TR extras and other software.

[Lord Icon]

For the best and the most detailed support, very useful information and news don't forget to visit these sites:
Tomb Raider Hub (http://www.tombraiderhub.com/index.html) & Tomb Raider Chronicles (http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/).

Note: This post is meant to be as a quick reference (mostly for noobies) regarding TR tools and other useful software. What do you need, where to find them and what do they do.

TR games (PC):

TR 1
TR 1 Gold - Unfinished Business & The Temple Of The Cat
TR 2
TR 2 Gold - The Golden Mask
TR 3 - Adventures Of Lara Croft
TR 3 Gold - The Lost Artifact
TR 4 - The Last Revelation
The Exclusive Times Level
TR 5 - Tomb Raider Chronicles
TR 6 - The Angel Of Darkness
TR 7 - Tomb Raider Legends

You can download for free:
TR1 Gold (expansion pack with extra levels, TR1 cd required to install and play, about 6.4MB and 6.5MB 3DFX version),
TR2 Gold (five levels expansion pack, TR2 cd required to install and play, about 16.69MB) and
The Exclusive Times Level (a stand-alone playable level using TRLR engine and it’s about 32.9MB).

You can download extra levels, the demos and all needed patches for XP from: http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/windowsxp2.html (http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/windowsxp2.html)

Custom Levels Download Sites:

http://www.trle.net/ (http://www.trle.net/)


TR Tools:

1. VDMSound
2. TRAI (Tomb Raider Advanced Installer)
3. dgVoodoo
4. Glidos
5. TRLE (Tomb Raider Level Editor)
6. TRLM (Tomb Raider Level Manager)

1. VDMSound was created by Vlad Romascanu. VDMSound is a soundcard emulator with some additional features to enhance game play for DOS games running on an NT OS and is a MUST have. Also VDMSound MUST be installed (and computer re-booted) before installing TR 1. Free.

2. TRAI (Tomb Raider Advanced Installer) was created by Bokkie. TRAI simplifies installation of TR1 and TR1 Gold (downloaded version only) especially when it comes to sound card. It configures sound card and dgVoodoo for you. Did I forget to mention that is completely free??? Well it is.

3. DgVoodoo was created by Dege. DgVoodoo is a glide wrapper for DOS games running under Windows. DgVoodoo is completely free and it’s included with TRAI. Some people reported that dgVoodoo is more stable on their computers than Glidos. Personally I had no problems with either one but it’s really up to you.

4. Glidos was created by Paul Gardiner. Glidos was the first program to provide glide emulation for DOS and allow games like Tomb Raider to show their full potential on modern computers. Before it there was no way for those games to make use of modern graphics cards. Glidos is not free ($10 to remove logo). You can try it though for free for the first three levels of the game. After that a giant spinning logo will appear taking the entire screen and making the game basically unplayable. Unless of course you’re like me and you have the very first release of TR1 then you’ll see the giant spinning logo from the first level. There are some advantages that Glidos has over dgVoodoo. One of them is the capability of use of high quality graphics “texture packs” (still under development) for TR1. You can check them out and download whatever Matthew Hill has ready from: http://www.resonantedge.com/trx/
The other one is capability of use “audio packs” for TR and can be found on Glidos’ website at: http//www.glidos.net

5. TRLE (Tomb Raider Level Editor) was created by Core Design and is included with Tomb Raider Chronicles. With TRLE you can edit or create new TR levels. There are TRLE full and Lite versions. Lite version is only for playing custom levels. The full version is for playing and editing custom levels. Please note that some custom levels NEED the full version to play. It has something to do with the way they were created. The TRLE full ISO version as well as the "Lite version" are free to download from: http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/tr5/editor/trle.html

You can find the above tools and instructions on how to install and use them on TRC website at: http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/ & http://simulation.tombraiderforums.com (http://simulation.tombraiderforums.com/)

6. TRLM (Tomb Raider Level Manager) was created by Paolo. It simplifies installation and management of custom levels. You can read more about features and find manuals on TRLM website at: http://www.trlevelmanager.it/ (http://www.trlevelmanager.it/) The website is in Italian, English and French (last time I checked).

