SimCity Classic DOS Last Minute Information December 1, 1993 ----------------------------- COPY PROTECTION: --------------- SimCity Classic is NOT copy protected. The Red Sheet from previous versions of SimCity is gone. Please, please, oh pretty please do not give away copies of SimCity to your friends. Heck, don't give copies to your enemies either. Illegal copies do terrible things to wholesome software companies like us, and will make us raise our prices. Besides, if we find out you gave away an illegal copy of SimCity Classic, we'll tell your mother. THEN you'll be in BIG trouble... SOUND CARDS: ----------- SimCity Classic works with a whole bunch of sound cards. If you didn't see your sound card listed in the Install program, try selecting Sound Blaster 2.0. Most cards on the market these days are Sound Blaster compatible. To change the sound card settings easily, use the SETTINGS.EXE program located in the SimCity directory. If you're familiar with editing text files, you may edit the CLASSIC.CFG configuration file directly. Instructions are later in this file. SimCity uses Miles Design Drivers for sound card compatibility. They are external sound card drivers that give us versatile sound card support without having to change the SimCity program itself. You can see the drivers listed in the SIMCITY\DATA sub directory. They are the files with ".ADV" extensions. As more sound cards become available, we will try to provide Miles Design Drivers for them. Call our Tech Support Hotline or check our Tech Support BBS for information about the latest available drivers. If you are low on free memory (conventional RAM), use the SETTINGS.EXE to reconfigure SimCity Classic to have "No Sound" and "No Music." NOTE: Sound and Music are NOT compatible with Hercules Graphics. VIDEO MODES: ----------- SimCity Classic can run in several video modes: Hercules Monochrome EGA Hi-Res Monochrome (640x350 2 Color) VGA/MCGA Hi-Res Monochrome (640x480 2 Color) EGA Hi-Res Color (640x350 16 Color) VGA/MCGA Lo-Res Color (320x200 256 Color) VGA Hi-Res Color (640x480 16 Color) Different video modes use different amounts of memory (Conventional RAM). For example, if SimCity is set up to use Hercules Monochrome 2 Color graphics, the game will require about 440K free memory. But if SimCity uses VGA/MCGA Lo-Res 256 Color graphics, the game will require about 550K free memory. As a rule of thumb, it is always best to have as much free Conventional RAM as possible. You can change the video mode SimCity runs in by using the SETTINGS program located in the SimCity directory. Be careful! You are allowed to choose any video mode you want, even if it doesn't work on your computer. GRAPHICS SETS: ------------- SimCity Classic is fully compatible with the SimCity Graphics Sets. Use the Installer that comes with the Graphics Sets. If you are running SimCity in the VGA Hi-Res Color (640x480 16 Color) video mode, the Graphics Set Installer may report that it installed EGA graphics. That's OK. VGA and EGA 16 Color video modes use the same Graphics Sets files. OLDER VERSIONS OF SIMCITY: ------------------------- If you have an older version of SimCity, toss it! SimCity Classic is a lot better! If the old SimCity is still installed on your hard drive, you can use the same sub-directory for SimCity Classic. Just install over your old files. CLASSIC.CFG FILE FORMAT: ----------------------- This is a standard ASCII text file that tells SimCity Classic what type of graphics, sound and music to use on your computer. Here's a sample CLASSIC.CFG file, with an explanation below. 2 .\DATA\SBFM.ADV 220 7 1 * .\DATA\SBDIG.ADV * * * * CEGADAT Line 1: Video Mode. Choose: H - Hercules Monochrome M - EGA Hi-Res Monochrome (640x350 2 Color) V - VGA/MCGA Hi-Res Monochrome (640x480 2 Color) E - EGA Hi-Res Color (640x350 16 Color) 2 - VGA/MCGA Lo-Res Color (320x200 256 Color) 4 - VGA Hi-Res Color (640x480 16 Color) Line 2: Miles Design Driver for MUSIC (MIDI). Choose: ADLIB.ADV - Original Ad Lib SBFM.ADV - Sound Blaster V1.5 or V2.0 SBP1FM.ADV - Older Sound Blaster Pro SBP2FM.ADV - Newer Sound Blaster Pro, Sound Blaster-16 PASFM.ADV - Pro Audio Spectrum PASOPL.ADV - Pro Audio Spectrum Plus or 16 PCSPKR.ADV - Internal PC Speaker (Yuck!) GMT32MPU.ADV - Roland MT-32, LAPC-1 ARIDXMID.ADV - ARIA Sound Synth Compatible Sound Cards MT32MPU.ADV - Roland MPU-401 General MIDI - Any sound card or MIDI source that emulates an MPU-401 and uses General MIDI instrument mapping can use this driver (ex: Roland Sound Canvas, SCC-1, Wave Blaster) NO MUSIC - Disables all music (The drivers are located in the DATA sub directory, so be sure to enter the path. See the example CLASSIC.CFG above.) Line 3: Port Address for Sound Card. Must be in HEX (ex: Sound Blaster is usually 220). "*" means default. Line 4: Interrupt (INT) for Sound Card. Must be in Decimal (ex: Sound Blaster is usually 7). "*" means default. Line 5: DMA Channel for Sound Card. Must be in Decimal (ex: Sound Blaster is usually 1). "*" means default. Line 6: DRQ for Sound Card. Must be in Decimal. "*" means default. Line 7: Miles Design Driver for SOUND EFFECTS (Digital Audio). Choose: SBDIG.ADV - Sound Blaster V1.5 or V2.0 SBPDIG.ADV - Sound Blaster Pro, Sound Blaster-16 PASDIG.ADV - Pro Audio Spectrum Family ALGDIG.ADV - Ad Lib Gold ARIADIG.ADV - ARIA Sound Synth Compatible Sound Cards NO SOUND - Disables all sound effects. Lines 8, 9, 10 and 11 have the same properties as lines 3, 4, 5 and 6, but for the sound effects card. (Usually the same as the music card, unless you have a real fancy-shmancy setup.) Line 12: Graphics Set. Choose: CEGADAT - 16 Color Video Modes MONODAT - Monochrome (2 Color) Video Modes MCGADAT - 256 Color Video Mode NOTE: Sound and Music are NOT compatible with Hercules Graphics. SIMCITY.CFG: ----------- This is a dummy file for Graphics Set compatibility. DO NOT edit or delete this file.