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KING'S QUEST VII TECHNICAL TIPS AND SUGGESTIONS
Thank you for purchasing King's Quest VII - the latest release of
one of the greatest adventure series ever created.
The following
information provides the latest up-to-the-minute information that
was not available when the documentation was created.
This file
should be considered an extension to the manual provided with this
game.
It also contains some extra tips that may help you improve
game performance.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
* Installation Procedures
* Handy To Know
* MS-DOS Problems and Solutions
* Memory Troubleshooting
* Sound Card Troubleshooting
INSTALLATION PROCEDURES
If you are using file deletion tracking utilities, such as Mirror,
SmartCan, Undelete, etc., please disable these utilities before
installing King's Quest 7.
To Install King's Quest 7 under MS-DOS, follow these instructions:
1)
Insert the King's Quest 7 CD into your CD-ROM drive.
2)
From a MS-DOS prompt, type the CD-Drive letter followed by a colon
and press the <ENTER> key.
For example, if your CD-ROM drive is
labeled as your D drive, you would type:
D: <ENTER>
3)
At your CD-Rom drive label prompt, type:
INSTALL <ENTER>
4)
Be sure the correct choices have been made for MUSIC and AUDIO.
Choose ACCEPT THESE CHOICES AND INSTALL
Follow the on-screen prompts to complete the installation.
HANDY TO KNOW
To speed up or slow down your walking speed in the game, press the +
or - keys on the number pad on your keyboard.
If you try the game in MS-DOS and find your sound card is not
supported, try the game in Windows.
A list of BBS and Tech Support Numbers for Sound Card, Video Card,
and Miscellaneous Computer Peripheral / Software Manufacturers is
provided on the King's Quest 7 CD.
To view this file, type
"EDIT D:\CONTACT.TXT" (if your CD-ROM drive is D:).
If you have any technical issues that are not covered by this README,
please look at the THEGUIDE.TXT file on the King's Quest 7 CD.
To view this file, type "EDIT D:\THEGUIDE.TXT" (if your CD-ROM drive
is D:).
A Problem Reporting text file is also on the game CD.
Please type
"EDIT D:\MOREINFO.TXT" (if your CD-ROM drive is D:) and follow its
instructions to report any problems not covered in this README or
THEGUIDE.TXT.
MS-DOS PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS
-INSTALLING THE GAME
Problem: After typing "D:INSTALL", you see the error "Bad Command or
Filename"
Solution: Type D: amd press the <ENTER> key, then type INSTALL and
press the <ENTER> key.
Problem: After running INSTALL, a row of dots runs across the screen,
then stops and locks up.
Solution: At the CD-ROM drive prompt (such as D:\), Type the following:
CD\INSTALL
INSTALL -m
(If this doesn't work, try typing INSTALL -f)
These commands bypass hardware detection.
The dots are our way of
saying "Please wait, we're checking what kind of hardware you have".
When the dots stop, this means some hardware is not responding to our
tests.
These commands may correct installation problems you encounter.
If you continue to experience installation problems, then you
will want to check your hard drive for lost allocation units or
other problems on your drive.
Use the CHKDSK command or SCANDISK
command to verify that there are no problems on your hard drive.
Lost allocation units and other errors can cause installation
problems when attempting to install King's Quest 7.
Please
consult your MS-DOS manual for more detailed information about
using CHKDSK and/or SCANDISK.
Problem: There are no AUDIO or MUSIC choices during installation.
Solution: This means you typed "D:INSTALL".
Please type "D:" and press
ENTER, then type "INSTALL" and press ENTER.
Problem:
"Can't create output file" or "Not enough space" during
installation.
Solution:
You need to free up more hard drive space before installing
the game.
Problem: The install doesn't work from your second CD-ROM drive.
Solution:
Run the install from your first CD-ROM drive.
-STARTING THE GAME
Question:
How do you start King's Quest 7?
Explanation:
We assume you installed King's Quest 7 onto your C: drive.
