FSDreamTeam forum

Products Support => JFK for FSX/P3D => Topic started by: divemaster on November 23, 2009, 12:17:01 am

Title: Please Help me!
Post by: divemaster on November 23, 2009, 12:17:01 am
Ok i know this has been asked way too many times before but i need to ask it again!

Why is it that FSX seems to have big problems with registering my COUATL!

Ok so i try to load up JFK and normally the buildings dont appear so i go and sometimes reload fsx and presto its there!

So i head off and uninstall JFK along with COUATL, Add-on manager, and download the new JFK from the website and reinstall, and i say yes to running COUATL in FSX when FSX loads.

I got an error message the first 2 times even tho i said continue to run the program, it closed FSX (before finishing the loading screen) and then on the 3rd time I got in no problem.

Did one flight which wasnt to a FSDT airport and just checked the add-on manager and Couatl was there, but now on my fight from JFK, it isnt!!

What am i doing wrong and how can i fix it!!!

I do have mcafee on my computer, however i have removed any of its rights to scan now (unless its an inbound file which it checks) and so its not removing the COUATL file anymore as it thought it was a virus... that is another pain in the ass but not ur fault!

Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on November 23, 2009, 12:38:07 am
Try this:

- Edit your %APPDATA%\microsoft\FSX\FSX.CFG with a text editor. Find ALL the occurences of the bglmanx.dll and couatl.exe files in the [Trusted] section, and remove the whole line that contains either reference to those files. This will reset the trusting question.

- Reboot Windows (IMPORTANT). Don't launch FSX yet.

- Uninstall ANY scenery (or the stand-alone Addon Manager), and (IMPORTANT) reply YES to BOTH questions about removing the Addon Manager AND the Couatl engine. Reply YES to BOTH question. This is important, and it will remove all files.

- To be sure, check you don't have any bglmanx* (.dll and .dat files) in your FSX root, and you don't have the fsdreamteam\Couatl.exe. If you still have them, remove them manually.

- Reinstall the scenery you just uninstalled (or the stand-alone Addon Manager, if this is what you uninstalled in the previous step)

- Launch FSX, and note it should ask you permission to run BOTH the Addon Manager and the Couatl Scripting Engine. Reply YES to both, and reply YES to both the question made by Windows (yellow Shield) AND the question made by FSX. If you are not getting both questions, it means you haven't properly cleared the [Trusted] section in the FSX.CFG as above.

- If you get any error, disregard the fact that is suggesting not to run the module, and ALLOW the module to run. It doens't matter if the FSX crashes now.

- Try again to launch FSX, and see if it works. If still crashes, reboot Window AGAIN (IMPORTANT), and try again.

Addition

Under Vista or Windows 7, be sure you are NOT running FSX in "XP SP3 Compatibility mode". This will break our products, and it's not really necessary. To check for this, find your FSX folder with Explorer, right-click on the FSX.EXE file, select "Properties", select "Compatibility" and check that all compatibility modes are turned off, which is the default setting.

If all else fails:

Try to download the Stand-alone Addon Manger installer, available here:

http://www.virtualisoftware.com/binaries/setup_addonmanagerX.exe
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: divemaster on November 24, 2009, 11:23:35 pm
Hey that seems to of worked! Will hope it continues to work then, if not i will be back to report!
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: Putt4eagle on November 28, 2009, 12:49:16 am
I have run into the same issues but in a little different way. I have owned Chicago for a while and had problems with that but apparently didn't learn my lesson. I downloaded the trial and then purchased Orlando from the add-on manager in the game. All seemed well. I then attempted the trial of Ft. Lauderdale to take a peak. I am now getting the same error messages as many others. Orlando and Chicago are gone. I have followed the above recommendations to the letter and I am still getting the same messages and my two purchases have been whipped off. There absolutely has to be a better way of getting this fixed.  
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on November 28, 2009, 01:18:34 pm
I have followed the above recommendations to the letter and I am still getting the same messages and my two purchases have been whipped off. There absolutely has to be a better way of getting this fixed.  

