Cedega 5.0 Release Notes

Released November 8, 2005.

Overview

TransGaming is pleased to announce the release of Cedega 5.0, dubbed Cheddar, giving TransGamers access to more Windows games in Linux with greater ease. TransGamers are able to download Cedega in RPM, Debian and TGZ formats from the downloads section of TransGaming's website: http://www.transgaming.com/

Cedega 5.0 is our first release to feature integration between the Cedega GUI (formerly known as Point2Play) and the core Cedega technology (now referred to as the Cedega engine). In addition to the usability improvements that accompany this fusion, we also give you the ability to play Battlefield 2, Dungeon Siege II, City of Villains, Madden NFL 2006 and Madden NFL 2005 on your Linux desktop today. And since this is Cedega 5.0, we also bring you technology advancements such as a scheduler for 2.6 kernel users, pixel shader 1.4 support, improved OpenGL VBO/VAR support for caching geometry on the video card, and preliminary OpenGL FBO support for faster render-to-texture performance.

Enjoy!

New Features

Cedega 5.0

System Requirements

Operating System

Core requirements are:

CPU Type and Speed

Recommended minimum hardware is

Please note: individual requirements may be higher for certain games.

64-bit Linux distributions

Since Cedega is intended to run standard 32-bit Windows games, it is by nature a 32-bit application. When running Cedega on a 64-bit Linux system, an appropriate 32-bit compatibility environment must be available. Please see the documentation for your Linux distribution to learn more about running 32-bit applications on your system.

Linux 2.6.9, 2.6.10 Kernels and Copy Protection

There is ptrace bug in the Linux 2.6.9 and 2.6.10 kernels that may cause copy protection to fail. This bug has been resolved in the 2.6.11 kernel. TransGaming recommends avoiding the use of 2.6.9 and 2.6.10 kernels at this time.

Prelink, Exec-Shield, and VA Layout

As of Cedega 4.3, there are no longer any compatability issues between prelink, exec-shield, the new VA layout and Cedega. These features can be left enabled and will work seamlessly with Cedega.

Exec (error = 21)

The version of mount that comes with some distributions now run with the noexec option unless otherwise specified. Running games from a partition mounted with noexec can cause an error = 21 message.

To fix this issue, edit the /etc/fstab and modify the partition line by removing the noexec option and adding the exec switch to the mount options.

For example:

change

/dev/hda1 / ext3 errors=remount-ro,no-exec,defaults 0 1

to

/dev/hda1 / ext3 errors=remount-ro,exec,defaults 0 1

If neither exec nor no-exec appears in the line it is recommended that you add exec to ensure that the partition can be used by Cedega.

To remount the partition run:

mount -o remount /

SuSE 9.3/10 and Multi-disc Installers

For most titles, Cedega no longer requires that static mount points be enabled on SuSE 9.3 and SuSE 10. However, there remain a few titles which do not properly automount with SuSE 9.3. Titles that do not properly automount in SuSE 9.3 include, but are not limited to; WarCraft III, Diablo II, World of Warcraft, and any other title which uses a hybrid Mac/Windows disc. In order for these titles to work, subfs must be completely disabled, and the discs must be manually mounted. We recommend that TransGamers upgrade to SuSE 10 which does not have this issue.

CPU Speed

Laptop and portable computer users may experience some games running overspeed with characters moving too fast and time passing very quickly. This behavior is caused by the ACPI settings for your CPU which dynamically change the available CPU speed as required to save on power consumption. When a game starts the lower/power saving CPU speed is determined then when the game is playing the CPU is throttled to its highest speed causing strange behavior. To fix this behavior it is recommended that you set your CPU speed/frequency to its highest available before starting Cedega. The method for setting the CPU speed is different on each distribution.

In Fedora Core 4 this can be done by (as root):

In SuSE 9.3 this can be done by:

In many Debian based distributions such as Ubuntu this can be done by:

Please check your distribution documentation for how to set the CPU Speed for your computer.