If you installed it to another drive, like D:, please type D: (ENTER)
instead of C: (ENTER):
Commands To Type:
C:
(and press the ENTER key)
CD\SIERRA (and press the ENTER key)
KQ7DOS
(and press the ENTER key)
Problem: "DOS/4GW Professional Fatal Error (1307): Not enough memory"
Solution: Rerun the INSTALL program.
BOOTABLE FLOPPY DISK.
Select the option to MAKE A
Follow the prompts.
When you are finished
making one, leave the boot disk in your floppy drive A:, turn off
your computer, then turn it back on.
This will allow the boot disk
to run to free up more memory for the game to run successfully.
Problem: "No VESA support detected"
Solution: This means your video card's VESA program was not run before
the game started.
high-resolution.
VESA allows MS-DOS games to run in colorful, crisp
Please refer to your video card manual for
more information to run your particular VESA program to enable high
resolution in MS-DOS.
Some examples are "VVESA.COM", "VESA.COM", and
"VMODE VESA".
More Information:
We have provided many popular VESA drivers for you
on the King's Quest 7 CD.
They are located in the \DRIVERS\VESA
directory on the CD.
Problem: "Fatal: Unable to find mouse driver" or "Mouse driver not found"
Solution: This means your MS-DOS mouse program was not run before the
game started.
Rerun INSTALL and choose MAKE A BOOTABLE FLOPPY DISK to
help us find and use your MS-DOS mouse driver.
More Information: MS-DOS needs a mouse program to be run before it can
use the mouse.
To see if a mouse program is hidden on your hard drive
type "DIR \MOUSE /S /P".
Directory of C:\MSMOUSE
MOUSE
COM
Directory of C:\WINDOWS
Let's say you see:
MOUSE
DRV
MOUSE
INI
A mouse program will end in ".COM" or ".EXE", so the mouse drivers in
C:\WINDOWS in this example won't do.
To run the mouse driver in
MSMOUSE in this example, type "C:\MSMOUSE\MOUSE.COM".
a message saying your mouse is now enabled.
King's Quest 7.
You should see
You can now play
If there is no .COM or .EXE file that has to do with
your mouse, please refer to your mouse documentation or computer
dealer for more assistance.
Problem: "Error 29: Unable to initialize audio hardware"
Solution #1: This can be caused by choosing Microsoft Sound System for
Music on a Sound Blaster compatible card.
Rerun INSTALL and choose
Sound Blaster for both MUSIC and AUDIO.
Solution #2: If you have a Gravis Ultrasound, please install and run the
game in Windows.
Note:
King's Quest 7 requires a Sound Blaster compatible sound card that
supports DAC speech and FM (or MIDI) music.
-MUSIC, SPEECH, AND SOUND EFFECTS
Problem: On a Proaudio Spectrum card, choosing Sound Blaster causes
popping and lockups during the start of the game.
Solution: Please choose Proaudio Spectrum for AUDIO and MUSIC, instead
of the default choice: Sound Blaster.
Problem: You get no music on a Sound Blaster 16, but the voices are OK.
Solution: Rerun INSTALL and make sure you picked Sound Blaster for MUSIC.
If you chose MT-32 or General MIDI, you may not hear music on your
Sound Blaster 16.
Problem: You get no music on any Sound Blaster compatible card, or you
get a blank screen when the game starts, or the game gets stuck on the
opening Sierra logo.
Solution: Check if your SET BLASTER environment variable is enabled and
at the correct setting.
press <ENTER>.
To check this, at the C: prompt, type SET and
You should see a line that says BLASTER = A220 I7 D1
(or something similar).
If you do not see such a line and your sound
card is on Address 220, IRQ 10, and DMA 1, at the C: prompt, type
SET BLASTER = A220 I10 D1 and press <ENTER>.
how to access your sound card.
This line tells MS-DOS
Now you can run the game.
Problem: You get no music or no speech in the game
Solution: Many sound cards have mixer software to adjust the volume
levels of music and speech.
Please refer to your sound card
documentation for more information.
Problem: Moving the mouse causes audio static on your sound card, or
the audio just "pops" a lot.
Solution: This can be a problem with your VESA driver.
