When I try to start the windowed mode I just get a black screen and after a few seconds the game returns with a generic error message...
Is there a work around or is it impossible?

GodFire

I would like to know how to get windowed mode as well. All we get is a 'cannot set windowed mode' message.

You can get it running in Windowed Mode but setting your graphics card to 16 bit colour mode. But It takes forever to switch and load up and obviously 16 bit colour trashes every other windows program.

He is right.
When you put Windows into 16 bit color mode the windowed mode works.
and the worst thing I noticed is that aero gets deactivated.
Thanks for the tip :)

Is there a reasonable way to get this to work?

I run too many other things all the time to be able to switch into 16 bit mode.

I've created a simple application that automaticaly sets color depth to 16-bit and starts Pharaoh in windowed mode. And after the game is closed it returns 32-bits colors back.

Just put PharaohStarter.exe into the game folder and run it.
Download it here.
If it doesn't work then maybe you need to install NET Framework 4.0.

This worked like a charm, thanks.

I ran into this after being frustrated myself, but found an easier way to fix the problem based on the comment about needing 16-bit color depth. If you're using Windows 8 - and I can only assume 7 as well - you can simply set the game to run at 16 using the compatibility options in Windows and then run the game windowed. This works fine for me without mucking up the colors of any other apps, and doesn't require any scripts to switch your whole color scheme back and forth.

Great, just great. Thanks a lot for this! I've been searching for something similar for a long time ;)

You set 16-bit colour in Control Panel -> Display -> Adjust resolution -> Advanced settings -> Monitor. It's a graphics card setting, not a shortcut setting.

It's a shortcut setting in Windows 8, but going back and looking at an older machine, you're right, it's not there in 7. I never noticed it before because I never ran the game windowed until recently. Gotta be the first time Microsoft ever actually restored compatibility with an upgrade.

So this worked fine, mostly (I seem to have so mouse problems when it comes to moving the camera around.). My main issue is that dragging the windowed game into my second screen (Which runs at 1360x768, while the main one runs at 1920x1080, its an ''extended display'' setup.) causes the mouse to be completely unresponsive.. Or rather, it seems that the clicks are misplaced (I hear the sound of the click in game, but am unable to select anything.).

I'm guessing the resolution change is causing issue here, but I really need my big screen to be running my main programs. Any tip?

Thanks!

Your a king mate. Cheers

An update for the download link? Since Dropbox changed the way they handle public URLs, old ones are not available anymore.
Or: does anyone have it saved and can upload it? I'm probably not the only one that would appreciate it ;)