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walter09
06-15-2009, 01:57 AM
Hi everyone!

When starting PE, after some seconds, PE freezes for about 30 to 60 seconds. After that everything works fine until a few operations have been performed. Then it sleeps again. And so on. Betwen those periods of sleep, everything seems to be working.

What does freeze/sleep mean: I can move the mouse, but the UI doesn't accept any clicks. Further, when the mouse pointer's last position was over the 3D window, the crosshair separates (and remains) from the triangular-shaped pointer. When I click again on some spot, the PE Window gets completely black with the 3D window having a white frame.

PE is working perfectly with no "sleep phases" when I set SDPIXELFORMAT to SOFTWARE.
Suspecting a problem with PE and the QuadroFX 580, I did the following:



Removed and reinstalled (acc. www.clausbrod.de) the latest nVidia Quadro driver (182.65) - :( nothing
I removed PE, deleted all the application settings in the user profile directory and reinstalled PE - :( nothing
I followed all the troublesooting steps on the website mentioned before - SDPIXELFORMAT to SOFTWARE was a success but with a QuadroFX 580 not really satisfactory to me.

Now I was hoping that the "Insiders" might have an idea.

Walter

Mike Swartz
06-15-2009, 06:09 AM
You isolated your issue to either your graphics card or the graphics card driver when you set SDPIXELFORMAT to SOFTWARE, and your problem went away.
If you correctly uninstalled your graphics driver before installing the latest version, you have either a hardware problem, or you made changes to your advanced graphics settings that do not work with Modeling PE. First try opening the NVIDIA control panel, and change your advanced 3D graphics settings to the system default. There is also an NVIDIA setting that let's the application decide what advanced setting to use. Try that as well.

If none of this helps, you may need a new graphics card.

walter09
06-15-2009, 01:25 PM
Thanks for the reply, Mike!

Although I didn't change any advanced settings, I tried to reset them to system defaults on the global settings tab (I have a german XP & driver so I don't know the exact name of the tab, sorry). Result: still the same problem.

I also have an application related tab where I can adjust settings/create profiles for specific applications. Does it make sens to activate the profile labeled "cocreate onespace"?

From your experience, which settings are critical for PE?

The card itself is brand new. And it works perfectly with other CAD applications (Demos of AutoCAD and SolidWorks).

Walter

clausb
06-16-2009, 08:52 AM
A good while ago, we received reports from CoCreate Modeling users describing similar symptoms. Back then, we were able to track the issue down to driver software for special (Microsoft) mice. I'm guessing you might be able to read German; if so, see the discussion at http://ww3.cad.de/foren/ubb/Forum29/HTML/002708.shtml . (If not, post here to inquire more details.)

Claus

clausb
06-16-2009, 08:56 AM
From your experience, which settings are critical for PE?[/U]


The top three causes for problems with Modeling PE:

An installation of Spyware Doctor (symptom: activation fails)
An incorrectly installed 3D graphics driver (symptom: crashes or error messages when opening the 3D graphics window)
An inaccessible default printer (symptom: startup process halts while initializing the Annotation module)

walter09
06-16-2009, 10:01 AM
A good while ago, we received reports from CoCreate Modeling users describing similar symptoms. Back then, we were able to track the issue down to driver software for special (Microsoft) mice. I'm guessing you might be able to read German; if so, see the discussion at http://ww3.cad.de/foren/ubb/Forum29/HTML/002708.shtml . (If not, post here to inquire more details.)

Claus

Yes, I also found that discussion before and went through it. I'm using a Logitech mouse and keyboard. Nevertheless, I uninstalled the SetPoint software for the mouse and the software for the keyboard (G11). Still the same, but it was worth a try.

The top three causes for problems with Modeling PE:

An installation of Spyware Doctor (symptom: activation fails)
An incorrectly installed 3D graphics driver (symptom: crashes or error messages when opening the 3D graphics window)
An inaccessible default printer (symptom: startup process halts while initializing the Annotation module)



I also read about those issues in the other threads. What I really meant was, are there any critical settings concerning the OpenGL settings of the nvidia card which could cause such a behaviour (e.g. Tripple-Buffer, Antialiasing...)?

Thanks for your patience!

Walter

clausb
06-16-2009, 10:09 AM
Funny, your description sounds very similar to the earlier cases I've mentioned (which were related to wireless keyboards/mice).


There are probably a couple of settings in the graphics driver which might have an effect when using our realistic rendering module (which isn't available in the PE version). Apart from that, I can't think of any special requirements, really. Also, CoCreate Modeling is used in a wide variety of graphics configurations and seems to run almost everywhere, provided that the 3D graphics driver was installed correctly.

When Modeling PE freezes, do you see any suspicious activity in Windows Task Manager? (Just a wild guess.)

Claus

walter09
06-16-2009, 10:41 AM
Funny, your description sounds very similar to the earlier cases I've mentioned (which were related to wireless keyboards/mice).


There are probably a couple of settings in the graphics driver which might have an effect when using our realistic rendering module (which isn't available in the PE version). Apart from that, I can't think of any special requirements, really. Also, CoCreate Modeling is used in a wide variety of graphics configurations and seems to run almost everywhere, provided that the 3D graphics driver was installed correctly.

When Modeling PE freezes, do you see any suspicious activity in Windows Task Manager? (Just a wild guess.)

Claus

I couldn't stop thinking about the mouse thing, so I unplugged the Logitech wireless mouse and plugged in a wired MS mouse. It didn't change anything.

Using the Task Manager and the ProcessExplorer (Sysinternals) I couldn't spot anything unusual. When PE makes it's nap, SolidDesigner.exe shows a CPU usage of 50%. The load is distributed equally to both CPUs (Core2Duo E8500). Going deeper down that SolidDesigner.exe process tree, there is a cmd.exe, holding itself the annotator.exe.

But that was indeed a good thought!

walter09
06-19-2009, 06:37 AM
I couldn't resist to dig further and I found the problem. And I can tell you, it's not new.

When browsing through the task manager of XP, I spotted a process called ipoint.exe. Bingo! That's the MS IntelliPoint Software. After killing that process PE ran as it was supposed to. I uninstalled the IntelliPoint (version 6.1) Software and PE now runs without the short naps fully using the QuadroFX card.

I'm using Logitech mice for some years now and obviously I must have forgotten to uninstall the MS software :o. Allthough there was no more MS mouse connected to the PC, the IntelliPoint software was still running in the background. Interesting that this behaviour only occured when the 3D window was visible :confused:. Anyway, now it works!

Thanks Claus and Mike for your assistance!

All the best from Vienna,

Walter :D

clausb
06-19-2009, 06:59 AM
Congratulations, great debugging job!

Claus