New - Vista - crash after log-in (4/8/08)

So I updated to Vista Ult a few months back, been running SL with out an issue until a week or so ago. Now the viewer crashes after log in. My screen will go black. Like to the point where my screen thinks theres no feed to it. Vista lets me know with a bubble that a graphic issue just happened. But wont give me any info.

So far I've...
With the SL viewer...
Cleared the SL cache - crash still happens.
Uninstalled SL and installed a new copy - crash
For the heck of it, I installed one of the beta viewers - crash
Ran both viewers in XP mode.

With my computer...
Switched the theme to Windows classic.
Checked to see if a update was around for my nVida card. - Drivers have been up to date

I HAVE NOT installed SP1 for Vista, as windows update will not let me. (SP1 and my audio hardware/driver hate each other. Or so they say.)

I have updated my Windows defender definitions twice.


For a more detailed info on system please ask.

Right now I'm wondering if I'm the only one having this issue?

i know the feeling....i missed my old xp sooo much..sniff...i have new and better computer but with vista..my old laptop with xp worked better than my new computer...sinff...i really dont know why???

Just got new computer with vista and I crash a few minutes after logging in. My avie either keeps moving in a direction or I can spin around but not a take a step in any direction. sadly the only advice I can find is to update graphics drivers which I did before installing SL on this machine.

The running and spinning, not being able to move sounds very much like you get disconnected right after you got connected to SL. to make sure you're still online, go to preferences inside SL and then to "communication". If the options there are all grayed out, then youre no longer connected to the SL server. This might be caused by a misconfigured firewall or simply because there were so many packetlosses (data never received) that the SL server thought, your client wasnt running anymore and disconnected you. This might be caused by using a wireless connection.
About videocard drivers... its often worth giving beta drivers a try, for they might be more stable than the ones you can get from nvidia or ati directly.
For Nvidia for example 174.82 is the latest driver and available from here:
http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showforum=89

-Asriazh

i got the exact same thing!
i bought a new laptop on monday ad the (very) old XP one i had wouldnt work anymore with SL... i got a top quality ATI Radeon 2400, really good processor and mem. as soon as i turned SL on it crashed and restarted itself, once it had come back on the bubble told me it was vista that was causing the problem so i installed SP1 but nothing changed!

i took it back to the shop to see if they could work out what it was.....spent 7 hours waiting for them to download the same drivers for the grahics card that i had already done once i got it (we're not as thick as these tech guys think we are!) i told them to try running it as thought it was XP not Vista but they informed me it wasnt possible.... me and one of the store shelf packers printed the spec off from the SL website and tried to find a laptop that would work... technically they all would (if it wasnt on Vista) but the tech guy kept telling us they wouldnt work so eventually i got a complete refund!

i am now on my dads 3year old intel 950 chipset on XP and it works perfectly if not a little jerky sometimes..... i think the only problem is Vista.... tried it on 3 old XP systems and it works fine.... my little brothers is best nVIDIA go 1600. unfortunately he plays WOW 24 hours a day!

i dont really know what to do other than keep buying laptops and trying them, then taking them back if it doesnt work.

Maybe if we bug Microsoft enough they will go back to XP

To start with, I'm using a desktop. But the thing that's bugging me. Is that SL ran fine on it up till like a week or so ago.

I'm running SL on a Vista machine (desktop) with no problems at all. I think I've seen what you are experiencing except on very much less severe level. On maybe three occassions in the last 3 or 4 months I've seen a Windows pop up box telling me that there was a graphics card issue and it tells me that the issue was resoved. Nothing more, just an ok box to click. The pop up has, on every occassion, occured when I was doing something extremely graphics intensive......like running some complicated script in the GIMP while making some texture. I honestly cannot remember for sure if I ever saw it while on SL. After clicking ok I have no further problems and nothing is lost that I was doing at the time of the pop up.

Maybe, it's something like that that is happening except Windows cannot resolve your issue? The first time I saw it, I thought "Oh crap, my graphics card is failing". But, it's so intermittant, I quit worrying about it......when my card fails, I figure I'll know soon enough. Not much help, I know, but maybe it will give you a direction to look. And it could be an indication of a pending failure. I know I'm thinking that way anyway.

Peggy. I don't have this issue when I have Ps and Ai running. Most of the time together with Dw, Al and Br. (Can ya guess what I do for a living. lol) And I've never had the screen go black. (As it no feed to screen.) Like I've ran into with SL. I'm starting to think it might have something to do with Vista not being friends with OpenGL. Maybe a older update corrupted a file?

I'm still working on figuring out whats going on with my system.

Sorry, no I cannot guess what you do for a living.......Ps and Ai along with Dw, Al and Br mean absolutely nothing to me. You mentioned your monitor goes black and you get a "bubble" from Windows telling you that you had (or have) a graphics issue of some kind and from what I can gather it does not "fix" itself. That sounds like your graphics card is dying on you. If that's the case then new, updated drivers will not fix it......a new card is about your only option.

And I can tell you that Vista does not have openGL problems........way too many people run SL on Vista machines for that to be true. Also the fact that Windows will not let you upgrade to SP1 says it is possible you have a Windows installation problem.....try calling Microsoft tech support for that.

Right now I can't upgrade to SP1 because SP1 does not support my audio at this time.
Ref: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=948343 ; Method for Cause 5 : Realtek AC'97
Thankfully it wasn't because of the other language I run vista in. lol.

When it comes to the bubble it appears after my screen starts to display something again. It's sort of resembles what vista likes to do whenever you plug in a TV or another monitor. With the black, and flicker of the window style. (I hope you know what I'm talking about. Because I know it's not just my desktop. My roommates new Vaio does it as well whenever she plugs the S-Video cable into it.) So yeah. The bubble only pops up after. My other windows are fine. SL on the other hand is just black.

What bugs me, is that this wasn't a issue up until now. I have no problems running games like the Sims 2, and W.O.W. Oh! Since you said you use GIMP, I thought you would know that Ps = Photoshop, Ai = Illustrator, Dw = Dreamweaver, Fl = Flash, and Br = Bridge.

I know that normally speaking Vista doesn't have a issue with openGL. Even I, myself, was running SL for months with out a issue. What I'm thinking is, somehow, someway, something was corrupted. Which may be why I'm having issues. The other thing that I didn't even think about until now. Is that when SL crashes the window that comes up asking you to "end program now" Is in Japanese. (The other language on my computer.) Now for a bit I did have everything set up to be able to run non-UNICODE programs. And thus my file system was set up the same way. Keep in mind, SL only crashes after I've logged in, and it's grabbing textures. (Along with showing IM's and the group notice junk.) Right now I have my desktop set back up in default system settings. So why would the one box come up in Japanese?

ehhh.... it's too late to be thinking of such things. lol

Before I forget. Thank you for your input so far.