When I first played the game I started with the tutorial for the Eurasian Dynasty. It worked fine unitl I was asked to open up the construction panel either by pressing F1 or clicking the tank icon on the bottom of the screen. First I pressed F1 and the game crashed, saying something like this programme has stopped working. I started it again thinking the cause is with the F1 key so I pressed the tank icon instead, but it still made the game crashed.
My computer is running Windows Vista. I tried to run it as administrator but for some reason the option is blanked out. I have User Access Control turned off.

I have exactly the same problem. Can't play it, since I can't design any vehicles. UAC turned off, DEP set to the default setting, running as administrator. Seems it's not vista compatible.
Edit: After numerous google attempts to find anything about this problem, I did find one interesting piece of information. The game tends to crash when running widescreen resolutions. I've turned it down to 1024 x 768 and F1 does work now. :)

Have either of you raised a support ticket with GOG?
But it's good to know that Vengeful got it working by not using a widescreen resolution.

Nope, not yet. Might be a good idea, would be cool to be able to run it in a higher resolution. :)

I found out the cause of the problem was the same. When I first tried the game I had it running at 960 x 600, which made it crashed. Then I tried 1280 x 768, which also crashed. After that I tried 1440 x 900, and the screen worked.

I also have this problem. Running in 1024x768 is a temporary fix, but I would certainly like to see this issue resolved. Thanks for the help.
Edit: looks like a mean post without a smiley face, so :)

Hi,
Running Windows 7 64bit with Core 2 Duo P8700 @ 2.53GHZ, 6gb ram, ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4650.
Playing the game at 1600 x 900 32bit.
Same problem.
Going to try the res fix now. :)
Yay, works. Looks like we may just have to live with it. :(

I, too, found my F1-related problems solved by turning my graphics up to their maximum. Fortunately, it didn't seem to have much of an effect on the game's framerate, and it looks crisper than ever.

Same problem but on XP. Set the resolution to 1360 x 768 but will give it a shot at a smaller resolution.

Same prob here i sent a ticket. I'll let y'all know if I hear anything.

I've had the same problem on Windows XP & Windows 7. Both computers are running a widescreen. Interestingly, the game worked fine on the XP (SP2) prior to a video card upgrade, memory upgrade, and a wide flat panel (before it was an ordinary CRT). Hadn't played it after those upgrades, then I reformatted the XP. Now trying to reload everything - with all the new hardware and having the F1 problem. Too many variables changing, so this forum thread is very helpful. I'll try this.
Also, I sent Zuxxez a support ticket request. They said to make sure I was running the latest version of MS DirectX 9.0c. I did the upgrade to a newer version of 9.0c & upgraded video card drivers: no joy - F1 problem lingers.
I'll try the lower resolution to both compys. :-)

I had to lower the resolution on the Windows 7 box to 1024x768 - bleh - but it finally worked. However, I haven't been able to successfully install the GeForce 1.1 patch for Earth 2150 to bring the game version to 2.8.7.1 on Windows 7. The patch hangs after extracting the install files. I changed the compatibility settings for the extracted patch file itself and still hangs. Any suggestions?
Also, to run Earth 2150 on the Windows 7 box, I've had to run it in Windows XP SP3 compatibility mode (otherwise the main menu in the game doesn't appear).
On the Windows XP, I had to lower the resolution to 1440x768. The XP is using a 22" flat screen, the Windows 7 is a laptop with a short and wide screen (24"). Color depth reduction doesn't help (use 32-bit).

This problem still seems to exist. Any widescreen resolution causes the game to crash when you press F1, or go to the construction research thing which is the same as pressing F1. It would be nice if this could be fixed now, since more and more people have widescreen monitors now. I know if anyone can do it, it's GOG. I've seen so many games here running awesomely, that I could not get them running myself.

I bought it for the daily gems and it doesnt seem to work on my laptop at 1980x1020x16, but it seems to work fine on my desktop at 1680x1050x16 just fine.

This issue is related to the game engine. You can't solve it unless you change to a non-widescreen resolution. There is a thread on the official forums stating clearly that the Earth 2 Engine doesn't fully support resolutions not widespread at the time.