READ ME for My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary and the DKMM Sampler
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Introduction
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This file contains information about installing and running My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary and the DKMM Sampler. It's organised into the following sections:
My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary
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A. Installing My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary and Sampler
B. Video Display Notes
Some things to try if images display incorrectly, or you have video driver errors.
C. Audio Problems
How to resolve some common sound problems.
D. CD-ROM Problems
Solutions to some problems people have with CD-ROM drives.
E. Running out of memory or running slowly
Tricks of the trade you can try to help My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary run when there isn't much memory about.
F. Printing
Some notes on printing My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary images.
More help on making the best use of all the features within My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary is available once you have started up the product. Just click on the Options icon and then select Help For Parents. (You will also find a reminder of some of the main points in this README.TXT.)
DKMM Sampler
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A. General system requirements for running the Sampler
B. Other important issues for PC Users
C. List of Director 4.04-compatible video and sound cards
Users who DON'T already have Video for Windows (TM) installed will require approximately 4 Mb of space on their hard disk to install My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary and the accompanying Sampler. (Users who DO already have Video for Windows will only need 1.6 Mb of free space. Once you have checked this space is available you should:
1. Insert the disc into your CD-ROM drive.
2. Under Program Manager, choose Run from the File menu.
3. Type d:\setup (if d is your CD-ROM drive).
4. Click OK and follow the instructions.
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B. Video Display Notes
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In General
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Because My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary uses 256-color images, it does not look its best when you run it in 16-color mode. If your computer is running in 16-color mode, and your video card supports 256 colors, you can run the Windows Setup program to change the video driver. This will enhance the image quality of My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary. For more information on changing video drivers, check your Windows documentation.
Images appear in monochrome
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Some color video cards may display My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary images in black and white. If this happens, you should upgrade your color video driver. If you do not have a newer video driver, contact the supplier or manufacturer of your video card.
Images are truncated
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Some video drivers are designed to provide large fonts; if your system is using one of these, any image in the main window will appear slightly truncated. You can run the Windows Setup program to change the default video driver to one that does not default to large fonts.
ATI cards
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Some of the advanced features of ATI cards may be incompatible with My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary. In particular, for the more powerful ATI cards, you may find that the "256 color palette" of the "ATI Control Panel" must be set to ON. For more information, see your video card documentation.
Other Display Problems
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If you continue to encounter problems when displaying images or running animations in My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary, you may be able to isolate them by going through the following process:
1. Running the Windows Setup application, and checking the Display driver. If it is VGA, then try running Windows in Standard Mode by exiting and restarting it by typing "WIN /S" at the system prompt. If My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary works, then try running enhanced mode by exiting Windows and restarting it by typing "WIN /D:XV" at the system prompt. If this also solves the problems, then edit your SYSTEM.INI file's "[386Enh]" section so that these entries read:
EMMEXCLUDE=A000-EFFF
VIRTUALHDIRQ=OFF
2. If the Display Driver shown in the Windows Setup application is not VGA, then try using the "Changes Systems Settings..." in the Options menu to change the Display driver to VGA. If this solves the problem, then you might consider using a different video driver provided by your video card manufacturer. If not, you should contact your video card manufacturer for advice.
Remember, when trying to solve your problem, that My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary uses 256-color images, so using the 16-color mode of the standard VGA driver will cause it to no longer look its best.
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C. Audio Problems
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There are many possible causes of audio problems. Remember, for example, that your computer can only play one sound at a time, so when another application is playing a sound, My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary cannot do so. Most applications are well behaved and only prevent other programs from playing a sound when they themselves are doing so. However, some applications, such as certain Screen Savers, remove audio capability from all other Windows applications. If you have such an application, you should deactivate it when you are running My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary.
Audio is fuzzy or distorted
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There are a number of possible causes of fuzzy or distorted sounds. Problems are often caused by low quality speakers, speakers set to high or maximum volume, or speakers powered by batteries that are failing. You should also be aware that some speakers are not capable of playing low frequency sounds properly.
If the software supplied with your sound card allows you to change settings you should check them to see if they are causing the distortion.
Some sound cards have software which allows you to adjust the volume AND tone of the sound; start with these tone controls set in the mid position and your volume level set between 80 - 100%. This should give a clear signal with no distortion.
