Win2K, DirectX8 & ordinary users

OK, I'm having a machine with Win2KPro, SP2 and DirectX8.0 installed. And my son wants to play games on this box, so I installed some games like NHL2000, Black & White that he could use. Since I have some stuff on the machine that I want to keep, I set him to be an ordinary user with no extra privileges. When he tries to start NHL2000, he gets an error message stating that DirectX7 is not installed (the game needs DirectX >=7). Hmmm...

Same thing goes for Black&White, ends with an error message about DirectX...
Though he can play FIFA2002, CS, UT, Quake* and lots of other games which he is not allowed to use...

So I promoted him to be a privileged user, but with no dice. Same error messages. Then tried making him an administrator, and things started working...

But I don't want him to be an admin for that box as lots of weird things can and will happen then...

So why does one need to be an admin to use DirectX in Win2K? Or is this only on my box?

I figure that i can start playing with permissions and tweak the registry to make this work, but I rather not, as that is somewhat time consuming. So does anyone know how to deal with this?

//NoXcuz

You could try running:

dxdiag

from the run box, but it may not help..

How about trying to install DirectX from the user profile it needs to be running in?

I've tried installing directx from the user account which needs it, but it only tells me that it needs administrator privileges. So I promoted the user to an admin, ran the install, rebooted, de-promoted the user to an ordinary user. And found out that nothing had changed...

Have also tried searching the KB at MS and various other resources to no avail...
I'll try downloading and installing again, as I'm not sure if it's 8.0 or 8.1 I'm using. Or if that changes anything...

//NoXcuz

I had a look all around the 'net for you but couldn't find anything similar to this problem. Could just be a dodgy version but the fact it works on the admin account doesn't suggest so, maybe it's not directX to blame, maybe the game wants some resource that isn't available to standard user policies.

I was able to run dxdiag as the specific user as suggested, and got correct information returned. However, I upgraded to direcx8.1 to see if that would change anything. Well it didn't...
I also downloaded lots of security updates, patches etc since I haven't bothered to do so earlier. Still no dice.
So I decided to get my hands dirty and go down on the registry...
And here's where the problem was... Some keys associated with those particular games weren't allowed to be read by ordinary users. As soon as I changed that, things started working... I'll admit that it took some time to find them all though...

I still wonder why this problem occured, since I haven't done anything specific to 'lock down' the machine. And I haven't played around with the registry or the user's permissions...

It seems to work now at least...

//NoXcuz

Good to hear,

I'm starting to believe that Win2K is stupid, but most people would probably ask me why it took so long to see the light. It didn't really, it just took a long time to get my eyes accustomed to the light though I've been blinded by it since I upgraded.

So here's one for you. If you remember a while back I said that I could only get 2 browser windows to work at one time, a third window would just fail to load until one of the others had finished. When reinstalling win2k I had the chance to experiment. Everything was working as should be when I had just IE on the system, I could have numerous browser windows running at one time. I installed Opera 6 and guess what, back to square one. Firstly nothing would load, so I went into services and stopped the DNS from running, and things would load again, but only two pages at a time. It would seem that Opera 6 and my version of Win2K don't like each other...

I've never had any problems with IE and Opera co-existing on the same Win2K box. I hardly use IE though, just for some sites who require IE to display all javascripts and applets correctly. Or for layout testing etc.
I prefer sticking to Opera as it is useable on most OS's.
There are some aspects of W2K that are good, but I can't think of any right now...
And isn't it so that the more software you shove into your box, the more problems you'll have...

//NoXcuz

BTW, that 'avatar-substitue' of yours is somewhat eye-catching...

//NoXcuz

'Eye-catching' is that a good thing or a bad thing?

I need both IE and Opera (and NS) for layout so I can't remove any of them, and my girlfriend would be a bit lost if I said she has to use Opera.

Apparently things worked properly during the day yesterday when my girlfriend tried it, so I'll just keep an eye on it. It could be the DNS service isn't starting properly all the time, don't know.

As for win2k, I think it's fairly true to say lots of apps == problems. Personally I get a little worried when boxes flash up when something is installing that say about files being replaced, and to insert the win2k disk to get the file back. If it's that important it shouldn't be allowed to install. Also, windows flash up saying that drivers are tested by MS. That's all well and good, but if my modem doesn't work and I d/load drivers I don't care if MS has tested them or not as long as it makes things work.

Good or bad thing, well it kinda draws the attention from what you've written to that little image instead, so it really depends on what you've written...

I tried to convince my wife into using Linux instead of any Win*, and I got her as far as using Shisen-Sho, Mahjong and some other board/card-games. Though using NS4.7* on Linux instead of IE on Win, or any mail client on Linux instead of Outlook was to ask for too much from her...
I haven't tried that hard though... And it's so much easier to let her & the kids share a box with Win, IE, Outlook, games and whatnot.

As for installing software, drivers etc on W2K, that's probably the biggest problem of them all. And has been for a long time too. Almost every piece of software will install drivers that might require a different version of some system file(s) that are already installed. So either you choose to overwrite the files, which means that Windows won't work properly in some way, or you choose not to install the drivers which means that the installed software won't work properly. Just take your pick...
The same problem applies to upgrading, patches service packs etc...

MS is not alone to be blamed for this, but it's just so easy to blame them. Even when they tried a different approach with W2K that should prevent important system files from being overwritten, I can't say that it has worked out to 100%. At least not for me... I also want my modem to work whether MS has certified the drivers or not...

//NoXcuz

Funny, the first thing about Linux that my girlfriend pointed out was that it's got MahJong on it. She's adicted to the version on her laptop. I could get her laptop online, but it's too much effort and it's a laptop for doing work, so one distraction is enough for her.

The logo could be a good thing then, sometimes..

It's a problem when every install and update brings with it possible complications.

I recently formatted the HD and installed from scratch again, it's amazing how fast a 1ghz/768MB RAM PC actually goes when it's just the bare bones.

Talking about distractions, there are more in life than computers, so one should probably not shove too much stuff in a box anyway...

The only drawback with a 'clean' computer is that you can't do very much with it...

//NoXcuz

Oh yeah, a lot more distractions... especially when it's sunny.

A clean computer with minimilist Linux, a writing application, and a web browser. That would be all I need. So, if I partition the HD so that I have that available as a boot option, will I be given the speed I desire?

Hmmm, the sun is shining and I'm sitting in front of a window with lots of distractions walking by... Don't think that it matters what OS I use or even if I have my laptop on or off; my current 'work speed' is somewhat slow due to the distractions anyway...

Regarding speed issues: As long as you don't need any special mouse/graphics card/modem/whatnot drivers, it should be a pretty clean machine... And the speed should thus fulfill your needs... At least in a perfect world...

//NoXcuz

I'll just have to see what happens then.