Please try a
different VESA driver to eliminate the problem, or run the game
in Windows.
Contact your video card manufacturer for more
information to update your VESA driver
Problem: In MS-DOS, using a Reveal or Aztech Labs sound card, the music
is fine but the speech is barely audible.
Solution: The chipset used to emulate the Sound Blaster digital to analog
conversion is not 100% compatible with the Sound Blaster driver
built-in to the game.
Install King's Quest 7 in Windows for full
sound.
Problem: "Error 29: Unable to initialize audio hardware"
Solution #1: This can be caused by choosing Microsoft Sound System for
Music on a Sound Blaster compatible card.
Rerun INSTALL and choose
Sound Blaster for both MUSIC and AUDIO.
Solution #2: If you have a Gravis Ultrasound, please install and run the
game in Windows.
Note:
King's Quest 7 requires a Sound Blaster compatible sound card that
supports DAC speech and FM (or MIDI) music.
-VIDEO AND GRAPHICS
Question: What is "VESA"?
Explanation: VESA stands for Video Electronics Standard Association.
A VESA driver is a small program your video card needs to provide
high resolution graphics for MS-DOS games.
A VESA program either
comes on a floppy disk with your video card, or your video card
automatically supports VESA.
Information: A group of VESA drivers can be found on the KQ7 CD
in the \VESA\VESA directory.
Go to the directory name that
matches your video card and run that VESA program.
Example: If you
have an ATI Mach 64, go to the VESA\VESA\MACH64 directory and
run the M64VBE.COM file.
For complete instructions about loading a
VESA driver for your video card, please consult your video card
documentation or contact your video card manufacturer.
Problem: If your video card does not have automatic VESA support, the
INSTALL offers a list of VESA drivers to try.
Choosing some VESA
drivers to test locks up the INSTALL.
Solution: Make sure you run your particular video card's VESA driver
before running the King's Quest 7 INSTALL.
If you don't have a
VESA driver, please pick the closest choice for your video card
from our list.
If it doesn't work, please contact your video card
manufacturer for information to enable VESA on your particular video
card.
Problem: Moving the mouse leaves garbage on the game screen, such as
random blocks of the background image or multiple cursor images.
Solution: You need the latest VESA driver from your video card
manufacturer.
Please refer to your video card manual for more
information.
We have provided many VESA drivers for you to try
on the King's Quest 7 CD.
They are located in the
\VESA\VESA directory on the CD.
Please refer to the READ.ME
file in the VESA directory for more information.
Problem: On the ATI Mach 64 video card, moving the mouse leaves
garbage on the screen.
Solution: ATI has an updated VESA driver that will solve this problem.
You can download and unzip the file "64VBE101.ZIP" from the ATI BBS
at 905-764-9404.
This file unzips into "M64VBE.COM".
We have
included an unzipped copy of this file in the \VESA\VESA\MACH64
directory on the King's Quest 7 CD.
Please read the 64VBE101.TXT
file in that directory for more information.
Problem: On Cirrus 542x video cards, moving the mouse leave garbage
on the screen.
Solution: Cirrus has an updated VESA driver that will solve this
problem.
You can download the file "UNIVESA.EXE" from the Cirrus
BBS at 510-440-9080.
We have included a copy of this file in the
\VESA\VESA\542X directory on the King's Quest 7 CD.
Problem: The \DRIVERS\VESA\ATI VESA driver does not work on the ATI
MACH 32 video card.
Solution: Do not use the \VESA\VESA\ATI VESA driver for the ATI
MACH 32 video card.
Use the \DRIVERS\VESA\MACH32 instead.
Problem: None of the \VESA\VESA drivers work on your Diamond VIPER
card.
Solution: You need to run a particular VESA driver for your video
card.
We have included this file in the \VESA\VIPER directory on
the CD.
Problem: None of the VESA drivers on the King's Quest 7 CD work on
your video card.
Solution #1: Make sure your video card is a Super VGA video card with
at least 512K of video memory.
Solution #2: Ask your video card manufacturer how to enable VESA for
your particular card.
