Diagnosing FO1 XP graphics/startup problem

[Daedalus213]

I'm running a 1.4 GHz athlon, 512 mb RAM, WinXP SP2, DirectX 9.0c... With a mostly busted ATI Radeon 9700. More on that in a bit...

I did a humungous manual install and patched up to 1.1. When starting the game, I'll get the interplay logo, and then it'll go into the regular introduction ("Brian Fargo Presents", etc). If at any point during the intro I click, it'll invert the colors (kinda- the background goes lime green from black, and the white text goes black) and then freeze. Nothing happens unless I press escape, in which case it just boots me back out to Windows. I've tried reinstalling, with no luck. Also, I tried a DOS install using dosBox- the DOS install worked fine (except too slow to play, even after jacking up the CPU cycles to maximum), so I know it's (probably) not a matter of a bad CD or corrupted file.

I've tried all the troubleshooting I saw here on the FAQ with regards to graphical glitches, blackouts, etc., and I tried running it in Win95 compatability, in 16 bit at 800x600, etc.

As I said, my Radeon is mostly busted, so I have it disabled. But apparently, that shouldn't matter, because that's one of the steps to get it runnning in the first place. So my question is, has anyone seen this sort of bug before? Is it another symptom of my vidcard (Which otherwise works "fine" when disabled for anything that can normally run with acceleration disabled) or is it a new and unusual glitch?
Any kind of help would be appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Roshambo]

I've got an idea about the extent of this problem.

When you click, so that the graphics "invert", what happens if you Alt+Tab back to Windows and then return to the game?

 

[Daedalus213]

I think, at one point, I did that and I got it so that it went back to normal colors when it went back (until I clicked again).
However, now, the only reproducible effect I can get is a solid black screen when I return (after 4-5 tries), so I'm not so sure...

 

[Sander]

In my efforts to get Fallout running without the blackouts, I encountered this as well. It seemingly happens only if you disable your videocard or disable hardware acceleration. Effectively, the game just doesn't draw anything at all. Alt-tabbing out and back gives a black screen, however by using keyboard shortcuts you can still press buttons. Loading a game, for instance, gave me the environmental sounds, and after some random clicking the combat sounds as well.

Now, to get rid of this, you need to not disable any hardware acceleration pertaining to video, this includes disabling your video card. In your case, Daedalus, enable your video card.

PS: I'm adding this answer to the troubleshooting FAQ for future reference.