Other TR tools:

Eidos EscapePlay - Stand-alone viewer for the FMV (full-motion video) movies in the PC Tomb Raider games. You can copy the movies to your hard drive or open them directly from the CD-ROM using this software. Can be downloaded from here: http://tombraiders.net/stella/files/ESCAPEplay/ESCAPEplay.zip

Bink Video - another stand-alone viewer for movie files in many different formats, including the *.bik files in TR: The Last Revelation and Chronicles (both Mac and PC versions). Run Bink and browse your TRLR CD-ROM to the folder called 'FMV' to find and play these files. Can be downloaded from here: http://www.radgametools.com/

XP Logo Key Utility. It is small and easy to use with no installer which is always good since it doesn’t screw up your registry. It will prevent TR (and other games) from crashing to the desktop when you accidentally hit the Win Logo Key. Just simply download and double click on EXE file. You can find and download it from here: http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_logokeys.htm (http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_logokeys.htm)

If you have Win98 and keyboard with Win Logo Key there are “Kernel Toys” which can be found here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows95/downloads/contents/wutoys/w95kerneltoy/ (http://www.microsoft.com/windows95/downloads/contents/wutoys/w95kerneltoy/)

Other useful software:

Free Firewalls:

ZoneAlarm Free Version. Read about and download it from: http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/home.jsp (http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/home.jsp)

Sygate Personal Firewall. (Product has been discontinued and support is no longer available). But you still can download it from here: http://www.snapfiles.com/get/sygatefw.html (http://www.snapfiles.com/get/sygatefw.html)

Free Anti-Virus:

avast! Home Edition. Read about and download it from: http://www.avast.com/ (http://www.avast.com/)

AntiVir Personal Edition Classic. Read about and download it from: http://www.free-av.com/ (http://www.free-av.com/)

Free Adaware/Spy Tools:

Ad-aware. Read about and download it from: http://www.lavasoft.com/ (http://www.lavasoft.com/)

Spybot Search & Destroy. Read about and download it from: http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/ (http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/)

SpyBlaster. Read about and download it from: http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html

Free ISO/CD/DVD Tools:

ISO Recorder. Read about and download it from: http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/isorecorder.htm (http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/isorecorder.htm)

ISO Buster. Read about and download it from: http://www.smart-projects.net/recover.php (http://www.smart-projects.net/recover.php)

Free File Recovery:

PC Inspector File Recovery. Read about and download it from: http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/uk/welcome.htm (http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/uk/welcome.htm)

Dignostic Tools:

Diagnose.exe. Simulation's diagnostic tool. http://simulation.tombraiderforums.com/trhub/download/diagnose.exe

Free cleaners and not only:

CCleaner. Read about and download it from: http://www.ccleaner.com/

RegSeeker. Read about and download it from: http://www.hoverdesk.net/freeware.htm

Starter. Read about and download it from: http://www.snapfiles.com/get/starter.html (http://www.snapfiles.com/get/starter.html)

Good sites to look for software (freeware and shareware):

http://www.download.com (http://www.download.com/)
http://www.softpedia.com (http://www.softpedia.com/)
http://www.snapfiles.com (http://www.snapfiles.com/)
http://www.majorgeeks.com (http://www.majorgeeks.com)

[tlr online]

Check out http://simulation.tombraiderforums.com for a similar page full of very useful info :wve:

[Lord Icon]

Yes. I added this just for a quick reference. Many people can't find Sim's page. His or something like this should be a sticky for, as I said, a quick reference. And this post is oriented around the tools for TR and not only so people can find (those little tools) faster. Like many don't have a firewall or anti-virus and they don't know where to look for them. Sim's website doesn't (or at least I didn't see it) have those programs. This is mostly as a guide to where to find them, where to find info about them and what they do in a few words.

If you think it's not useful you can delete it, no problem. It was NOT meant to step on anyone toes. :)

[Joseph]

Hi Converter. :wve:
Could you change this line:
You can download extra levels, some demos and patches for XP from: http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/windowsxp2.html (http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/windowsxp2.html)

to:
You can download extra levels, the demos and all needed patches for XP from: http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/windowsxp2.html (http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/windowsxp2.html) because that is a fact? Thanks! :)

[Lord Icon]

Done.

[Joseph]

Also: the Tomb Raider Level Editor full ISO version as well as a "Lite version" is free to download from http://www.tombraiderchronicles.com/tr5/editor/trle.html

[Lord Icon]

Done.

[Joseph]

Also, i would add to this:
You can download for free:
TR1 Gold (about 6.4MB and 6.5MB 3DFX version),
TR2 Gold (five levels expansion about 16.69MB) and
TR1 Gold ('expansion pack' with extra levels, TR1 cd required to install and play)
TR2 Gold ('expansion pack' with extra levels, TR2 cd required to install and play)

[Lord Icon]

You meant TR2 Gold TR2 CD required but it's done. :)

[Joseph]

Good list Converter. :)

[Lord Icon]

Thank you. At least someone likes it. :)

[Joseph]

Yes. But your list is not complete without a link to our Tomb Raider Hub (http://www.tombraiderhub.com/index.html)at the top and in bold! :) Many hard work is in there to make it loaded with supportive thorough deep-insight knowledge and information!

[Lord Icon]

Done.

