Hi All!

I have been using 3dsMax for a few months now, but am becomming increasingly frustrated by regular crashes where the program will be forced to close when I manipulate something.

Firstly these crashes have been happening with a range of different files, none of them particularily complex (relitively low poly, etc) and whilst performing different actions. It would seem very unlikely therefore that a corrput file is at the origin.

The first crashes I had started occuring when I was using the UVW unwrap. Often when using the relax tool (but not only). Now some models I have been able to unwrap with no problems at all, others I have got to a certain point and then suddenly I get a random crash, and other models I have had multiple crashes.

Another “common” crash is when I click on the Max icon (top left) to open/save/import or whatever, as soon as I click on the icon, Max closes with an error.

I have also have a few seemingly totally random crashes in edit-poly mode (one recently when in vertex mode I used the weld tool, moving the sliders in the floating helper caused a crash).

Just yesterday a friend sent me a map file he has been working on with no problems, and with me it crahses contantly. With that file open if I goto customize and change anything in the menu, as soon as I hit ok, max crashes. This happens every time.

The thing is, depending what I am doing and what file I am working on I sometimes can go a week with no crashes, then I’ll start doing something different; a new file or starting the UVW unwrap process and suddenly I’ll start getting crashes.

I am really at a loss to know what to do… I have updated drivers, used the Max reinstall function. Tried different settings in windows and max.

The varied nature of the crashes and the causes, tend to make me think that there is some underlying conflict somewhere, but I have no idea what that might be.

SYS INFO:

Win 7 Pro 64
Pentium i7 2600K @ 3.8Ghz
16 GB Kingston Ram
Geforce GTX 580
Gigabyte Z68X-UD4-B3
Corsair 850W Power
C:/ = Crucial 128SSD
D:/ = WD HDD
F:/ = Crucial 128SSD

Paged Memory: 16367MB on the C:/ drive

Below are some images showing;

Installed programs
Processes
Services
Performance Manager
Hardware Manager
CPU-Z

None of these crashes showed anything in the event viewer, I have also looked in the Action Center and found nothing (but then I dont really know the Action Center very well)

I did notice that in the Performance Manager its shows that my PC is using 2.8Gb of physical memeory more or less “at rest” (firefox, skype and a couple of open folders) which seems like a lot, but I dont know.

I located the 3dsmax_minidump.dmp file but have no idea how to read it or probably what it means even if I could read it.

Oh, and I have the service pack installed, and I removed scripts and plugins and it still crashes.

If ANYONE can help, I would really appriciate it. I really enjoy Max, but its very hard to like when this keeps on happening.

Installed programs:

http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t418/gulliwog/programs.jpg

Processes

http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t418/gulliwog/processes.jpg

Services

http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t418/gulliwog/services.jpg

Performance Manager

http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t418/gulliwog/performance.jpg

Hardware Manager

http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t418/gulliwog/hardware.jpg

CPU-Z

http://i1058.photobucket.com/albums/t418/gulliwog/cpu-z.jpg

THANKS ALL!!

Gulli,

Aside from the email I already sent… I had some new ideas after looking at the process list.

I know it sounds crazy… but I might try disabling some of the processes as a test, including these:

BrMfcMon.exe*32
BrMfcWnd.exe*32
plugin-container.exe*32
pptd40nt.exe*32
RAVCpl64.exe
TeaTimer.exe*32

I picked those specifically since I don’t recognize any of them (I also didn’t recognize the mssecess.exe… but it’s being reported as a MS security software so I’m not sure it’s good to disable that or not). I know some must be for your printer and sound card… but it isn’t unheard of for some hardware to cause odd interference (I have read over the years people having problems because of the software for things like mice/tablets… so it might not be far fetched that this could potentially have a similar problem). If anything… worth a try.

Also, just for re-iteration (from my email to you) and for anyone reading who can add/update this:

If this doesn’t work, I’d try to backup your folder at

when Max is not open. Then delete the folder from that location… then start Max. Perhaps there is some user file that is corrupted… and I’d think that Max should recreate the files you need. (If not, you have the backup.)

If that fails, try uninstalling Max… then re-installing it. I’ve never had to go to that extent… and it certainly doesn’t sound like a lot of fun. But I know you don’t have any extra plugins installed right now so it shouldn’t be that monumental (though it still sucks).

Anyway, hopefully Steve Curley or Eric Craft or some other Max god chimes in with some even better advice! :)

______________________________
Shawn Olson's Creative Arts
Developer of the Wall Worm Model Tools for Source

Max 4/Gmax, 2008 - 2014
Mudbox 2009-2011
Win 7 x64 (x4)
Geforce 480x2
Intel I7 930
12GB RAM

Gulliwog,

At the risk of pointing out the obvious but since you’ve not mentioned otherwise - do you have the latest service pack installed?

Vanilla Max2012 had quite a few issues, I found UVUnwrap particularly unstable and generally the application was unusable until the first SP.  [doh, sorry ignore that - I ought to learn to read :p]

If you haven’t already, also try switching to DirectX. I’ve not found Nitrous to be a cause of crashing, but it does seem to behave differently to DX with some functionality...depending on what you’re doing your experiences may differ.

3DS Max 2010/12/13 | Maya 8.5 | MotionBuilder 7.5
Windows 7 64bit | 12GB | i7 980X 3.33 ~4.0 (Overclocked)
nVidia FX 3800 270.51 [8.17.12.7051]
Cintiq 21UX 2010
[3DS since DOS R1]

Hi All,

Thanks for all the feedback. So, I tried Shawns idea of simply going into the Users folders and deleting everything in Autodesk 3dsMax (after backing up). Now on relaunching I opened up the map file that shawn had sent me. Previously everytime I had this file open and I changed anything in the customize menu Max would crash… I mean I made it happen at least 10 times in row without fail. Since deleting the Users folders, the file is stable, and I can change things with no problem.

I am a little retiscent to shout “Victory” so soon. But I have to admit its a positive sign I think. The problem with these crashes is that they were pretty random, and it is kinda difficult to know what to do to provoke one, this map file is the only one Im sure that crashed Max everytime.

I did actually mention right at the end of my post that I have the service pack installed, I should have probably made it clearer, but it only occured to me as an afterthought.

Teatimer has only been recently installed (last couple of weeks - so defintiely nothing to do with it)… Im not a big one for anti-virus software really, I havent used an anti-virus in years and I never had any problems. Except that I was starting to think that just possibly the problem with Max stemmed from a virus, so I installed a few things to check, including spybot.

I think even the brother printer software has been installed since I stared having the problems with Max, but you’re right, I should probably disable it anyway.

I mean, I really hope this fixes it, it would be great if such a simple thing could be the solution… however, 2 things Ive learned… 1) computers are very complicated and 2) If its too good to be true… :)

I’ll post here if anything changes, I need to get everything set up again right and hopefully it will stay satble this time.

Thanks again, everyone.

Gulli

PS Does the 2.8GB RAM consumtion seem high to anyone else?