First, ensure you have the current version of the Addon Manager. Run the installer again, and it will be automatically downloaded from the internet.

Yes, other user have the error, because IT IS a known FSX bug, that wrongly identifies a newly trusted module as having a problem, when it doens't, and everybody fixed if by following this method.

Just follow the above method precisely. And even if you get the message, keep insting ALLOWING the module to run, despite of the message. It WILL go away after a couple of tries, or after a reboot.
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: G.Bosak on February 15, 2010, 12:03:28 pm
same problem here,

followed all these steps several times, there is no chance to get the trusted question back.

i have all FSDT FSX Airports except Hawaii and cant get them reinstalled properly. :-[

i run W7 64bit, there is no anti-virus installed

No XP compatibility mode running.

reason for reinstalling was that the install of VCRedistributable pack (64bit) forced me to reactivate all my FSDT aiports. Since then, there where no buildings in every airport and no addonmanage-rmenu in windowed FSX Mode visible.

I really love your installers, there is more work to keep them alive, then to fly.  >:(



Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on February 15, 2010, 01:03:01 pm
followed all these steps several times, there is no chance to get the trusted question back.

This is the main issue, and of course it doesn't have anything to do with our installers, the Trusting question HAVE to be posed, whenever a new module is installed.

If it doesn't, either you haven't updated the Addon Manager OR, some Windows config error has blocked the Trusting system. Try this:

Open REGEDIT, and check this key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WinTrust\Trust Providers\Software Publishing

Check that the value of this key is 0x23c00  (23c00 hexadecimal), that should be the default value when Windows is installed. If is set to any other value, set it back to 0x23c00.

Also, be absolutely sure that you removed all the bglmanx.dll entries in the [Trusted] section of the FSX.CFG. If that registry key is set to the correct value, and the FSX.CFG is reset of all the knowledge about the bglmanx.dll, you should see the Trusting question.

And, be absolutely sure that you are using the current version of the Addon Manager installer, which is also able to fix already corrupted DLL/EXE.XML files for you, in case they are, which is also another reason why you wouldn't see the trusting question.

Quote
reason for reinstalling was that the install of VCRedistributable pack (64bit) forced me to reactivate all my FSDT aiports.

This can't be the reason, because the x64 version of the VC++ redistributable package is ONLY needed for native 64 bit apps. 32 bit apps (like FSX and all our software), even when run inside a 64 bit OS, needs the x86 ( 32 bit ) version of the VC++ redistributable, which is what our installer installs automatically.

It's just not possible the x64 version of the redistributable could cause a problem, because it's a different set of .DLLs, that resides in different folder ( amd64 folders under WinSxS, instead of the x86 folders ), and our programs specifically includes the appplication manifest that clearly indicates the x86 version needs to be used.
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: G.Bosak on February 16, 2010, 03:46:55 am
Hi umberto,

thx for your reply. this registry line did let me install addonmanager and couatl again:

Quote
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WinTrust\Trust Providers\Software Publishing

But i have the same symptoms as before.

in departure mode all of your airports are visible. in approach mode i only see jetways, although they are all licenced except PHNL demo.

i took some screenshots of LSZH (but its the same on every airport) and my settings, just if you don't believe me:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=7OTE2IB2

Quote
This can't be the reason, because the x64 version of the VC++ redistributable package is ONLY needed for native 64 bit apps

Maybe you didn't understood me exactly, the meanings was that i installed VC++ 64bit for an other reason, but i monitored that exactly this install caused the reactivating process of your 6 airports. Maybe it shouldn't but it did! Directly after install of this 64bit redist-pack i opened FSX and there was a dialogue to reactivate all your airports.

I only reinstalled the PMDG-747X on this day which renews the 32bit VC++ for the 747-8 update, but after install of this addon there was no FSDT reactivation dialogue, cause i also openend FSX directly after that. Even though if we imagine it was the 32bit VC++ package, why must this happen?  Nearly every FSX addon needs a proper VC++ package, and renews this automatically. How a licence can depend on this?

another screenshot for you: (the blue transparent assign shows you which package forced me reactivating)

(http://www.bilder-space.de/show_img.php?img=baaa95-1266288445.jpg&size=original)




Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on February 16, 2010, 10:00:07 am
thx for your reply. this registry line did let me install addonmanager and couatl again:

Ok, at least we know the problem was a Windows setting.

