Topic: runtime error and MJ shutdown (Read 2400 times)

Poor Zeek · « **on:** April 20, 2002, 10:48:20 am »

Things seemed to be going fine, although MJ was a bit on the touchy side and would crash occasionally. I burned my first CD with no problems at all. After my second burn, however, I tried to play the CD and got a runtime error (I think it said C ) and abnormal shutdown. Then the "this program has performed an illegal operation..." window wouldn't go away. It's sitting on my screen even now. I've restarted my computer twice and reinstalled MJ once. Each time, MJ seems fine until I try to play that second CD I burned. Playing other CDs is no problem for MJ, and that particular CD is no problem for my old Windows CD Player.

What the heck is going on here??

Z

JimH · « **Reply #1 on:** April 20, 2002, 12:43:45 pm »

Try turning "digital playback" off.

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #2 on:** April 21, 2002, 05:13:24 pm »

I've never had digital playback on.

Also.. Yesterday, I tried playing the evil CD on a portable CD player, and the player got very confused. It just kept spinning and spinning the CD and wouldn't respond to "stop" or "play" buttons. I tried burning the same playlist again -- just in case the burning weirdness was a fluke the first time -- and the same exact thing happened again. Is this playlist just jinxed?

Z

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #3 on:** April 22, 2002, 10:18:38 am »

If it helps, I'm running Win98, v2.

JimH · « **Reply #4 on:** April 22, 2002, 10:23:25 am »

What version of MJ is it?

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #5 on:** April 22, 2002, 03:55:06 pm »

It's MJ Plus, version 7.2.280.

Just now, I tried burning the evil playlist with a different type of CD (even though the one that worked had been on the same brand as the one that didn't). It didn't help. In fact, the program didn't even give me the "abnormal shutdown" message this time. It just closed down completely and instantly the moment I asked it to look at what was in drive D. Then I again got the "illegal operation" message that wouldn't go away.

I'm pretty sure now that if I tried to burn the playlist that worked fine before, it wouldn't work fine now. It's as if my MJ has a degenerative disease and just keeps getting worse. I'm tempted to try burning that other playlist, but I'm getting really sick of throwing CDs in the trash!

Zeek

Charlemagne 8 · « **Reply #6 on:** April 22, 2002, 05:22:59 pm »

Did you try a complete uninstall / reinstall? You may even need to go into your registry to completely uninstall. [bold]Be sure to back up your library AND your registration AND your registry settings before messing with your registry.[/bold] If that is new to you report back before doing any registry editing. Also, post your "system info" by going to "help" in MJ and "system info" and "copy to clipboard" and then paste it in your post {CTRL|PLS|V).
Also try checking the suspect disk as you would any other disk.
MJ 7.2.280 has been very stable for most folks for a while. I'm not saying it's NOT an MJ problem but it could also be your burner or a batch of bad disks.

CVIII

Doof · « **Reply #7 on:** April 23, 2002, 05:29:32 am »

First, I'd try burning a CD that doesn't contain any of the files that are on the Evil CD.

If that works, I'd then try and determine which file on the Evil CD playlist is the culprit. There's a chance that MJ may be decoding it improperly and you're winding up with some garbage on the CD that's confusing both MJ and other players.

If that first test doesn't work, try upgrading your ASPI layer. You can download the file here.

You may also want to consider upgrading to 8.0. There was a lot of work done in the CD burning component, and it's much better than it used to be.

JohnT · « **Reply #8 on:** April 23, 2002, 06:18:15 am »

You can check the "test mode" box to avoid ruining CD's while you try various tests. If the "use generic driver" option is checked, try unchecking it or vice-versa.

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #9 on:** April 23, 2002, 06:27:01 am »

Thanks for the suggestions!

CVIII ~
I did an uninstall/reinstall a couple of times, but I didn't know what to do about the registry stuff, so I chickened out and left it alone. I saw that it seemed to be backed up by MJ's backup, but I just wasn't sure, so no, I didn't do a complete and utter uninstall. I'm still not sure how to go about it safely.

Doof ~
This morning, I plan to try burning the playlist I burned with no trouble a second time; I'll let you know how it goes. The possibility of a particular song causing the problem is something that I considered and would like to check out, but I've never had any luck with rewritable CDs (perhaps a sign that something is amiss with my burner?) so I'd have to burn a whole CD-R for each song. Not an attractive option! Next Page

Is there only one version 8, the beta version?

Off topic: Do other folks have trouble with rewritable CDs? The guy who sold me the computer says they hardly ever work for anybody, but I wonder if he's a weasel...

