problem loading saved game

i'm having a problem loading one of my saved games.

Every time i click the saved game it says that the save game 'could not be loaded'.

Anybody else encountered this problem, or does anyone have any suggestions on how to fix it?

In XP (don't know Vista equivalent)

Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter

Click on the drive you save your game to and click 'Analyze'. When it's done click 'View report' then 'Save as'. Then open the text file you just saved and look at the list of fragmented files. If your FM save game is on this list with a high number of fragments, that could be the culprit. To check if fragmentation is the cause (and save the time involved in defragging, although you should do it if your drive is heavily fragmented) move the save file to a USB memory device and try to load it from there. If it works from there then your save is not corrupted. Keep that copy for now, defrag your drive and try the FM save game from your drive. If it doesn't work delete it and copy the USB memory device save game onto your hard drive. It should work then.

Other than a fragmented drive the only other cause of this I know of is a corrupted save. This can be caused by a few things (open to correction and not exhaustive):-

1. bad sectors on your hard drive => run chkdsk (google this to find out how) and run whatever diagnostics came with your machine

2. Antivirus possibly interfering with the writing process => disable AV when playing FM or add the various FM folders to the AV's exclusion list

3. Using 3rd party tools like FM Modifier or MiniScout => don't use them

4. bad RAM => run whatever diagnostics that came with your machine

And possibly corruption created by FM itself but I don't really know for certain the if it does/why it does/how it does.

To minimise the gaming damage set up the rolling auto save function or manually save to a new file cyclically. This way if your save game does fail you won't have lost as much gaming time.

Cheers mate, i'll try that

your a big help!