Make sure you have the latest VESA driver.
Solution #3: In the \VESA\GENERIC directory on the King's Quest 7
CD, there is a Universal VESA driver.
Run the INSTALL program in
that directory and follow the instructions.
enable VESA on your video card.
This will try to
-MOUSE AND GAME CURSOR
Problem: Moving the mouse causes audio static on your sound card, or
the audio just "pops" a lot.
Solution: This can be a problem with your VESA driver.
Please try a
different VESA driver to eliminate the problem, or run the game
in Windows.
Problem: The mouse cannot get past the left side of the screen
Solution: You need either an updated mouse driver or an updated VESA
driver.
-MAKING AND USING A BOOT DISK
Question: What is a boot disk?
Explanation: A boot disk is a way to make games work faster and better on
your computer.
All you need is a blank floppy disk for your A: drive.
This will not work in your B: drive.
To make a boot disk, rerun the
INSTALL program and choose the menu option MAKE A BOOTABLE FLOPPY DISK.
Problem: "Can't find FORMAT.COM--Unable to make boot disk"
Solution: This is caused when our boot disk maker program cannot find
FORMAT.COM on your hard drive.
PC Tools or Norton Utilities.
This usually happens if you installed
These utilities rename FORMAT.COM
to either FORMAT!.COM or XXFORMAT.COM.
type the following commands
CD\DOS
If this is the case, please
COPY FORMAT!.COM FORMAT.COM
COPY XXFORMAT.COM FORMAT.COM
One of these commands will help restore your FORMAT command back to
normal, and will allow our boot disk maker to work.
Problem: "Can't make bootdisk since you're not using COMMAND.COM" or
"Boot disk was not created"
Solution: This can be caused if you are using 4DOS or NDOS (in Norton
Utilities).
key.
Get to a C:\> prompt.
Type:
SET
and press the ENTER
COMSPEC should equal C:\COMMAND.COM or C:\DOS\COMMAND.COM.
If COMSPEC = 4DOS.COM or NDOS.COM, the boot disk maker will not
work.
To correct this, type:
SET COMSPEC=C:\DOS\COMMAND.COM
This will allow our boot disk maker to work.
When you reboot
without a boot disk, the COMSPEC will return to your original
setting.
Problem: "Can't Find SIERRA.ERR" after using a boot disk.
Solution: The boot disk maker did not find your CD-ROM driver or some
other files required to run for CD-ROM access.
file on the boot disk.
Edit the A:\CONFIG.SYS
Make sure there is a line that loads your
CD-ROM drive.
Problem: "Invalid Drive Specification" using a boot disk on a Western
Digital IDE controller.
Explanation:
The Western Digital IDE hard drive controller displays a
message "Press the SPACEBAR to boot from a floppy disk."
If you
insert the boot disk and reboot before seeing this message, you'll
get the message "Invalid Drive Specification" and won't have hard
drive access until you reboot without the boot disk.
Solution: Remove the boot disk from the floppy drive.
computer.
Reboot your
When you see this message, insert the boot disk and press
the SPACEBAR.
Problem: "Invalid Drive Specification" using a boot disk on larger
Seagate hard drives, such as the Seagate 800 meg hard drive.
Explanation:
Seagate hard drives larger than 528 meg use a disk manager
called "EZ-DRIVE".
If you insert the boot disk and reboot before
seeing this message, you'll get the message "Invalid Drive Specification" and won't have hard drive access until you reboot without the
boot disk.
Solution: Remove the boot disk from the floppy drive.
Hold down the
CTRL key and reboot your computer.
You'll see a message "Insert
bootdisk and hit ENTER to reboot".
Insert the boot disk and press
ENTER.
Problem: "Invalid Drive Specification" using a boot disk on a removable
media drive, such as Bernoulli, Seagate, or SyQuest drives.
Explanation: Our boot disk maker does not load the removable media drive
software drivers.
If your removable drive was D: and your CD-ROM was
E: when the game was installed, then you booted with our boot disk to
free up more memory, your Bernoulli drive would not be seen, and your
CD-ROM drive would now be D:.
