P3D & Windows 8 = BLANK SCREEN !

[bloxboy 15]

Hi Guys hope you can help. I am trying out Win8, and all my progs work with no problem, but when I installed and ran P3D, everything loads up and I can even hear the sound of the default planes engine, BUT NO DISPALY, except for the taskbar at the bottom of the screen, and a bar at the top saying P3D Academic version, but everything in-between is black. I can press escape and get the "End Flight" box with all the options, and can exit from this, but cant get any other menus because I can't see them. Have installed the latest Nvida drivers for my GTX 580, also tried various compatibility modes in win 8, all with the same result. BTW had no probs in win 7. Any help would be much appreciated.

[Arismac 10]

This is not intended to be "tacky" even if it sounds that way. The only answer is to revert to and stick with Windows 7. I know you have only found one program so far, that has problems with Win 8 but more are appearing everyday.

 

Just might be the "Lemon of the Year -2012"

[mgh 89]

Prepar3d's minimum operating system is Microsoft Windows XP, Vista, or 7 (32-bit). Its recommended operating system is Microsoft Windows 7 (64-bit)

 

http://www.prepar3d....oduct-overview/

[bloxboy 15]

Thanks Guys for your comments, But I can't understand why other people are running P3D and Win 8 with no problems, if it is not compatible. it seemed that any new version of windows that came out in the past always ran FSX, which is what P3D is, so why is Win 8 any different, and if it is why haven't LM produced and update/fix like many other companies have done ?. All very annoying !!

[FS++ 708]

why haven't LM produced and update/fix like many other companies have done ?

 

They will probably do, albeit at their own pace.

 

I can confirm it's running under Windows 8 Pro 64 Bit.

 

I would look at things like UAC, or anti-malware possibly blocking things. And obviously the Beta graphics drivers used.

[vgbaron 3,614]

At this point, LM has said they have no plans to support V1.x in Windows 8. Some people have had success getting it to run so it's probably just a matter of getting the right settings.

 

Vic

[FIVE-BY-FIVE 453]

I love win8, I get amazing stability and performance in fsx/p3d and xp10. :good: Check your video driver/settings and Happy Holidays :Party:

[bloxboy 15]

Thanks again guys for all your input. I have tried various Nvida drivers, even went back to the generic windows 8 driver, but still no display. It would be good if someone else out there has had the same problem as myself, but has managed a fix for it. It seems though that I will have to have win 7 on as a dual boot just to run P3D. Still think it is not very good PR, LM not supporting Win 8.

[FIVE-BY-FIVE 453]

Thanks again guys for all your input. I have tried various Nvida drivers, even went back to the generic windows 8 driver, but still no display. It would be good if someone else out there has had the same problem as myself, but has managed a fix for it. It seems though that I will have to have win 7 on as a dual boot just to run P3D. Still think it is not very good PR, LM not supporting Win 8.

a billion/trillion dollar company not supporting win8 :Thinking: I wonder why?

[bloxboy 15]

Hi Guys, Just to let you know, I have now got P3D to display. A guy over on the P3D forum said he had the same problem, and found that DX9 was not installed, so I DL it from MS and installed it and it runs fine. Why the DX in Win 8 is not backward compatible I don't know. Anyway thanks guys for all your suggestions.

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

Prepar3D works fine with Windows 8 (except for the alt-tab issue, which a lot of graphics-oriented programs seem to have under Win8). But one word of caution, certain OS-specific software like DirectX and .NET keep getting updated by Microsoft. The level of backwards compatibility is good, but not perfect. Windows 8 has 3 "flavors" of DirectX: 9, 10 and 11 and it supposedly has the most recent files for running legacy DirectX 9 programs. But you can only check for this by running DXDiag and see is anything is missing or corrupt.

 

All that said, I don't think that there have been any updates to DirectX 9.0c since early 2011. But see this thread for more information.

[bloxboy 15]

Hi, Thanks for the info on DX9 etc, will check it all out.

[TheGrunt 44]

DX has never been "backwards compatible": higher runtimes lack some "legacy" features and just do things differently, when it comes to for example to vram command operations. Every runtime has to be separately installed, which is not included in the Windows version. Even Win 7 don't include DX 9, it has 10 and 11 and if you are going to need something earlier, it has to be installed separately. Some game installations might have done this for you without you thinking it, but DX9 is definitely not included in Win 7. And you can't get DX9 programmed software to work with DX10 or 11.

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

It's DirectX that I was referring to (not any specific version). And Win 7 and 8 both have ability to run programs that utilize all 3 versions. If Win8 didn't run a DirectX 9 program properly it is due to a bad installation.