Graphics Cards

AGP Memory

It is important to ensure that your system is configured with enough AGP memory, and that Cedega is configured to use it appropriately. The amount of AGP memory available on your system is determined by the AGP Aperture Size setting in your system BIOS, as well as the amount of memory in your system. It is recommended that you set your AGP Aperture Size to at least 128MB. The amount of AGP memory that is used by Cedega is controlled by the AGP Memory Available option in the Cedega GUI. The Cedega GUI 'default' setting for the AGP Memory Available option automatically chooses 1/2 of the detected availble AGP memory available. If you choose to override this setting, is important that this number be smaller than the total AGP memory because the system also uses AGP memory to transfer texture data. For example: if your AGP Aperture Size is 128MB you should configure Cedega to use 64MB of AGP memory for vertex data.

The AGP memory related settings are only relevant when using the NVidia VAR OpenGL extension for storing Vertex Data. If you have configured Cedega to use the VBO OpenGL extension, AGP memory will be managed automatically by OpenGL.

ATI FireGL drivers

TransGaming has seen some game-stopping instability with ATI cards using FireGL and/or DRI drivers running Cedega. Some games may not run at all, others may require manual tweaks or experience graphical issues in-game.

Games which do not run at all include: Battlefield 2, Dungeon Siege II, Far Cry, Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Madden NFL 2005, Madden NFL 2006, Need for Speed Underground and Sacrifice.

Battlefield 1942 and Battlefield Vietnam also have issues, but there are known work-around listed in their sections below.

The games Hitman Contracts, Battlefield 1942 and Battlefield Vietnam exhibit graphical corruption caused by a known issue in ARB_vertex_program.

The game World of WarCraft and possibly others may have missing and/or flashing textures caused by a known issue in ARB_fragment_program. This problem should be fixed as of Cedega 4.3.1 for driver version 8.10.19; if you are using 8.12.10 and are experiencing this problem, you may wish to try using older video drivers, or disabling pixel shaders.

TransGaming is continuing to improve support and we welcome all reports and your votes in the polls.

New Configuration Options

The following is a list of the new (or changed) configuration options for Cedega 5.0.

Scheduler

This controls the behaviour of the internal Cedega scheduler. The scheduler allows Cedega to set the priority for threads itself rather than relying on the kernel scheduler to do so.

Pixel Shaders

This controls the version of pixel shader support that is reported to applications. Pixel Shaders 1.4 are new in Cedega 5.0.

Dynamic VBO (Experimental)

This option enables an alternate approach to handling certain types of vertex data when using VBO. This has the potential to speed up certain graphics operations, but this depends upon the video drivers and may result in poor performance and/or graphical corruption. This option only takes effect if ARB_VBO is enabled and in use. This option is EXPERIMENTAL, and should be left disabled unless you find it helps a specific game.

Index VBO (Experimental)

This option enables index buffer information to be stored in faster AGP memory to improve data transfers to the graphics card. This option only takes effect if ARB_VBO is enabled and in use. However various graphics drivers still do not have fully functional support for these operations, and corrupt geometry and/or crashes may result. This option is EXPERIMENTAL, and should be left disabled unless you find it helps a specific game.

Frame Buffer Objects (Experimental)

Enables/Disables the use of framebuffer objects (FBO). FBO is a relatively new method of implementing render-to-texture functionality in OpenGL that has the potential for significant speed improvements. This feature is EXPERIMENTAL and should only be enabled for use with Battlefield 2.

Known Issues and Comments

Scheduler

With the introduction of the 2.6 Linux kernel, drastic changes have been made in the of process scheduling. Some distributions have taken advantage of this and optimized their schedulers to run certain applications better than others. Unfortunately, this means that some 2.6-based kernels may starve more 'aggressive' applications like Cedega at inopportune times, leading to stuttering movies, jerky framerate and/or random freezes.

