AC9 crashes possibly related to Windows Login - help

[Anonymous]

Hi All,
Having issues with AC crashing soon after opening a file.
Alt Click on anything, opening a section or 3d window will crash it, or if I just leave the file open it will crash on it's own without any prompting after a few minutes.
Currently happening on any file I open under my login.
If I get anyone else to login to my computer and open the same files, all is OK.
I've tried new & reset, deleting all Graphisoft directories in Docs & Settings, and even copy/pasting someone elses .prf files over mine.
Still no good.
This was happening a few weeks ago, and the IT Mngr couldn't work it out, uninstalled/reinstalled AC9, didn't work,and ended up fully reformatting the computer, which fixed it for a few weeks.

Any ideas/solutions???

Thanks,
Blair

P4 3.4GHz, 2 Gig RAM
NVIDIA Quadro FX500
Win XP Pro SP2
AC9 2045 AUS full

[Anonymous]

I have exactly the same problem since I upgraded my PC to 250Gb SATA drives. I ghosted the system partion so I know the software is identical. Reinstalling WinXp (sp2) and Archicad 9 made no difference. I downgraded my PC back to the 60Gb IDE drive and the problem went away. I installed another user on my PC to see if that made a difference as in your case, but it still failed.
Have you found a solution yet? I haven't found anything on the web yet.

Thanx.
Ivan

[Rob]

We've had the very same problem (like crushing AC without touching it after opening a file) at the office. The problem got solved after changing the graphic card (and drivers I suppose). But it's a funny stuff because all this started to happen after switching to XP (SP2) as oppose to Win2000 that we had before and everything was ok. We have changed the server application as well to Win2003 so it's a real dilemma what is causing these problems - new graphic card drivers, XP SP2 or some communication problem(??) of the server2003 vs AC dongle. God knows but I've found AC9 rather unstable on XPSP2 like occasional monitor flickering, sort of slow screen refreshing and random crushes when panning. Dodgy, dodgy things...

[Anonymous]

Rob wrote:
We've had the very same problem ... We have changed the server application as well to Win2003 so it's a real dilemma what is causing these problems - new graphic card drivers, XP SP2 or some communication problem(??) of the server2003 vs AC dongle. God knows but I've found AC9 rather unstable on XPSP2 like occasional monitor flickering, sort of slow screen refreshing and random crushes when panning. Dodgy, dodgy things...

You may be on the right track with the graphics card thing, all the files I'm having issues with are set to openGL for the 3D window. Not sure how this effects the 2D side of things but possibly the 2D redraw option is set to openGL? If I only I could get one of the files to stay open long enough to check.....
The main file I'm working on is not utilising openGL in either 2/3D, which is slow when using the 3D window, but stable.
I'll see if I can get a different card or updated drivers installed.
Also, to add to the every growing list of oddities, occasionally, when I open up an Office program, ArchiCAD will minimise and then maximise on the other screen! (Running two 19'LCDs).

I'll post again after the update of drivers or graphics card.
Cheers,
Blair

[Anonymous]

I'm pretty sure my problem is not related to the graphics card. I'm looking more towards a SATA hard disk driver issue and Archicad's background disk access for cache and backups etc. I can open Archicad in demo mode (ie no dongle - which disables the save/print functions) and I don't get the random crashes. Also my problem is not related to any one PLN file in particular. It even occurs with a blank "new and reset" file. And as I said in my last post when I switch back to an IDE disk (still with WinXp SP2) the problem also goes away.

Do graphisoft monitor these posts?

Hope we find a solution soon - it is costing me hours of lost productivity.

Cheers
Ivan

[Rob]

Blair,

I am pretty sure it's a problem with your graphic card. It sounds exactly the same as the problem what we've had and especially when you've mentioned the OpenGL. Change your card/drivers and that should fix it (well hopefully).

Also, to add to the every growing list of oddities, occasionally, when I open up an Office program, ArchiCAD will minimise and then maximise on the other screen! (Running two 19'LCDs).

this is a known bug of AC running on XP and I believe it's been already reported to GS.

[Anonymous]

Thanx for the ideas guys.

I updated the drivers on my 6 month old NVIDIA graphics card and the problem seems to have gone. I also notice that the display is a lot more stable with far fewer screen refreshes.

Thanks again

Ivan

[Anonymous]

Ahh, all is good.

Updated to the latest drivers this morning.
I can now open all the files that were crashing last week.
Between that, and it being a short week in Melbourne due to the horse racing I'm a pretty happy camper right now

Cheers for the help guys..

Blair

[Rob]

a beautiful week, I've put some money on makybe...life is beautiful

[__archiben]

Rob wrote:
a beautiful week, I've put some money on makybe...life is beautiful

better odds on makybe diva this side of the ditch because the kiwi's all loaded xcellent . . . i was up at the end of the day myself . . .

the sun's out. life is indeed good . . .

~/archiben