[.803][Bug?/Suggestion] "Failed to download data file" again. Why?

from Elemental Forums

Argh, this issue just keeps haunting me.

Once, again, when I start the latest build, it hangs on the Beta 2A splash screen for over a minute (if I fire up the task manager, it tells me that the program is not responding) and then eventually tells me:

Failed to download data file. Please make sure you're connected to the internet, have signed into Impulse and that no firewall or anti-virus program is blocking Elemental.

The Windows Firewall settings seem to be in order, but I also tried temporarily disabling the firewall and anti-virus, to no apparent effect. Reinstalling doesn't help. Deleting the Elemental folder in My Games doesn't help. The Impulse window being open or closed doesn't seem to have an effect.

If I terminate my internet connection before running the Beta, there is no hang, I get the error message immediately.

Beta 2 worked just fine and I upgraded to it the exact same way I did to 2A.

I've had this issue in Beta 1 as well and there it eventually stopped happening for reasons still unknown. Was it something that changed on my end? Was something changed on Stardock's servers? Or did I just find a time of day when the servers were in a better mood? *shrug*

debug.err

dxdiag

My Suggestion:

Make the data file download more explicit, when using this kind of system in the future. Have a popup explaining what is happening and how it's progressing.

The way it currently works, I couldn't tell why the game was hanging on the splash screen for minutes even when the data file was downloading correctly. I certainly had no idea what this error message referred to until I did some digging on the forums. Right now, I have no way of telling why the download fails. Does it fail to connect? Does it time out because the download is too slow? Who knows.

19,260 views 19 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

I think i'm having the exact same problem (just without the info about being unable to retrieve the data file).

But at the moment I never get past the splash screen...

 

 

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

I've seen some other threads about this issue (although they're surprisingly hard to find via search), but nobody seemed to have a better suggestion than what was already in the error message itself.

Is the only option to wait for the next build and hope it's different?

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Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Do you have any malware programs running like Ad-Aware or Spybot?

There are thread on problems connecting with Impulse (which apparently you can do but it's not clear you can) that may offer some clues, a few I've found are:

http://forums.impulsedriven.com/339802  Zuzag's and Gargabee's replies in that thread may offer some help.

http://forums.impulsedriven.com/330758/page/1/#replies

That forum may have other threads on your problem.

Also, investigating what elemental contacts to using task manager's resource monitor "network connectivity" (I'm pretty uninformed about this stuff so don't quote me.  Anyone who knows more about this is welcome to pitch in and educate me, and I'll buy you a  :beer: should ever we meet!), Elemental.exe connects to:

205.234.175.175  (vip1.G-anycast1.cachefly.net)

158.71.204.74.in-addr.arpa (domain name resolution or something like that)

74.204.71.158 (ussignalcom.net which "Provides services to business and wholesale customers in Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin and Ohio." -- where the Elemental folks are HQ'd IIRC)

You may wish to see if you can ping those IP addys (especially the first and last onee) as part of your troubleshooting.

Good luck! 

 

 

 

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

There were some server issues over Saturday night-Sunday morning. Does it work now?

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting kryo, reply 4
There were some server issues over Saturday night-Sunday morning. Does it work now?

 

kyro

The main issue is the Beta splash screen can't be alt-tabed or minimized and hides Windows/ZoneAlarm/etc. messages behind it! I've gone through this myself with each new release.

If you change the prefs.ini to windowed mode set (Fullscreen=0) you will see why the game won't start!

 

 

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting pad152, reply 5

Quoting kryo, reply 4There were some server issues over Saturday night-Sunday morning. Does it work now?
 

kyro

The main issue is the Beta splash screen can't be alt-tabed or minimized and hides Windows/ZoneAlarm/etc. messages behind it! I've gone through this myself with each new release.

If you change the prefs.ini to windowed mode set (Fullscreen=0) you will see why the game won't start!

 

 

I did that. No zone alarms occuring in my situation.

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting kryo, reply 4
There were some server issues over Saturday night-Sunday morning. Does it work now?

