FF7 failing strangely

[the man]

I read the Great FF7 FAQ and a bunch of FF7-related posts but couldn't find anything that worked, so hopefully someone can help.

The installation went fine but when i load the game there's no video display.  I can hear the music and i can hear the cursor movements when I hit buttons, but I can't see anything.  I noticed that the game only lets me select Software Rendering, and it fails the 8-bit Paletted Textures, so I downloaded the FF7 1.02 patch, copied the two files into the right folder, and selected Direct3D Hardware Acceleration.  I tried checking the Riva box and then the TNT box because I saw different pages that seemed to disagree on which to select.  Sadly, none of this fixed anything.

Any suggestions?

I'm using a 2 year old Alienware with a 2.8GHz P4, 2 GB RAM, and an ATI Radeon X800 XL.

[Izban]

do movies run for you i.e do you see the eidos intro or the squaresoft one with the chocobos

[Midgar]

Did this ever happen before? Is this the first time you have installed and played it? Another thought is that you might have downloaded the game, and it came with no movies... Can you name what CD version you have?

[the man]

No, the intro movies don't run.  The version is the original PC version I think, not the platinum edition that I think I remember seeing at a friend's house.  It is not, however, a downloaded version.  It worked a few years ago on an older computer that I don't have anymore, so I've been trying to get it to work on the alienware I have now.  It's never worked on my current computer.

It seems like the problem is more than just lack of movies, as I can't even see the title screen or anything.

[Midgar]

Try to clean your discs. Can you describe how your disc looks? And if you have basic computer skills try to place the video card from the old computer (if you saved it) onto your newer one. And use that one for Fianl Fantasy VII, but don't replace it, most likely you willl have more than one extra slot. If not then ask one of your buddies to let your keep or borrow an older one, and if you don't know how to, ask one of them to install it. Good luck buddy!

[Nydomos]

Run the installation disc, and try installing the DirectShow thing.
 
If that does not work, download the first set of Codecs here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/format/codecdownload.aspx