[Lord Icon]

I would make the links for Hub and TRC bigger but there is no text size. :)

[Joseph]

Now your list is an excellent summary, Converter! :tmb: Many people can't find Sim's page. His or something like this should be a sticky for, as I said, a quick reference. But it IS a "sticky link" all the time! Look at the top of Tech Forum main page (above the sticky threads). How could people miss that? :confused:

[Lord Icon]

Ignore my last post. I found the text size. :cln:

[Lord Icon]

You see they have to click The Tech Pages which takes them to another post (Sim's post) and from there to his page. New users and I bet some of old ones never click there because is not what they see first. What they see first are the stickies. People have the tendency to see from the Threads/Thread Starter and below. But of course I could be wrong.

Something else, in front of it says Announcement which many don't read. If they would read it then there would be less questions about software and how to set it up since the info regarding it is there. They would ask questions only if they had problem with it or if they couldn't understand the instructions. If it would say something like Permanent Sticky I think it would work much better. Just my humble opinion.

[Joseph]

Yes maybe you have a point there... :pi: Thanks for the comment! :tmb:

[Joseph]

It is sad that Sygate Personal Firewall Free version is discontinued since it was taken over by Symantec.

[Lord Icon]

Yes, it's unbelievable what those big companies can do to a product when they take it over.

[Lord Icon]

And just an observation. This thread had already 104 views in only a couple of hours. Just think if you move Sim's post to stikies section and give it different (better) title.

One last thing. I noticed that many people like simple lists (things like all they need on one page/post). So they don't have to click and click. And that's what this is. Just a quick reference (as I said many times already). :)

Thanks for your input Joseph. :wve:

[Joseph]

Yes, it's unbelievable what those big companies can do to a product when they take it over.
Try to gain money from it? You find that unbelievable? :D
Basically, it is only about buying out the competition. I can believe their concern as a software company. Well, for the user it is never a waste of money to buy a good product. I think the price for Norton and McAfee protection products is just about right. (i only mention those two because those are the only i ever bought). Almost too expensive, but just about right. Buying out the very strong (free) competition at least means they can maintain the same price for their commercial products.

[Lord Icon]

Couldn't agree more.

More competition = better for us (end users)
Less competition = better for them (more profit)

[Simulation]

Hi Converter,

I have taken on board some of your comments and have redesigned the "Annoucencement page" (haven't finished yet). This now includes links to the current semi-perminant sticky threads.

We are going to reduce the amount of stickies to just important active threads so we are not cluttred with too many stickies (which makes them less effective).

Regards,
Sim

[Lord Icon]

Sim - That's a great job you did with the "Annoucement Page"!!!!!! :) I simply love it. Clean, easy to read and easy to find (and waaaay better than my simple list). When you're finished with it that will be the "one stop" page for all the necessary links the forum users will ever need.

After you check and verify some of the links from my list (the one that are missing from your page of course) and you decide which one to keep just remove my thread (this one) from stickies so it won't take space.

And again great job, Sim :tmb:

[Simulation]

Thanks Converter :)
I should have it complete in a day or so.

[Lord Icon]

Sim - Another free and very good web browser is Maxthon (http://www.maxthon.com). It is based on IE Core but it has a lot of advantages and security fixes that IE lacks. It's updated very often too. It has tabbed browsing, you can just left click on a link hold it and drag it 1inch/cm or as far as you want within the website window (not on the tool bars) release it and will open the website in new tab. Also if there is an address that is not linked you can just highlight it and drag it just like you would with a link and it will open that address in new tab. Also it has a lot of plug-ins and it's highly customizable and translated into many languages. I was using it for a couple of years now without any problems. Very stable.

As for Internet cleaners one of the best is CleanCache (http://www.buttuglysoftware.com/). Cleans everything, cookies, temp files, all three index.dat files (for cookies, files, address). Also cleans mail programs and other browsers (not only IE and IE based). Requires Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1. I forgot to add that it's completely free.

[Lord Icon]

Just an observation Sim. Before I posted this thread I was watching the Announcement Page (before you redesigned it) and more specifically the how many views it had. The views were not going up much. After you redesigned it and changed the title of it the views increased rapidly. From just above 80, I think, a couple of days ago to 172. Not bad at all. Heck, my thread which is just a simple list reached 234 just in 3 days. Apparently that's what forum users needed. A one click stop with all (or at least most) the tools they need for TR and their computers.

If you wanted to see how it's gonna work (re-doing your thread), well... it's working pretty good so far, don't you think? :)

One more question: if someone has a new program or tool or a suggestion how they should go about contacting you?

[Joseph]

We planned to leave at least 1 sticky here. Not one of those that are here now, but a new one, for new announcements etc...which will not be closed of course, so members can post all their suggestions in. :)

[Lord Icon]

That's a great idea Joseph :)