Quote
in departure mode all of your airports are visible. in approach mode i only see jetways, although they are all licenced except PHNL demo.

Try to approach the airport, and check if you have this file:

%APPDATA%\virtuali\Couatl.err

If you have it, post its content.
 
Quote
Maybe you didn't understood me exactly, the meanings was that i installed VC++ 64bit for an other reason, but i monitored that exactly this install caused the reactivating process of your 6 airports. Maybe it shouldn't but it did! Directly after install of this 64bit redist-pack i opened FSX and there was a dialogue to reactivate all your airports.

I understood you just fine, it's just that this shouldn't simply happen. Unless, there's bug in the VC++ 64 bit installer, that in some way changes the Windows configuration so badly, that is detected as an hardware change. Probaly a minor one, that hasn't consumed any activation, but it shouldn't happen, and you are the first one reporting it.


Quote
I only reinstalled the PMDG-747X on this day which renews the 32bit VC++ for the 747-8 update, but after install of this addon there was no FSDT reactivation dialogue, cause i also openend FSX directly after that.

That's to be expected because, the PMDG use the VC++ 2008 redistributable, we use the 2005 one so, it's a different version altogether, it's not like 64 vs 32 bit of the same version.


Quote
Even though if we imagine it was the 32bit VC++ package, why must this happen?  Nearly every FSX addon needs a proper VC++ package, and renews this automatically. How a licence can depend on this?

It shouldn't, plain and simple.  I have all the different VC++ 2005 runtimes that were released so far, all installed at the same time, and I never seen such thing.

However, there are reports of troubles when having both VS 2008 and VS 2005 installed on the same system:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/showpost.php?p=94172&postcount=19

Apparently, the VS 2008 installer "updates" one of the VS 2005 .DLL and replace it with a buggy version. MAYBE, this could have an effect on the correct behaviour of our programs.

We use the VS 2005, for the very simple reason FSX itself is using VS 2005 runtimes so, we thought this would be the most compatible way.

Can you try the following:

- Uninstall ALL VS runtimes, both 2005 AND 2008, both 32 AND 64 bit versions.

- Reinstall any of our sceneries, which will put back just one VS 2005 version, and try if it makes any difference.
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: G.Bosak on February 16, 2010, 01:06:26 pm
hi umberto,

Quote
Try to approach the airport, and check if you have this file: %APPDATA%\virtuali\Couatl.err  If you have it, post its content.

to be upfront, i searched for this file without flying => it doesn't exist. In "Virtuali" folder there is only a KeyMapping.ini.
 Does it mean, the file you are looking for only exists during a flight (approach)? If yes, i will try as soon as possible and post the achievement.

There is one point i forgot to say in my last posting. After deinstalling and cleaning as you told me, i reinstalled all these airports ant they went to an "automatic" active status. There was no prompting in addonmanager to import the *.reg data again. Maybe this is essential for you, to know.

Quote
Can you try the following:

- Uninstall ALL VS runtimes, both 2005 AND 2008, both 32 AND 64 bit versions.

- Reinstall any of our sceneries, which will put back just one VS 2005 version, and try if it makes any difference.

i will do it, but i hope this step doesn't degrade my PMDG 747-X, 747-8 and my MD-11*fear* :-)
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on February 16, 2010, 01:26:16 pm
Does it mean, the file you are looking for only exists during a flight (approach)? If yes, i will try as soon as possible and post the achievement.

That file only exists if an error happened in the scripting system. Since you said you lose buildings only during the approach, I wanted to check if there was an error. If you have no file, it means there's no error so, that's not the cause of the problem.


Quote
There is one point i forgot to say in my last posting. After deinstalling and cleaning as you told me, i reinstalled all these airports ant they went to an "automatic" active status. There was no prompting in addonmanager to import the *.reg data again. Maybe this is essential for you, to know.

