If any of you are like me, you like to game.  And being so, you probably like racing games, especially the Need For Speed series.  So I'm sure you all got excited for the newest release of Need For Speed...Undercover!  I know I was.  I happened to come across it at a local video store for PS2 and I HAD to have it for PC.  My fiancee got it for me as a gift and I was stoked.

However, all good things must come to an end right?  I install it and I couldn't get it running, it kept crashing with a Windows Error window.  EA's Support was of no help to me, it was only by happenstance I figured out what it was.  As I also play Grid, Dirt, and Test Drive Unlimited, I know that there are some really weird and stupid security modules out there.  With these other games, chances are you will NOT be able to run Process Explorer while trying to launch the game.  I like to leave this Task Manager replacement running to keep track of my system.  It just so happens that NFS:Undercover has the same issue.  I closed Process Explorer and Undercover started right up.  YAY!  Three days back and forth with support wasted, only for me to not need their help to begin with.  Ok, Fine.  Time to play!!!

Or is it?  It's hard to play when you get a frame per second rate comparable to the turn signal on a vehicle...it's just impossible to play the game, not too mention tedious and NOT fun.  Well, here are my specs, I never would've though to have an issue with this:

AMD Phenom II x4 920 @2.8GHz
4GB DDR2-1066 (PC2-8500)
Sapphire HD4870 – 1GB GDDR5
Raidmax 630W Modular PSU
2x ASUS Sata 22x DVD+/-RW
250GB WD SATA (Windows), 320GB WD SATA (Secondary/Apps), 1TB Samsung SATA (Backups)
2x 19″W ASUS LCD Monitors

But apparently I was wrong.  I Googled for an answer and nothing came up that I could use...the normal "update your drivers" bs...well it's hard to update them when they are as up to date as can be.

So here I sit, I have NFS:Undercover that I want to play...and I can't...so it sits, for almost 2 months before I get the itch to play again and decide that I need to figure SOMETHING out to play the game in a way I can actually play it.  So I looked and found something that might be useful.

There seem to be two possible fixes out there, assuming that your hardware is sufficient enough to run the game:

1. (This is the fix that worked for me).  After you launch the game, ALT+TAB out of it, and open up your Task manager, and set the affinity for nfs.exe to just use one CPU (core) instead of all of them.  For instance, I have 4 cores, so I unchecked CPU0, CPU1, and CPU2, while leaving CPU3 checked to do the work for me.
2. (I have NOT tested this).  This is out there on a few sites, while I haven't tested it, and it seems to work for some people, it seems to apply more to people who have a cracked version of the game, or who are using a hacked version of the EXE that gets rid of the DRM crap that is loaded on the computer with NFS:Undercover.  What you need to do, is replace the paul.dll file that you have with one from a legit copy of the game.
3. (Here's a bonus).  One more thing to check for, if you have some type of messaging program, or email program that has popups in the bottom right of your PC or something, turn it off, as it popping up will slow down the game while it opens and closes :)

I hoped this helps some more people get their game running so they can enjoy it like I am!

If this helped, please comment and/or digg it! :)

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