/S is Vista ultimate, the cpu is an E6600, the graphics card is an 8800GTX, and I've got 2Gb of RAM and about 600Gb of disk space free.I tried uninstalling and reinstalling 747-400X, and then uninstalling and reinstalling FSX, FSX's SP1 and 747-400X but just keep getting the same problem.I've tried turning UAC off but that didn't help either.I tried the fsx.cfg tweaks but they also made no difference.I've made sure that Advance Animations is on.And then - after another re-install, everything started to work! So I copied the good fsx.cfg & dll.xml files... but after a few flights, the problems came back. So I copied the "good" fsx.cfg & dll.xml files back to the FSX folder, rebooted and... the problem still occurs. So, what else can I try?James Butler

[Rieder 3]

Start FSX with absolutely no FSX.cfg whatsoever. Load up any aircraft at all, them immediately quit FSX and restart it. This is so it rewrites the rest of a totally new FSX.cfg istself automatically. Then see if anything improves and how long for.If that fails to work you can discount the FSX.cfg because it definately isn`t that. Then go through the dll.xml with a fine tooth comb. Failing that, maybe its time to reinstall everything from the start, a nice clean setup.Reider

[trident 3 1]

Starting FSX with no FSX.cfg didn't fix the problem.The dll.xml is perfectly fine. I'd saved a copy when things were working perfectly, and it hadn't changed when I got the corrupt gauges etc.However, I do have another data point : I have to have my outbound firewall turned off for 747-400X to succesfully run. If it's on, I get the error. If it's off, I don't.And so I believe the issue is caused by the coppy protection/validation code. I should have realised this as soon as I saw that the installation package was Macrovision.... So now my question is : specifically what programs do I have to allow, and which ports do I have to open up so I can run 747-400X?James Butler

[trident 3 1]

More info :From further examination of the firewall logs, I now don't think it's the Macrovision protection that is sending out the packets. (Apologies to Macrovision, sorry guys!)Instead, I think FSX talks to itself via TCP, and these are the packets being blocked by the firewall. So, the solution is to let fsx.exe have full outbound access through the firewall.James Butler(aka PPRuNe Dispatcher)