fosterboy123

ok just thought i would write a guide and help anyone out who had troubles like myself. 1, Install Red Alert 1 2, Download & Install the following patches Patch 1 (TFD Update, Just run the EXE) - http://files.ea.com/downloads/eagames/official/cc_firstdecade/TFD-101.exe Patch 2 (TFD Update, Just run the EXE) - http://files.ea.com/downloads/eagames/official/cc_firstdecade/TFD-102en.exe Patch 3 (3.03 RA Update, Extract to (Drive):\Program Files\EA Games\Command & Conquer The First Decade\Command & Conquer Red Alert ) - http://ra.afraid.org/html/downloads/patches.html Patch 4 (3.03 TFD Fix, Place the "bmap.vqp" & "THIPX32.DLL" files into the above dir, and overwrite the current DLL, then run the "tfd-ra303fix.exe") - http://files.filefront.com/Red+Alert+Patch+Version+303+TFD+Fix/;5000445;/fileinfo.html/1/1 3, Next go into "My Network Places" in your start menu, and click "View network connections" on the left side. Right click your LAN connection and go to properties. 4, Click "Install..." then in the new window select "Protocol" in the next window select "NWLink IPX/SPX/NetBIOS Compatible Transport Protocol" Then click "Ok" 5, In the list above "Install..." on the first window again, click our new protocol and select properties. Ok now this is the part what im a little unsure on because i just messed with mine and it worked. but anyway heres how mine is set and hopefully yours will work if its set the same. 6, Leave "Internal Network Number" as "00000000", Change "Frame Type" to "Ethernet 802.3" and "Network Number" to "00000002". (I set this the same on every computer.) Also, Red Alert will not work well with LAN firewalls so disable it before you try and play. (Right click connection, Properties, Advanced, Firewall Settings, and then check "off".) 7, Repeat the above steps on each computer The reason you have to set up a new protocol is because Red Alert is such an old game that it uses old LAN communication methods that arent installed automatically on XP. The patches fix Incompatibility issues and also 3.03 makes the menu a lot better. Run Red Alert through the TFD menu, I find it a lot more stable and never get the "Insert CD" coming up that way. On another note, if anybody wants to share how to make the editor work please do it asks for the CD even if its in. Hope this helps (Also thanks to Tore for helping me out when i had probs with it!)

cheers but i didnt actually have to mess with it at all. i just went into the IPX network protocol properties and changed the network number to 00000002 on each computer, and changed each Frame type to Ethernet 802.3 and then it worked straight away. we can all see eachother in the lobby now. oh and i pwnd em btw ^_^

yep but tyvm anyway! i managed to get it working

argh! sorry to be a pain but we cant see eachother in the lobby or see either of us hosting games. any ideas m8?

cheers mate worked fine. i think the problem was i wasnt running it from the TFD menu, it must add some extra parameter. anyway, i tried the -cd command on the end of my ra95 exe before i patched and it never worked, but after the patch it works fine. thanks very much!

that i wasnt aware of, i was only using the 3.03 patch. ill give that a try now and let you know what happens. cheers!

im on windows xp 32 sp2. The game seems to work totally fine, i just cant run without the TFD disc being in the drive which means i cant run the game on my other home computers to play network games. which just defeats the entire object of me playing it it says ra95.dat bla bla and basically disc cannot be found in drive D, please insert disc. this also happens if i boot the game first with the disc in and then take it out. seems like there are files on the disc it needs or something.

woah cheers for the quick response. you should know that i own a legit copy of TFD i just simply want to play over LAN which is impossible if i cant take the damn disc out I installed a patch called "RA303_4player" to my red alert dir, and then "RATFD303" Fix, which i copied "bmap.vqp" & "THIPX32.DLL" to the red alert dir, overwriting the old DLL, and ran the "tfd-ra303fix.exe" which said it patched everything ok. i then added the IPX protocol to my Ethernet and when i click network on my menu it all works fine, goes to the lobby and i can host. i just cannot play with the disc out of the drive. and not one no-cd patch ive found seems to fix that. any ideas? cheers ^_^

hey guys im new here and google'd your site im looking to a solution for my problem ive installed TFD version of Red Alert, hoping to play some LAN with my mates, installed 3.03 unofficial patch, TFD fixed it, made my IPX protocol and everything works awesome. only problem is, i cant play RA without the TFD disc in, and theres no no-cd that will fix it. i cant even boot the game up with the disc in only to take it out. its a pain because it means i cant play LAN anyway. any ideas? ill be much appreciative, cheers