constant black screens
 

i built a windows 7 rig and i have not been able to get multiple instances of eq running without one or all of the screens going completely black in the event that another eq instance is loading up.

what happens is i'll have one instance running fine then go to load another and when it pops up the original instance goes to black but i can still hear the sound of footsteps if i press forward or the sound of him jumping when i press space bar.

i tried compatibility mode, i tried inserting an affinity thingamajig so the program would run on one core and thats about it. any suggestions?

That happened to me last year when I was playing on SoA server. It was a real pain in the neck to figure out how to fix it because it only did it on that one server. After spending serveral days looking for the cause of the problem I decided to reinstall Everquest and that fixed the problem.

I don't know if this will help, but it might be worth a shot:

Right click the shortcut icon you use to start EQ, and select Properties. Then, go to the Compatibility tab and put a checkmark in the box for "Disable visual themes". Reply here if that fixes the problem and I will add it to the FAQ if so. I don't know if it will help, but I know it helps one or 2 of the tools I run in Windows 7 64Bit.

disabling visual themes did not help. as soon as i find the install discs im going to re install.

i dont know if this helps but if one screen works and the other is black i can go to the black screen and press alt + enter and when it reaches full screen mode everything is fine again except that it blacks out the previously functioning instance of EQ

Have you tried using WinEQ 2 for running in window mode?

http://www.lavishsoft.com

no i havent but i'll give it a shot as the problem is persisting even after a clean install

win eq 2 is a bust as its giving me a "could not successfuly retrieve new file lavishpatcher.eve (-20). aborting patch. you may continue to use the software." error

Gonna toss some ideas out........have you tried driver updates and directx 9c runtime updates? Having dx11 is not the same thing as updating dx9c runtimes. Have you tried running the second instance of EQ from a different install path? That should not matter but it is worth shot. Did you install Everquest into the proper directory? If you are using Windows 7 x64 and you install EQ into the default path of C:\Program Files\ then you could experience alot of weird problems. Are you running EQ as an administrator?

I have seen instances of black screen issues occurring from GPU overload but with a modern GPU that is highly unlikely unless some part of your computer is failing. Have you tried stress testing your computer thoroughly? Doing so is a good way to eliminate hardware issues as a possibility.

i found the fix.

by default when you open a program a dialog box opens thats "are you sure you want to blah blah blah" and by defauly it darkens the rest of your screen. all i had to do was click on "Change when notifications appear" and theres a 4 position slider. slide it down one notch and the problem went away for me.

btw i am running directx11.

Hmm, it sounds like a UAC type of thing. I don't recall seeing that particular box that I can think of offhand. If we can get more specific directions on how to adjust the setting you mention (even from control panel or something), I will add it to the FAQ.

Adjusting Windows 7 UAC, try one of these links:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/975787

or

http://www.neowin.net/news/main/09/0...p-with-the-uac

yup thats it

The above fix did't remove my problem... anyone tried anything else to fix this ? its just annoying :/