The KQ7DOS.BAT contents will not be
correct to run the game in this case.
Solution:
Add your removable media drivers to the boot disk.
-RUNNING THE GAME
Problem: The game runs too slow
Solution: Make and use a boot disk.
Problem: Random crashes on Compaq Presario CDS 524, 920, etc.
Solution:
Make a boot disk.
Problem: "EMM386 Error 6 or Error 12... " The error number may vary.
Solution:
This is caused by a memory conflict.
Running the game from
the boot disk will usually correct this problem.
Please see "Create
a Boot Disk" and "Create a Clean Windows Environment" under Memory
Troubleshooting.
Problem: "Can't allocate X bytes in ..\(somename).cpp"
Solution: You are running low on conventional memory.
Please rerun
INSTALL and make a boot disk.
Problem: "CDR 101 Error reading" or "DOS Error, Read Error".
Solution:
Make sure the CD is not scratched, dirty, or smudged with
fingerprints.
If so, clean it with a soft cloth and try again.
This can also be caused by an outdated version of the MSCDEX file.
MS-DOS version 6.2 and above should use MSCDEX version 2.23
MS-DOS version 6.0 should use MSCDEX version 2.22
MS-DOS version 5.0 should use MSCDEX version 2.21
If you have MSCDEX version 2.20, please get a later version from
your CD-ROM manufacturer.
-OTHER QUESTIONS
If you don't see your question listed, most difficulties with
King's Quest 7 can be resolved by simply running the game with a boot
disk.
Please see "Create a Boot Disk" under Memory Troubleshooting.
MEMORY TROUBLESHOOTING
If you encounter random lockups or are receiving a "Not enough
memory" error message, a boot disk may correct these problems.
Try using the automatic boot disk creator included in the install
program.
To make a boot disk, run the install program and select
the "Make a bootable floppy disk" option in the install menu.
Follow the on screen prompts until the boot disk creation process
is completed.
The boot disk creator will create a customized boot configuration
that is optimized for playing King's Quest 7 on your computer.
When you wish to play King's Quest 7, insert the boot disk into
your A drive and turn on or restart your computer.
computer has booted, launch King's Quest 7.
Once the
NOTE - if you run
the install program from the game directory on your hard drive
rather than from the CD, the boot disk will add the option of
starting the game immediately after booting with the boot disk.
This is a convenient feature if you would like to simply boot the
computer and have it automatically start King's Quest 7 without
having to type any commands.
NOTE - the boot disk must be created for your A drive.
Making a
boot disk in your B drive will not allow the computer to restart
using this custom configuration.
Make sure you have a blank disk
for your A drive when attempting to use the boot disk creator
option.
SOUND CARD TROUBLESHOOTING
King's Quest 7's Control Panel can adjust the volume control in the
game.
If you need more control, most sound cards' speech and music
volume can be controlled separately through software provided by the
sound card manufacturer.
Here is a list of some common sound cards'
mixer volume control commands in MS-DOS.
Sound Blaster 16:
Type C:\SB16\SB16MIX
Vibra 16 in AST Advantage:
Type C:\VIBRA16\MIXERSET
Sound Galaxy 16 in Packard Bell:
Type C:\SOUND16A\UTILITY\MIXTSR or type C:\SOUND144\MIXTSR
Ensoniq Soundscape:
Type:
SSINIT
Compaq Presario CDS 524, 920, etc.:
If DEVICE=C:\CPQDOS\VOLCTRL.EXE is in CONFIG.SYS on the boot disk, then:
Press CTRL-RIGHTSHIFT to increase volume
Press CTRL-LEFTSHIFT to decrease volume
Proaudio Spectrum Family:
Type PAS * to bring up the mixer controls
Press CTRL-ALT-U to increase the master volume level
Press CTRL-ALT-D to lower the master volume level
Sound Blaster 8 bit: No software control. Adjust thumbwheel on card.
Thunderboard: No software control. Adjust thumbwheel on back of card.
Archived by OldGamesDownload.com on 11th October, 2019