DOpus crashes intermittently

Hi,

I'm experiencing crashes (1-10 times a month) since quite some time. They happened with DOpus v8 (Win Xp), v9 (Win7 x32, Win7 x64), and v10 (Win7 x64), they moved when changing Operating System, PC Hardware, and DOpus version.

I'm using the PC in my office (LAN) as well as in meeting rooms (WLAN+VPN), switching between the locations usually without rebooting (the PC is rebooted once a day).
I'm accessing local drives, mounted network shares and UNC shares.

The behavior is unfortunately not reproducible.

I can provide Minidumps if needed (which I assume). I'd like to do this via PN, but I don't know to whom?

Thanx
Christoph

You can send the minidumps to me or jon via a private message, or email them to leo@gpsoft.com.au

Crashes are usually caused by certain files or filetypes triggering bugs in 3rd party shell extensions or video codecs (e.g. when generating thumbnails or extracting details from movie files). The Other Troubleshooting section of the Opus FAQ has some guides to locating the problem which may be useful, depending on when it happens.

Thank you for sending the minidumps via email.

The dumps indicate that the crash is due to "heap corruption", which basically means a component has freed the same block of memory twice (or something similar) which can create a condition where a later memory allocation or release can crash the process. Unfortunately, the crash itself happens in a location that isn't related to whatever caused the problem (and often the crash is in a different location each time, as is the case here). It's a bit like a banana peel being left on the floor, then seeing a picture of the person who slips over on it, but not the person who dropped it.

The cause of the problem could be in Opus itself (although if it is, it's probably somewhere obscure or lots of people would see similar problems) or it could be in 3rd party components which get loaded into the Opus process: Shell extensions (for icons, columns, thumbnails, virtual folders), viewers, video codecs, and similar.

You can use ShellExView to see which shell extensions you have installed. If you see anything in there that you don't need anymore, it may be worth disabling the shell extensions or uninstalling the software they come with in case they are causing the problem.

Turning off all viewer plugins in Opus may also be worth a try, in case the bug is in one of them. (Preferences / Viewer / Viewer Plugins)

If you do a lot of work with video files, then it may be worth checking if there are updated versions of any video codecs/splitters you have installed (if any).

Thanks for the feedback.

I have disabled the shell extensions that I do not use and, to be sure not to easy find the root cause, additionally disabled all viewer plugins.
I'm not working with videos at all, so I did not change anything there.

I'll keep you informed about my experiences.

Thanx
Christoph