Windows 8.1

[Cinicus]

I just upgraded to Windows 8.1 and now FF14 wont launch. It says either a fatal DirectX error has occurred or Windows can not open this program due to an unknown error. Anyone know what I need to do to fix this. BTW im pretty new to PC's as I only got one to play FF14. Any help is very appreciated.

[BunnyChain]

I remember reading about a WMP codecs issue when I was thinking about upgrading to 8.1 myself. Maybe it's still relevant?

Here I think: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post1436790

[Cinicus]

Thank you for the link!!! Only thing I need to know now is how do I reinstall Windows 8? I bought my PC with Windows 8 preinstalled.

[Cinicus]

ok so the DirectX fatal error is "1000003d". I tried to update my DirectX files in hopes that it would help but it hasn't. >< stupid Microsoft making it so I cant play my game!!! If any1 knows how I can go back to windows 8 or fix the issue with windows 8.1 it would be awesome!!!!

[Cinicus]

ok I tried all the fixes in the link but nothing works. also my character creator benchmark works fine. I really could use some help on getting my game to work otherwise I wont be able to play FF14 . this is making me very sad as the only reason I got a high end PC was for FF14. I cant uninstall windows 8.1 because I don't have a disc because it came preinstalled on my pc when I bought it. Please help me!!!!!

[Raist]

either your DirectX installation is corrupt/missing dlls or registrations, your graphics/sound drivers are glitching out, or it can't init at your current graphics settings.

There is an old DX10/11 problem where sometimes all the DLL's needed for thunking back to DX9 emulation are not present or didn't get registered during the installation. The "easy" solution was to run the DX9 installer--but need the offline installer, not the web installer. The offline one doesn't scan to see what you need first--you just install and register all the DLL's again with the offline version. You can get the distribution package from Microsoft here:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/downl...s.aspx?id=8109

Been a while since I used it, so don't know if this has ben repackaged to automatically kick off installation after unpacking. You might have to browse to where you unpacked it and kick off the installation manually.

As usual, you can try to update your video and sound card drivers to see if that resolves it. Mileage will vary... sometimes newer graphics drivers don't resolve matters, or may introduce other problems. SE's games are just funny that way. So it is possible you may need to revert to older drivers as well. You can access older drivers at www.guru3d.com But, the initial 8.1 drivers for many video cards were indeed buggy, so this could very well be an issue if you have not updated since your initial move to 8.1.

Lastly... the settings. Make sure in your graphics card configuration pages that you are not running an aggressive overclock, and you have a decent fan speed set if you have control of it. This game will be taxing your entire system--CPU, Memory, and graphics memory and GPU. Need to make sure fans are working properly to cool everything and all that jazz (just entering that as a precaution for those that haven't thought of it). While in there, make sure all the graphics card's options are set to either a performance or application control setting--something could be over-riding what is set in the game's GUI and causing an issue.

The game's config may not be accessible, depending on when it is crashing. You can make some config changes at the title screen before trying to launch the game. If you are not able to get to the title screen to load the config menu there, then you will need to change the config file itself. Not sure if it will work, but you could try just renaming the file before trying to edit it to see if it will recreate a new one with basic "safe" settings. If you want to try editing it manually, make sure to make a backup copy just in case. Editing this thing can be quite challenging, as there are a TON of settings in there. Where there aren't values for specific dimensions like screen/window size, refresh rate, or things like volume levels for background music and such, basically higher values are higher quality setting. So if you see a value of 3 or 2, you can lower that to 2 or 1 to step it down a notch. Values of 1 can be tricky though--it could be an on/off toggle of 1/0, or it could be arange value of 1-3 for a quality level. Gonna have to make a judgement call on whether it is an on/off toggle or quality setting for those entries.

The file can be found nested in your user folder's My Documents/My Games folder and is named FFXIV.cfg:
C:\Users\<User Name>\Documents\My Games\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\FFXIV.cfg


As for the reversion back to 8.0 from 8.1... you may be SOL. Can't "undo" it in Add/Remove Programs like previous updates. Your only options are basically restore from a full/differential system backup set if you have one, or try to force a re-install/refresh to an 8.0 state. Methods may vary depending on your situation--whether it is an option in your OEM's partition and recovery options, or trying to use the utility built into Windows with an installation DVD (note, you may need a Win8.0 install disk for this to work). CNET has an article about it that may help you out if you want to attempt this. As always, make sure to backup all critical data to another disk beforehand--specifically everything in your User folder (this is where your FFXIV character data is stored). Would be helpful to archive the Square-Enix folder under the Programs (x86) folder also--so you don't have to download 5GB of updates if you have to re-install.
http://howto.cnet.com/8301-11310_39-...-in-windows-8/

If you haven't started using one yet, I would highly recommend you get a solid disaster recovery style backup plan in place. There are lots of drive imaging programs out there that are great for this sort of thing--it grabs a complete image of your entire hard drive and puts it on either a USB drive or DVD/BD. This allows you to completely rebuild your system to the exact state it was in when you took the backup. In essence, it allows a complete bare metal restore of a system in a matter of minutes... not hours/days of hunting down all your installers and crap if you have to reload Windows.

Not trying to promote them, but I tried out Paragon Software's Backup and Recovery Free edition a few years back, and it worked quite well (even if it was a little slow). It's free for home use, and allows you to create a linux boot CD that you can use to both backup and restore from. The latest version works with Win8, and provides support for burning directly to DVD/BluRay also. They have a new 2014 version out that I haven't tried yet, but I've used both the 2011 and 2013 editions without any issues on a range of systems--Win2000, XP, Vista, W7, and W8.0. Using the bootable CD, it basically doesn't really matter which version of Windows you are backing up/restoring (only used it in Windows for XP--got in the habit of just booting the CD to run my backups because I was supporting so many differnt versions of Windows). The trick is in figuring out how to bypass the Secure Boot feature integrated into the BIOS on the newer Win7/8 systems (should be a toggled option in the BIOS to allow you to call up a boot device at startup, or strong arm it to boot from CD/DVD).

The product page is kind of hidden from view on their website. You have to click just the right free software link to find it. When I've sent people there in the past, many got the free trials page instead, and never found this gem. Here is the path to the summary page for the 2014 free release if anyone is interested:
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/br-free/

[sodaboy581]

I would second running the DX9 installer. I'm playing FFXIV under Windows 8.1 just fine and didn't have to do that, but I've seen where reinstalling DX9 fixes a lot of issues in other Operating Systems. Give it a whirl!

[Cinicus]

Thank you guys!!! I was able to reinstall windows 8 as I found the product key that came with my pc. Then that wiped my pc clean for the most past so I reinstalled FF14 and now I'm getting a DirectX fatal error 30000000. WTH!?!?

[Cinicus]

Ok so I ran some update to my windows 8 reinstall and boom! Back in business!!! Thanks all for the helpful info and I hope this will help others with the same issue. I did it so crazy that I had to go through all this just to fix such an issue...happy it's over

[kaya_suzumiya]

offline direct x 9 installation should fix problem if using 8.1 since works fine for me but just thought id let u know