Zeek

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #10 on:** April 23, 2002, 06:50:44 am »

Just now, I went to My Computer and took a look at the latest evil CD. It saw the songs as "track 1", "track 2", etc. and when I right-clicked, it suggested I play them on WinAmp. So I did, one by one. No trouble until tracks 24 and 25, which wouldn't play. Then I opened up the little CD player that comes with Windows, and it knew the song titles and artist names, and it played everything fine until track 25, which it wouldn't play (although it knew the title and artist). It had no trouble with track 24, which surprised me. Is this scenario making sense to anyone?

I'll try burning that other playlist now...

Zeek

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #11 on:** April 23, 2002, 07:35:53 am »

OK, so I just re-burned the first playlist, the one that worked. It worked again; the newly burned CD plays just fine. So it seems to be a problem with the last one or two songs on the other playlist. Assuming that's the case, what do I do? They play fine on their original CDs and from my library, but they have some little strangeness that freaks MJ out when it comes to burning them? I don't get it.

Zeek

Doof · « **Reply #12 on:** April 23, 2002, 07:43:26 am »

What format are they in?

You could try re-ripping and encoding them from the original CD. I had a file that caused MJ to crash and I kept reporting it as a bug in MJ. I finally tried re-ripping them and the problem went away. I'd recommend doing that. If that doesn't work, try encoding to a different format.

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #13 on:** April 23, 2002, 08:25:53 am »

All the songs I've copied from CDs are on my computer in wma format. I wish I knew more about formats. The only CD player I have here at home is my computer, so I can't check which will play on regular CD players and which won't without driving to the office. wma was MJ's default format, I guess; I never set it, and I know plays at the office, so I figured I'd leave well enough alone. Would you recommend a different format for playing on regular CD players?

I'll definitely try re-ripping. Thanks.

Zeek

Doof · « **Reply #14 on:** April 23, 2002, 08:45:20 am »

Well, on a CD, the files are in CDA format, always.

On your hard drive, it's a different story. There are all sorts of formats out there, ranging in quality and filesize. The trick is finding the one that works best for you. Personally, I wouldn't use WMA. I just don't like the way it sounds. I use APE, which is the best quality-wise, but the files are much larger than most people want to deal with.

The best compromise between size and quality seems to be MP3 VBR, using LAME and the --r3mix preset. (the last time I looked into it - there may be something better now).

A good site to read up on some of this stuff (especially the LAME MP3 I mentioned) is http://www.r3mix.net

As for actually using LAME... it's a lot easier in MJ8 than it is in 7.2. Basically in 7.2 you have to download the LAME.exe and configure MJ to use an external encoder and all that, whereas in 8, it's all built in.

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #15 on:** April 23, 2002, 09:27:09 am »

I'll have to get myself more educated about this stuff, that's for sure. Thanks for the format tips, Doof.

The great news is that I re-ripped the misbehaving songs, re-burned the problem list, and everything seems fine! Next Page

I just hope I remember what to do if that evil ever happens again.

Thanks, everyone!

Next Page

Zeek

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #16 on:** April 23, 2002, 03:02:00 pm »

BTW, I used test mode several times with different things checked/unchecked, and it always told me everything was great. So I guess whatever happened to those songs was unpredictable. I had all other programs, screen saver, virus protection, all of it shut off. So what kind of thing would cause that to happen one time and not another.. disgruntled electrons that just don't want to go along with the plan?

Zeek

Charlemagne 8 · « **Reply #17 on:** April 23, 2002, 05:36:11 pm »

Gremlins ... or maybe that pesky Tuesday Guy.
Wise decision on the system registry. If you don't know what to do, you could mess things up.
To rip, APE is definitely the highest quality. It would be indistinguishable (I thought that was a real word but it sure doesn't look like one) from the original. It also takes a large quantity of storage space. The compression is only about 2:1. MP3 Variable Bit Rate (VBR) is probably the best for quality / space considerations. "High" quality would probably yield the best space:quality. MP3 also is more of a universal format at this time.
I'm glad your problem got solved. Keep your eye on Version 8 release. It's WAY better than Version 7. And I THINK that your Version 7 license will work. Could be wrong but that's my impression.

CVIII

Poor Zeek · « **Reply #18 on:** April 24, 2002, 06:44:18 am »

Thanks. Any other suggestions for where to go to get educated about all this stuff?

Zeek

JimH · « **Reply #19 on:** April 24, 2002, 06:58:24 am »

Please take a look at the first thread mentioned here:

http://www.musicex.com/cgi-bin/interact/NeoBoard.pl?Action=ShowPost&Board=inter&Post=8396&BoardIdle=7&SortingBy=0&BoardOrder=Descend&Page=0&UserSession=

I'm going to close this thread since it is on another topic. Please start a new one (with a subject that describes it) if necessary.

INTERACT FORUM

Author Topic: runtime error and MJ shutdown (Read 2400 times)

Poor Zeek