There shouldn't be ANY prompt to import the .REG data, ever, unless you reinstall Windows.

OR, if you lose your registry keys that hold the Serial Number. This might happen if you ran those pesky "registry cleaners", that might decide you don't need a registry key, because the related software has been removed. We don't remove the serial in the registry when uninstalling, for the obvious reason that you don't have to re-activate it each time you just uninstall the scenery. But a registry cleaner usually doesn't know that, and might have removed the key.


Quote
i will do it, but i hope this step doesn't degrade my PMDG 747-X, 747-8 and my MD-11*fear* :-)

The moment you remove the VS 2008 redistributables, all software requiring it will just cease to work.

But at least you would *know* if that was the problem. You can then reinstall the VS 2008 redistributables afterward. In any case, if that is the problem, I'm afraid there's no solution. However, nobody reported it so far, plenty of people use the PMDG airplanes with our products so, it shouldn't be the cause of the problem. BUT, uninstalling and reinstalling the redistributable, might fix a problem that might have happened during their installation.
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: ErrorInside on February 16, 2010, 01:31:51 pm
Maybe i could add something that helps to sort this:
I'm facing almost the same problems but:

-Only with KJFK
-not all buildings dissapear (see screen)
-equally if approaching or departing

I faced similar problems with LSGG and LSZH but them into the 2nd and 3rd place of the scenerylibrary helped - not so in KJFK

Cheerio
Florian

P.S. I did run all advices in this thread, except the deinstallation of the VS's
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on February 16, 2010, 01:34:01 pm
Do you find your system to be particularly slow ? How is your frame rate ?
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: ErrorInside on February 16, 2010, 01:42:10 pm
No, i don't think so.
I have frames of about 15-20ps in KJFK without all buildings but quite the same in LSZH (with all buildings)

SysSpecs:

AMD X2 6000
4GB RAM
GForce8800GT 512MB
Win7 (64+)

Cheerio
Florian
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on February 16, 2010, 01:56:07 pm
Ok, try the following: press ESC, as if you were ending your flight, but then choose the option to return to flight, and notice if all buildings reappears.
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: ErrorInside on February 16, 2010, 02:43:25 pm
So...now it's completely faulty.. ;D

I did unistall all of the FSDT scen. i own, deleted all of the couatl.exe and bglmanx.dll stuff in the fsx.cfg,  (path is C:\Users\my name\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\FSX, isn't it?) and rebooted.

Then i reinstalled but wasn't asked the "trust" question. i checked my reg (see screenshot) and found the values okay. Couatl and bglmanx are added to fsx.cfg automatically.

By the way: Now i got the "no building" problems in full fury  ;D

Cheerio
Florian



Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on February 16, 2010, 03:09:42 pm
Then i reinstalled but wasn't asked the "trust" question. i checked my reg (see screenshot) and found the values okay. Couatl and bglmanx are added to fsx.cfg automatically.

If you really removed all those sections, and after the first FSX start, you found them added automatically in the FSX.CFG, it means that Windows has instructed FSX to auto-trust the files for you. Which doens't happen automatically, but only if you, at least once, said to trust everything that is signed by Virtuali, which is one of the possible options.

In this case, everything is normal, and it's no strange behaviour at all.

Quote
By the way: Now i got the "no building" problems in full fury

So, let's start from scratch again:

- do you see the Addon Manager menu AND the Couatl menu under the Addons menu ? Do you see both, only one, of none of them ?

- Have you tried restarting FSX a couple of times, eventually rebooting Windows again ?

You should also allow some time for FSX to properly close. If you don't, and restart it too fast, it might be that the Couatl process is not closed and, if this happens, there will be no buildings. You can check if this is the case, by keeping the Task Manager open, and verifying there's no Couatl.exe process running, before restarting FSX.
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: ErrorInside on February 16, 2010, 03:30:31 pm

- Have you tried restarting FSX a couple of times, eventually rebooting Windows again ?