It does work now, but weird things have happened. I installed the Beta on a laptop and it worked there, while at the same time it still repeatedly wasn't working on my regular desktop. Then I... um... seem to have resolved the issue by physically moving my desktop computer, at which point the Beta started working. So, this was either an issue with Wi-Fi signal strength, or the most amazing coincidence I've even witnessed.

Mind you, if it was a Wi-Fi issue, that's still pretty weird, since every other program worked and had good download speeds during the period when the Beta didn't. But I have no other explanation. I had stripped almost every network-related from my PC and the damned data file still wasn't downloading, but then - almost as a joke - I moved the box and it immediately worked.

Oh, and as for those IP addresses... I can ping 205.234.175.175, but not 158.71.204.74 and 74.204.71.158 - even now, even from computers where the Beta does work. Which is, at this point, all of them.

This whole thing makes my head hurt.

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

I think that elemental is downloading this file

https://stardock.cachefly.net/cvp/elemental/ElementalCoreData_v803.zip

I do not know why or what the file does, but it appears in my gateway proxy logs for each time I start elemental.

one of the 'advantages' of a higher security network

harpo

 

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

I am also getting the error message when my internet is throttled to LOW(128kb/s) speed broadband, which means I can NOT start a game when my internet is at low speed, not the usual speed (1.5mb/s), inspite of my cacheing transperent proxy firewall router computer.

harpo

 

Reply #10 from Elemental Forums Top

I am getting this same error with the new Beta 3-

it's intensely frustrating- I've installed it on two different systems- both on two separate networks.  I cannot ping the 2nd and 3rd IP addresses mentioned above either, nor do I have any strange proxy programs like ZoneAlarm or similar...

I've re-installed once-  and find it quite annoying that I have to d/l the whole she-bang from scratch.

Strangely, I also can't seem to find the 'prefs.ini' file pad152 references above.

Any suggestions?   o_O

Reply #11 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Gothmogg, reply 10
I am getting this same error with the new Beta 3-

it's intensely frustrating- I've installed it on two different systems- both on two separate networks.  I cannot ping the 2nd and 3rd IP addresses mentioned above either, nor do I have any strange proxy programs like ZoneAlarm or similar...

I've re-installed once-  and find it quite annoying that I have to d/l the whole she-bang from scratch.

Strangely, I also can't seem to find the 'prefs.ini' file pad152 references above.

Any suggestions?  

Where you located?

I guess the only good news I can give you is that this stuff goes away in beta 4 since for mods we can't (obviously) require downloading of data files.

Reply #12 from Elemental Forums Top

I only get the error if I use ELLaunch.exe but Elemental.exe works fine

Reply #14 from Elemental Forums Top

Ah.  Elemental.exe-  *facepalm*  I can't believe I didn't think of that...  

 

...WORKS!  :D Thanks, guys!

 

Oh- and I am located in Utah, Frogboy.

Reply #15 from Elemental Forums Top

This is funny. I too live in Utah. I have the game installed on 2 machines, my gaming machine and my laptop. When I run the game on my game machine, it works just fine with no error. When I run it on my laptop, it will tell me I need impulse running EVERY TIME. If I run the game with Impulse, the game runs just fine. elemental.exe fixes this problem. However, on my desktop, I never get this message. One thing I am curious about...

 

Gothmogg, Are you connected with a wireless connection? My laptop is wireless my desktop is wired. I will try my laptop with a wired connection when I get home from work and see if that fixes the problem.

Reply #16 from Elemental Forums Top

Same issue for me on Beta 3C.  Starting it from the Impulse launcher fails, but going to the .exe file works.

Reply #17 from Elemental Forums Top

Same here but it wasn't doing this last night. I assumed they are patching it or something.

Reply #18 from Elemental Forums Top

I have this issue on my laptop, but not on my main machine. I've done a bunch of things before replying to the thread (including reinstalling Impulse).

Reply #19 from Elemental Forums Top

I'm getting the same error on my system (windows 7 running avast -- confirmed through network and firewall settings that there are no programs that are being stopped/blocked).

 

If I try running the file after update, I get the connection error.

 

When I run the elemental.exe file directly I receive a blank screen with the option to open the impulse menu.  If I try to log in using that menu it tells me "Object reference not set to an instance of an object"