If treble or bass is added in this software you must reduce the volume to compensate, or distortion will occur. Check your sound card manual for the optimum settings.
Powered speakers are best and, if possible, should be placed either side of the screen. You may need to adjust the position of these speakers slightly if the magnets in the speakers are unshielded and cause discoloration and distortion of the image.
If your CD-ROM is not MPC compatible, then the sound may play badly or be interrupted when playing. Check your CD-ROM's documentation to ensure that it meets the following requirements:
1. It has an average seek time of less than one second;
2. It has a transfer rate of 150KB per second while using less than 40% of the CPU bandwidth.
Sound plays too quietly
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Make sure the volume is set to an audible level. Check the sound card itself, the speakers or headphones if they have a volume control, and any software which may have been supplied with your sound card which can change the volume level.
If sound is set to an audible level, then you may have a problem with the way your sound card drivers are set up. Check they are set up correctly (from the Drivers section of the Control Panel), and, if necessary, reinstall them. Consult your sound card documentation for more detailed information.
My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary will not work with sound driver software which drives the internal "PC Speaker".
EISA machines
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If you are running My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary on an EISA machine, and the sound appears scratchy, change the DMA channel on the sound card to DMA 7. Consult your sound card documentation for more detailed information.
Media Vision Sound Cards
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Please ensure you have the latest drivers for your Media Vision sound card. Some earlier drivers cause problems for My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary. Contact Media Vision for current driver information.
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D. CD-ROM Problems
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Should My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary have problems finding the data files it needs from its Compact Disc, you'll see a message asking you to select the drive which contains the files. To find what has caused the problem, do the following:
Ensure that the My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary CD has been correctly inserted into the CD-ROM drive.
Ensure My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary is looking in the right place for the Compact Disc Drive. If, for example, the drive letter has changed as a result of a system change (for example, by adding or removing a Ram Disk or another device) then My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary will fail to find its CD-ROM. You can check that the drive letter is correct by using Windows File Manager to see which letter is assigned to the Compact Disc Drive.
If you have an external Compact Disc drive, ensure that it is plugged in, turned on, and connected to your computer. You may need to check the documentation that came with the drive.
Verify that your Compact Disc drive is MPC compatible, so that it meets the following requirements:
1. It has an average seek time of less than one second;
2. It has a transfer rate of 150KB per second while using less than 40% of the CPU bandwidth.
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E. Running out of memory or running slowly
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My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary uses your computer's system memory to display pictures. If you find that My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary runs slowly or if you encounter out-of-memory errors, the program probably doesn't have enough memory. Consider doing the following to improve your computer's performance:
Close any unnecessary applications.
Check that your computer has at least 4MB of memory. You can do this by leaving Windows, and typing "mem" at the system prompt. If you have less than 4MB of memory, then you need to install some more.
Check that Windows has 4MB of memory available for My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary. You can do this by selecting "About Program Manager" from the "Help" menu in Program Manager. You may find more memory becomes available if you restart Windows.
If you are running Windows in Enhanced mode, set up a permanent Windows swap file on your hard disk. You can do this by following the instructions in your Windows documentation.
On machines with only 4MB of memory, the SMARTDRV setting that controls the size of the disk cache for use inside Windows should be restricted to 512K or less. If you are running Windows for Workgroups 3.11 and using 32-bit disk access, make sure that the SMARTDRV settings in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file enable Smartdrive to cache your CD-ROM drive efficiently. Please consult your Windows documentation for further information on how to check and adjust these settings.
Clean up your hard disk by defragmenting it. There are a number of tools available to carry out this task, including the DEFRAG command found in DOS version 6 and later.
If you still cannot run My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary on a 256-color display, try switching to the 16-color Windows VGA driver. For instructions on how to change your Windows display consult your Windows documentation. Note that images used by My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary are 256-color, so they do not look their best in 16-color mode.
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F. Printing
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Printing screens from My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary may take several minutes, depending on the type of printer you use. Since screen resolution and printer resolution are often different, the printout may not match the quality you see on the screen.
You can change the settings of your printer from within My First Incredible, Amazing Dictionary by selecting "Printer Settings..." from the Options menu. (Please note: an explanation of the Printer Settings... dialog box is NOT currently included in the Dictionary's on-line help.)
