Windows 10 experts - why won’t a Visual Basic program run?

[Ray Proudfoot 8,954]

26 minutes ago, SkyyStorm said:

Not really anything of note. I suppose I can try a repair, but I'm scared of breaking my windows. =P

We appeared to have exhausted all other options. Would a repair be that risky? You could argue it's already broken. I have run repair myself and although it didn't fix my problem it may fix yours. I think it uses fairly conservative settings.

[SkyyStorm 2]

I will try running a repair. I've also cleaned my registry, and I'm quickly reinstalling RC to see if maybe something was fixed because of that. But if that fails, I'll run a repair tonight.

[jpf 14]

I would personally go back a few steps. check the zips (I believe) are not corrupt or the wrong sizes. I don't know if there's MD5 checksums available for each zip.
compare OS version with someone with a working copy. (home vs. pro)
disable anti-virus, anti-malware, etc.
make sure you're logged in with admin rights.
unzip to a new folder using win10 built in and not another utility.
run (each) installer using 'run as admin', (or follow the instructions bearing that in mind).

I don't know the specific instructions for installation. I seem to remember it being made available in a series of zip files and some people mentioned download problems when it was first made freely available. I doubt you need the run times for VB, esp. if no one else has used them. VB projects I wrote in VB6 included all the requisite binaries as part of creating the installation.

Edited March 20, 2019 by jpf

[Ray Proudfoot 8,954]

@jpf, there's a single zip for RC4. I've downloaded and installed it myself so it's not corrupt. This is a fresh upload from the original.

There's a process stopping it from running on some PCs but Win 10 version number doesn't appear to be critical.

[jpf 14]

5 hours ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

there's a single zip for RC4.

there were 12 zips when I downloaded it consisting of 1 for program, 1 for key maker and 10 voice packs. that was very early on in it being made freely available.

Edited March 21, 2019 by jpf

[Ray Proudfoot 8,954]

@jpf, In his post of 29 Dec 2018 the link is for a single file for RC4 and another for the key generator. The 10 zips you refer to are probably the independently created Meatwater voice files which modified the original wav files but are not part of the “official” release.

Edited March 21, 2019 by Ray Proudfoot

[FS++ 708]

It's using VB6 (32 Bit), therefore, no need for VB .NET runtimes.

I guess it's all to do with properly registering the supporting VB6 dlls. I mean not just having them around sitting in Windows system folder and assuming they are installed. It runs fine on Win 10 Pro x64 bit on a standard installation, including latest updates.

Windows 10 has beefed-up security measures, and it's best not to mess with Windows UAC, folders permissions and such.

Keep permissions in default settings and just set the programs exes you need for flight simming to run as admin.

 

Edited March 21, 2019 by FS++

[Ray Proudfoot 8,954]

@FS++, on my install the warning that a dll was missing only appeared after I tried loading a flight plan. Prior to that the splash screen showed followed by the main interface. The splash screen isn't even showing on Skyystorm's PC.

When you say it runs fine is that after you installed RC4?

I have UAC turned off and have done for many years. I'm the only user and an experienced user. The popup every time a exe is launched is irritating. There are no folder permissions required for the program to open and display its interface.

[FS++ 708]

3 hours ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

@FS++, on my install the warning that a dll was missing only appeared after I tried loading a flight plan. Prior to that the splash screen showed followed by the main interface. The splash screen isn't even showing on Skyystorm's PC.

When you say it runs fine is that after you installed RC4?

I have UAC turned off and have done for many years. I'm the only user and an experienced user. The popup every time a exe is launched is irritating. There are no folder permissions required for the program to open and display its interface.

I suggest you reset UAC slider to default, restart PC and re-register all required VB dlls and try again.

Don't forget to run the command prompt (for registering dlls) as admin

After that it's up to you whether to keep UAC on.

It could be that when Windows sees it disabled, it silently denies some operations.

 

 

[Ray Proudfoot 8,954]

@FS++, you didn’t say if you’ve tried installing it yourself.

There’s no need to register dll files until a message appears explicitly stating that.

I have UAC turned off and have no problem so that alone is not the problem.

[FS++ 708]

7 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

@FS++, you didn’t say if you’ve tried installing it yourself.

There’s no need to register dll files until a message appears explicitly stating that.

I have UAC turned off and have no problem so that alone is not the problem.

I have the installation from the payware package I bought years ago. And I installed it myself and Windows 10 went through numerous updates since, without crippling it.

 

[Ray Proudfoot 8,954]

2 hours ago, FS++ said:

I have the installation from the payware package I bought years ago. And I installed it myself and Windows 10 went through numerous updates since, without crippling it.

Understood. Not a like-for-like install as we have now.

[John_Cillis 2,406]

On 3/21/2019 at 9:50 AM, Ray Proudfoot said:

Understood. Not a like-for-like install as we have now.

This is a late post to this thread,

Try obtaining and adding COMDLG32.OCX to Windows 10, you will have to manually add it to your \windows\syswow64

Then you need to open a command prompt in admin mode and run regsvr32 in that folder and simply type "regsvr32 comdlg32.ocx"

If this is not the ocx you need the procedure can be done with other ocx's, for instance I also had to do the same with RICHTX32.OCX to get another legacy program to run.  I've been a VB coder since '93 and have had to deal with such issues in the past.

Microsoft did a "My Bad" and forgot to include this on Windows installs after Windows 98, it is a legacy OCX needed for some legacy VB apps to work.  My freeware programs Mirrorart and Spirapaint are dependent on it and run fine after I installed it into windows.  I alerted Microsoft to the problem but in their manner they never responded, they desire to push newer copies of Visual Studio on dev's, even though Visual Studio is free they push devs to drop legacy support even though it can be had if the right ocx's are found and registered.

My bad if this issue has already been mentioned and your problem resolved.

John

[Ray Proudfoot 8,954]

John, thanks for posting that. There is a pinned topic on the RC forum about registering that particular DLL as it was a common problem for owners of RC4.