Yupp, rebooting did it. Now, all buildings are displayed properly.
Thank you a lot for your fast help.
Cheerio
Florian
Title: comprehending the issue now after spending a lot of my freetime in investigating
Post by: G.Bosak on February 25, 2010, 08:46:36 pm
Hi umberto,

i've  deinstalled and reinstalled all your airports to each latest version.
worked with a brand new fsx.cfg (to eleminate tweaking errors)

I said some posts before this issue only exists during nightapproaches and it is still so, when Active Sky Advance is active.
If i deactivate this weatherengine your buildings will exist in approach, no matter if its night or day.
This must be a conflict between your simconnect usage (addonmanager?) and the usage of Active Sky Advance remote. (i use ASA via simconnect which is installed on a client PC, works fine and no other addon Airport shows this conflict with ASA, but all of yours.)

This i can reproduce in every flight now. ASA live weather data get lost when reaching ~9nm radius at all of your airports. (no more windvectors are seen in ND) and as i said, no airportbuildings are shown in nightflights, although there are correct installed, have latest addoninstaller and are in a healthy "active" status.

I know it sounds strange, but if there is any change to get a logfile of this simconnect conflict, which helps to debugg this issue some helping steps are needed. ???

I can't invest in any further addon sceneries if they work under laboratory conditions only.

regards
GB
Title: Re: comprehending the issue now after spending a lot of my freetime in investigating
Post by: virtuali on February 25, 2010, 09:28:00 pm
I know it sounds strange, but if there is any change to get a logfile of this simconnect conflict, which helps to debugg this issue some helping steps are needed. ???

Yes, there is:

Open notepad, and copy the following text:

Code: [Select]
[SimConnect]
level=verbose
console=1
RedirectStdOutToConsole=1
OutputDebugString=1
; file=c:\simconnect%03u.log
; file_next_index=0
; file_max_index=9

Save the file as SIMCONNECT.INI in this folder:

Documents And Settings\YOUR LOGIN NAME\Documents\Microsoft Flight Simulator X Files

At the next FSX launch, you should see a text window with diagnostic message, that should tell you what's going wrong. Let me know what you are getting, so we can have an idea what's happening.

Quote
I can't invest in any further addon sceneries if they work under laboratory conditions only.

Maybe are are being too quick assuming is the scenery that has a problem. One might say that you shouldn't invest into weather utilities that prevents sceneries from working...

And, most importantly, we have a Trial version!

We just can't test with each and every possible 3rd party addon out there. If we did, we would had to spend all our available time installing and uninstalling hundreds of products, instead of doing actual developement work. That's why we have a Trial, so users can evaluate themselves if the scenery works with combination of addons THEY use.
Title: Re: comprehending the issue now after spending a lot of my freetime in investigating
Post by: bojote on February 26, 2010, 04:00:47 am
Hi Umberto,

I don't know if this is important, but it might be related to what the user is reporting:

are you familiar with WDDM 1.0 and WDDM 1.1?

apparently (but I don't know why) in KJFK when using VISTA (or) Win7 running FSX in Vista compatibily mode (which reverts to WDDM 1.0) the 'buildings' seem to appear ONLY within VERY SHORT range of them... I noticed this when I was doing some test videos, The ones I sent you DO NOT have this problem (they were not run in Vista compatability mode) but if I do, the buildings will NOT show unless I fly over them. Initially I thought it was related to the 'Optimize view' LOD setting in Add On Manager and/or a specific WDDM 1.0 driver issue when using view optimization.

I guess the user reporting the problem can 'SLEW' over the buildings to see if they appear and see if this is related to his problem
Title: Re: Please Help me!
Post by: virtuali on February 26, 2010, 10:03:10 am
Under Vista x64, if I turn on any of the Compatibility modes, the Addon Manager just won't work. It might be different on Windows 7, I'll have a look at it.

In any case, if the issue is related to video drivers, it *might* be there's a problem with WDDM 1.0, that FSX gets wrong information about the pixel size of an objects from the driver, which is used to compute the LOD to use so, the object disappears too early, because FSX thinks is too far from view, even if it's not.