Some dot-matrix printers may not print pictures properly with the "Low / Faster" quality setting in the Printer Settings... dialog box. On these printers change the quality setting in the Printer Settings... dialog box to "High / Slower".
Because the pictures can be quite large, you may have difficulty copying or printing in low-memory conditions. In this case, follow the advice in section D of this file, and try again.
This Sampler Disc has been created using Macromedia Director (TM) 4.04 for
Windows. The recommended PC configuration to run Dorling Kindersley Multimedia's Sampler is as follows:
486SX 25 MHz IBM or compatible PC
8Mb of RAM
Double-speed CD-ROM drive
Sound card, mouse, hard disk
SVGA 256-color display
Loudspeakers or headphones
Microsoft Windows (TM) 3.1 or later
However, DKMM's Sampler will run on lower specification machines, but it will run more slowly, and below the speed of the actual titles.
(All of the titles featured should run on 386 machines with 4Mb of RAM and a single-speed CD-ROM drive. Please check individual box details for the exact specification of each title.)
Users should also be aware that Director requires sound cards, video software drivers and hardware that fully support Windows 3.1 standards. Guidelines on appropriate video and sound cards have been taken from Director 4.04 technical documentation and included in section 4 of this README file.
1. Certain video and sound cards that have NOT been tested by Macromedia may
experience problems running the sampler. For example, users with Cirrus cards and older Cirrus drivers may find Dorling Kindersley Multimedia's Sampler crashes or otherwise behaves badly. (Replacing the driver with a newer Cirrus driver or the generic Windows SVGA 256 640x480 color driver should solve the problem.)
Contact the manufacturer of your particular video or sound card for details of their most up-to-date drivers if you experience any problems. Consult the Windows documentation supplied with your computer for more information on how to change drivers if necessary.
2. For the technically minded, the sound sample rate used for narrations and animations in the sampler is 11.025 KHz. (This is a space-saving requirement.) In the final products the sample rate is 22.050KHz, giving superior audio quality.
3. DKMM's Sampler uses 256-color images and will not look its best if your computer is running in 16-color mode. We strongly recommend that you set your display driver to 256-color mode if you have not already done so. You can run your Windows setup program to change your display driver. For more information check your Windows documentation. (Users with Windows 3.1.0 may need to obtain the necessary 256-color drivers from Microsoft.)
C. List of Director 4.04-compatible video and sound cards =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
VIDEO CARDS
Director requires video software drivers and hardware that fully support Windows 3.1 standards. The following video systems have been tested and found to be compatible with Director during authoring and playback. We recommend installing the latest available video ROM and software. Contact the video card manufacturer for information.
Authoring and playback are not limited to these systems. If you experience difficulties with a card that is not on this list, first test it at 640 x 480 resolution with the monitor's color depth set to 8-bit (256 colors). Next, contact the hardware manufacturer to find out if the problem has been addressed with an updated driver.
The following cards have been tested and provide acceptable results for authoring and playback:
Bus Driver
Video card Type Date Rev
ATI Graphics Wonder VLB 3/19/93 2.3
ATI Graphics Xpression VLB 6/13/94 1.1
(See Note 1)
Compaq QVision 1024/I ISA 1/18/94 7.40
Diamond Viper PCI 9/27/93 3.01
(Recommended)
Diamond Viper VLB 9/17/93 2.01
Genoa Windows VGA 24 VLB 8/8/93 1.7
Headland Video 7 RAM II VGA ISA 5/15/92 3.10
Hercules Graphite Pro VLB 12/29/93 2.21 (See Note 2)
IBM XGA-2 MCA 11/12/93 2.11
(See Note 3)
Number Nine 9GXE64 PCI 6/22/94 1.19.04
(Recommended)
Orchid Fahrenheit 1280 ISA 8/10/92 3.0
RasterOps PaintBoard PC ISA 3/25/93 3.10
(See Note 2)
Spider Black Widow VLB 1/20/94 (Recommended)
Trident 8900C ISA 9/23/92 3.10
Trident 9000C ISA 7/8/93 VC4.5(WC1.6)
(See Note 2)
Note 1: Set DeviceBitmaps=OFF in the Windows SYSTEM.INI file [MACH] section
after card software installation if using this driver version.
