Is Vista no longer supported, even with DirectX 11?

Dagoth_Rac · February 2016

Neither the 32-bit nor 64-bit versions of the PTS have worked for me at all during the TG PTS. I immediately get an ESO crash with the standard, "What were you doing when ESO crashed?" dialog box. I am running Vista 64-bit with DirectX 11. I know that the new version of ESO is supposed to require DirectX 11 and I had no worries because I have DirectX 11 installed. But now I am wondering if ESO will just no longer support Vista, even if you have DirectX 11 installed?

Obviously, the live server and prior PTS rounds have presented no problems.

bikerangelo · February 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-IfnjBHtjHc

Dagoth_Rac · February 2016

Cute, but not really helpful. Are ZOS specifically pulling Vista support with Thieves Guild or not? Because that is not what they stated. They said they were pulling support for non-DirectX 11. Vista supports DirectX 11.

Mumyo · February 2016

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Neither the 32-bit nor 64-bit versions of the PTS have worked for me at all during the TG PTS. I immediately get an ESO crash with the standard, "What were you doing when ESO crashed?" dialog box. I am running Vista 64-bit with DirectX 11. I know that the new version of ESO is supposed to require DirectX 11 and I had no worries because I have DirectX 11 installed. But now I am wondering if ESO will just no longer support Vista, even if you have DirectX 11 installed?

Obviously, the live server and prior PTS rounds have presented no problems.

I cant start the 64 bit client on windows 8 and 10 either.
From what i heard it only works on windows 7 which is anyway the best windows that was released since windows.
If even the 32 bit wont work id change the system as fast as i can anyway. See it as a wake-up call.
Nobody likes it, literally nobody! Wouldn't suprise me if zos gave a s**t as allways but this time i wouldnt even be mad.

Robbmrp · February 2016

Windows Vista was one of the worst OS that Microsoft put out. You will get a lot better system performance by upgrading it to Windows 7 at the very least. The longer you stay on that OS, the less performance you will get from your existing system.

s7732425ub17_ESO · February 2016

You should not be using Vista. Windows 7 is the best operating system out there.

I'm a programmer, and at my company, we actually support Windows XP, Windows 7, and up. But guess what? We don't support Vista even though it is newer than XP. There's a reason for that.

Dagoth_Rac · February 2016

Robbmrp wrote: »

Windows Vista was one of the worst OS that Microsoft put out. You will get a lot better system performance by upgrading it to Windows 7 at the very least. The longer you stay on that OS, the less performance you will get from your existing system.

I have never had any problems with Vista. It seems a heck of a lot more stable than the supposedly beloved XP ever was, and no better or worse than my Windows 7 machine. I have been playing ESO on Vista for almost 2 years with zero problems. I actually have a Windows 7 machine and will switch ESO to that if I must, but would prefer to not go through the hassle unless absolutely necessary. ZOS said they were dropping support for non-DirectX 11. They said nothing about dropping support for Vista. I would just like to know if ZOS is officially making it where ESO will not run on Vista.

Nestor · February 2016

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

I actually have a Windows 7 machine and will switch ESO to that if I must, but would prefer to not go through the hassle unless absolutely necessary.

Switch it to the Windows 7 machine. Even Microsoft has given up on Vista

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/lifecycle

Note, if you copy the ZOS directory over to the new machine, you won't need to re-download the whole game, just run a repair on it and you will be good to go. Note, you may have to do a bit more than the repair, the detailed instructions can be found in a post in the PC Support section of the boards. But you can avoid the 35GB download.

No, this is not an official answer from ZOS, just someone trying to help.

Arkadius · February 2016

You might want to try running the clients with OpenGL. This way you could at least see if your problem is indeed related to D3D11, or if it's somewhat else.

Dagoth_Rac · February 2016

Xiana wrote: »

You might want to try running the clients with OpenGL. This way you could at least see if your problem is indeed related to D3D11, or if it's somewhat else.

That is interesting. Is there a post somewhere on exactly how to do that?

Arkadius · February 2016

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Xiana wrote: »

You might want to try running the clients with OpenGL. This way you could at least see if your problem is indeed related to D3D11, or if it's somewhat else.

That is interesting. Is there a post somewhere on exactly how to do that?

Sure. Take a look here:
http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/2665996/#Comment_2665996

Dagoth_Rac · February 2016

Xiana wrote: »

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Xiana wrote: »

You might want to try running the clients with OpenGL. This way you could at least see if your problem is indeed related to D3D11, or if it's somewhat else.

That is interesting. Is there a post somewhere on exactly how to do that?

Sure. Take a look here:
http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/2665996/#Comment_2665996

I completely uninstalled and reinstalled PTS and I see that my "pts" directory has no UserSettings.txt file. Which seems odd. I guess it is crashing before it even gets to create the default UserSettings.txt file. Anyway, I copied the UserSettings.txt from "live" and changed D3D11 to OPENGL. But ESO still crashes immediately. I think it is crashing before it even consults that file. :-(

RinaldoGandolphi · February 2016

Ok

For starters Windows Vista X64 SP2 with the Platform Update for Windows Vista and the Platform Update Supplement for Windows Vista is the same OS as Windows 7. I know this because i have ran modified AMD GPU Drivers that adding a simple line to an ini file allowed them to installation nd run flawlessly including CrossfireX on Windows Vista.

