Strange new problem I fixed.

[JerethKhan]

I had an issue with Windows 7 where the Loader for Fallout 3 would just keep popping up and detecting my video card and setting my video settings every time I pressed play. Took a few hours to figure out why it was doing it on my PC, but I figured I'd share my experience in case someone else had the same problem.

I had tried all of the fixes that are all over the web (turn off dual screen, .ini adjustments, Live install, etc). I noticed that though Fallout would replace one .ini file, it wouldn't replace all of them.

 

At some point in time my shell folder for "Documents" was changed to another drive (E: in my case) and that drive had since been changed to a different drive path (F:) to make room for a virtual drive I wanted on E:. So every time Fallout would try to write the file it didn't have a valid path. Rather than informing me of this, it just tried to launch Fallout.exe. Fallout.exe couldn't find the path to its ini files, so it would relaunch the launcher to to the first load and set the video settings. So on and so forth for a few hours while I tried fixes. (It's good to note, the only fix I found online was someone making a new account on windows and installing it there.)

 

I've seen this on the interwebs with only the normal fixes not working, so if this ever happens to someone else the fix is pretty easy. Simply copy your documents path name (usually C:\Users\<user name>\Documents or My Documents) then open regedit (windows key+R the type regedit). In regedit, make your way to "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders" and you'll see a string called "Personal". Paste in your documents path way. Do the same for "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders" which is below it a bit.

 

This cleared up my loader loop issue and I can well imagine it may be the root cause of other people's problems, especially if you've fiddled with Shell Folder and/or changed perms for any of your drives.