Note 2: Use in 256-color mode only.
Note 3: This card does not draw extremely wide arcs properly.
The following video cards have been tested and provide acceptable results for playback:
Bus Driver
Video card Type Date Rev
Actix ProStar VL VLB 8/18/93 1.42
(See Note 1)
ATI Graphics Ultra ISA 3/19/93 2.3
ATI Graphics Ultra Plus ISA 4/25/94 2.3
ATI Graphics Ultra Pro VLB 4/25/94 2.3
ATI Graphics Ultra Pro ISA 4/25/94 2.3
Blackship Color DesignerA3 VLB 7/8/93 1.32
Diamond Speed Star Pro ISA 2/17/94 1.08
Diamond Speed Star VGA ISA 4/14/92
Diamond Stealth 24 VLB 6/3/94 3.00
Diamond Stealth Pro VLB 10/6/93
Elite Group GD5426/28 VLB 8/18/93 1.32b
ELSA Winner2000 Pro PCI 6/23/94 1.22
Hercules Dynamite Pro ISA 12/1/93 2.10 (See Note
2)
Hercules Dynamite Pro VLB 12/1/93 3.00
Hercules Graphite Power ISA 4/6/94 2.10
IBM XGA Display MCA 11/12/93 2.11 (See Note 3)
Matrox MGA Power Graphics PCI 3/28/93 1.42
Media Vision ProGraphics 1280 VLB 9/15/93 1.01
Media Vision ProGraphics 1024 VLB 4/15/94 1.5
Mitac MVA-CL5428-1MB VLB 3/15/94 V1.43
Number Nine 9GXe Level 10 ISA 2/9/94 V3.11
(See Note 4)
Number Nine 9GXe Level 11 VLB 2/9/94 3.10.061 (See Notes 4, 5)
Number Nine 9GXe Level 14 VLB 4/7/94 3.15
(See Note 4)
Number Nine 9GXE64 VLB 6/22/94 1.19.04
(Recommended)
Orchid Celsius VLB 10/1/93 1.32 (Recommended)
Orchid Fahrenheit 1280 Plus VLB 3/1/94 rel 7
(See Note 6)
Orchid Fahrenheit VA VLB 4/29/93 5.01
Orchid Kelvin 64 PCI 3/14/94 1.1
Orchid Kelvin 64 VLB 2/23/94 1.21
Orchid ProDesigner IIS ISA 3/1/92 2.0
Paradise WD90c33 VLB 6/28/93 1.2
Standard 1Mb-24X ISA 3/19/93 1.30
STB Horizon VL Pro VLB 6/29/93 1.3
STB Lightspeed PCI 12/1/93 1.1
STB Pegasus VLB 11/29/93 1.3
TrueVision Bravado 8 ISA 1/15/92
Note 1: Driver version 1.53 sometimes freezes when playing certain Director
transitions. Driver version 1.42 is recommended.
Note 2: Does not always properly display QuickTime digital video in 16-bit (thousands) and 24-bit (millions).
Note 3: Does not draw extremely wide arcs properly.
Note 4: Sound break-up or distortion may occur during complex transitions.
Note 5: The cursor sometimes disappears when using a large virtual desktop.
Note 6: Video snow appears during some palette transitions.
SOUND CARDS
The following sound cards have been tested and are compatible with Director:
Sound Card Notes and comments
Compaq Business Audio
Creative Labs SoundBlaster
Creative Labs SoundBlaster Pro
Creative Labs SoundBlaster 16
Creative Labs SoundBlaster AWE32
Gateway 2000
IBM M-Audio *
MediaVision ProAudio Spectrum
MediaVision ProAudio Spectrum 16
MediaVision ProAudio Spectrum 16 Pro
Microsoft Windows SoundSystem Version 1
Microsoft Windows SoundSystem Version 2
Orchid SoundWave 32
Reveal Forte 16
Roland Rap-10
* IBM computers that have the M-Audio sound card should use driver version 1.3 or higher for best results. Older versions of this driver don't play all sounds in Director or AVI movies. The version 1.3 driver did not pass the 16-bit sounds test for Director. Testing revealed that 8-bit sounds are corrupted when played after a 16-bit sound. At the time these release notes were written, version 1.3 (dated 1/10/94) was the most recent driver available from IBM.