The following updates back port all the DirectX 11 functionality and Ribbon UI, XPS, etc from Windows 7 back to Windows Vista

Platform Update for Windows Vista
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/971512
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/971513
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/971514
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/960362

Platform Update Supplement for Windows Vista
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=14539

For good measure Install the following:

DirectX End User Runtime - This is a web installer that will update your DirectX Runtimes
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=35

Visual C++ Redistributable packages and .Net Packages
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=5582
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=2092
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=23691
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=23691
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=30679
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=40784
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=48145
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=42642
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8328
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=13523
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=48145
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=26999

With all those updates installed i see ZERO technical reason ESO won't run on Windows Vista. Vista SP2 with the 2 Platform Updates pretty much is Windows 7, all the core DirectX 11 and other functionality was backported to Vista to ensure the WDDM and other features would continue to be compatible. In otherwords WDDM 1.0 Drivers would work on Windows 7 and WDDM 1.1 Drivers would wok on Windows Vista which is how Microsoft wrote the spec in the 1st place.

Windows Vista is still supported till April of 2017.I would hope ZOS isn't canning support for an OS that isn't EOL yet. That just reeks of being cheap when Vista with those updates installed(most Vista machines got them via Windows Update) is fully DirectX11 compatible. I don't see how that can be justified. Any OS that supports DirectX 11 (Vista, 7, 8, and 10) be able to play this game, when there is no technological reason to lock one out. MS would not have put in the manpower and resources backporting that functionality back to Vista and Server 2008 if they didn;t intend compatibility.

Simply put whats works on 7 should work on Vista and Server 2008 and ieven if you wrote your app specifically to target 7 those updates ensured it would work on Vista by giving it all the new D3D libraries and such. Simply put it should work.

Im not fond of the idea of canning support for an OS that is still receiving updates. Its just poor form. ESO should support Vista until April of next year, its costs them nothing to do so as Vista and 7 are pretty much interchangeable and you don't evne have to change your code to do it because both of them use the same DirectX 11 API so cost isn't even an issue.

Do the right thing ZOS, fix it.

Dagoth_Rac · February 2016

@RinaldoGandolphi

Wow. That was a very knowledgeable post. I am pretty sure I have all the latest and greatest Vista and DirectX and video drivers, etc. But I will dig into your post deeper and see if I missed anything. Of course, I am not sure this is even a Vista/DirectX thing. It could just be some unrelated weirdness with Thieves Guild not getting along with my machine for reasons completely unrelated to Vista. But at least this gives me some paths to follow to troubleshoot before moving to Windows 7.

Thank you for taking my concerns seriously. I really do appreciate it.

ZOS_GinaBruno · February 2016

Vista doesn't support DX11 out of the box, but should be supported with SP2. As long as Vista is up to date, the game should still run ok.

altemriel · February 2016

Vista is in general very buggy and Microsoft themselves admited, it was a big fail, I would recommend to upgrade to Win 8 or higher

Reevster · February 2016

I couldn't get past the char select screen with vista like a year ago, so I quit playing , then the new DLC came out,so I built myself a "budget" gamer rig and had to buy windows 10 since Vista was left out of the 'free" upgrade.... Pooh Microsoft.

WalkingLegacy · February 2016

s7732425ub17_ESO wrote: »

You should not be using Vista. Windows 7 is the best operating system out there.

I'm a programmer, and at my company, we actually support Windows XP, Windows 7, and up. But guess what? We don't support Vista even though it is newer than XP. There's a reason for that.

XP use should be all but gone for most companies, by law or by some group pledge crap, XP is to be phased out to meet the standards of PCLC.

To the OP, vista should be supported still as Microsoft isn't completely dumping it until 2017. SP2 gives you DX11.

Sometimes your registry gets mucked up, sometimes your install files get messed up.

If you're using addons, turn them off. If this doesn't work.

Try uninstalling, then deleting all pertinent game folders and then reinstall game.

Otherwise a fresh install of Vista would be worth doing. I usually do a new install once a year.

Mix · February 2016

Hmm, I've updated my video card (GTX 750Ti) and I run windows Vista with SP2. I made sure to get all the downloads I could from @RinaldoGandolphi post.

Trying to launch the PTS results in an instant crash with the Crash Report pop-up.

My Windows Update is broken and I tried all of their fixes and it still doesn't work, but I did verify I have all the above updates. What update is stuck on are two security updates, if I try to manually download them it tells me they aren't for my system, but they are labelled for Vista 64 bit lol.

I can't say I like Vista, but if I reinstall it and the game still doesn't work I am going to be very upset, but it would save me $130 or so that getting Windows 10 would cost me:(

enisfraub17_ESO · March 2016

Not sure if you resolved this issue. If so, please let me know how.
I too am crashing at launch after installing the DLC. I have tried everything i can think of and found something that could be the problem. when i run dxdiag i see this:
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found

I am thinking that parameters not found cannot be a good thing. All drivers are updated. I even updated Teamspeak as a post regarding this issue indicated that sometimes this can cause a problem.

another internet search post said that the registry files were gone and had to be recreated?
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_other-gaming/directx-not-found-and-cannot-be-installed-because/3a9cbe05-c846-42ec-956f-72c2d0b09382

any help would be greatly appreciated.

I am very concerned that my guildmates are missing me and will remove me from the roster.

Blackbird71 · April 2016

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Vista doesn't support DX11 out of the box, but should be supported with SP2. As long as Vista is up to date, the game should still run ok.

You really need to communicate this to your support team! They are hung up on resolving a crash issue because they don't understand this simple fact and can't move past it to address the real problem.