Starting with Cedega 5.0, we include a user-mode scheduler to alleviate most of these problems by performing rescheduling of game processes manually. For most games, this will give users the performance they have come to expect with previous Linux kernels. Unfortunately, some games are not yet fully supported by this method, if you experience unusual behavior in any application, check the following section to see if the game has known conflicts with the Cedega scheduler. Additionally, some installers and patchers may run slower with the scheduler enabled. You can also disable the internal scheduler in the configuration profile for the title in question.

Pthread Stack Size

If available, the Cedega engine attempts to make use of the POSIX threading API (pthreads) to manage threads, instead of the Linux-specific LinuxThreads API. Some older Linux distributions which provide the pthreads APIs impose a fixed maximum stack size of 2MB. This can cause problems with some games which require larger stack sizes. Common symptoms of such problems include (but are not limited to) a crash to desktop when starting a game or when loading or saving a level. If this happens, you may be able to work around it by starting Cedega with pthreads disabled in some cases. Alternatively, you may wish to upgrade to a more recent Linux distribution that does not have a limit on thread stack sizes.

To disable pthreads when using the Cedega GUI, you can disable pthreads on the per-game configuration as necessary, or for all games by adding the following line to the [transgaming] section of the .cedegarc file.

 pthreads_forced=off

Games with known problems on 2MB stacks include (but are not limited to):

ATI cards and VBO

The OpenGL VBO and VAR extensions are used to speed up geometry data transfer to and from a video card. On NVIDIA cards, the VAR extension is preferred, though VBO is available. On ATI cards with the FireGL drivers, only VBO is available. While VBO should work on ATI cards for most games, there are still a number of titles which may exhibit problems, both in terms of graphical corruption and performance. For these titles you may simply disable the VBO option.

ATI and 64-bit distributions

A number of users with ATI video cards on 64 bit machines do not receive accelerated 3D graphics with Cedega or will only receive a grey screen when starting some games (such as Half-Life 2/Counter Strike: Source). This issue is caused by an error in the ATI driver setup in the 32-bit compatibility environment.

To get working 3D acceleration with Cedega you need to setup the correct path for the LIBGL_DRIVERS_PATH environment variable. To do so run in a terminal:

 $ export LIBGL_DRIVERS_PATH=/usr/lib32/modules/dri/:/usr/lib64/modules/dri

then launch Cedega from that terminal. To set this variable permanently check your distribution documentation for the best method.

In-game license agreements & HTML

When used with the Mozilla ActiveX control Cedega can display HTML content in some on-line games. Some games use HTML content to display license agreements when starting the title. Please ensure you have correctly installed and activated the Mozilla control using the Cedega GUI Setup Wizard in order to view this content.

Regardless of whether or not the license agreements are displayed by these games, TransGaming Technologies Inc. will not be held liable for any failure or breach on your part of any 3rd party license agreement.

You are solely responsible for ensuring that you have read and will abide by any third party license agreements, regardless of the ability of the Cedega software to display such license agreements on your system.

American McGee's Alice

Anarchy Online

Baldur's Gate 2

Battlefield 1942

Battlefield 2

Battlefield Vietnam

Black & White

Call of Duty

City of Heroes

City of Villains

Civilization III

Command and Conquer: Generals

Counter Strike: Condition Zero

Counter Strike: Source

Dark Age of Camelot

Diablo II

Doom 3

Dungeon Siege

Dungeon Siege II

EverQuest

Far Cry

Grand Theft Auto 3

Grand Theft Auto Vice City

Guild Wars

Half-Life 2

Hitman: Contracts

Homeworld 2

Madden NFL 2005

Madden NFL 2006

Max Payne 2

Medal Of Honor: Allied Assault

Morrowind: Elder Scrolls III

Need For Speed: Underground

Painkiller

Punkbuster

Sid Meier's Pirates! Live the Life

SimCity 4

StarCraft

Star Wars Battlefront

Star Wars Galaxies

Star Wars: Jedi Academy

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords

Steam

Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne

World of Warcraft

Problems?

Please check the Cedega HOWTO for other common problems, installation procedures and additional information. The Cedega HOWTO available from the TransGaming downloads area: http://www.transgaming.com/downloads.php

Let the Games Begin!