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Author Topic: Media Center keeps crashing  (Read 2062 times)

mseeley

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Media Center keeps crashing
« on: January 19, 2013, 09:29:26 pm »

I have used Media center since Aug.  In general it has worked well, but I've had 3 seperate instances of it crashing for no apparent reason.  When I try to open it again, I have no luck and have to uninstall and reinstall.  The first two times this happened, re-installing worked and I was back up and running with little troubleshooting.  However, on this most recent attempt, I cannot get MC to work - even after uninstalling and re-installing twice.  The crash occured when I was converting about 100 music files from FLAC to ALAC.  The conversion was going fine when all of a sudden my computer went dark (i.e. completely shut off).  I really like this program but am starting to lose my patience with these crashes. Has this happened to anyone else?  What do I need to do to get MC working again??
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InflatableMouse

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #1 on: January 20, 2013, 02:44:03 am »

Which version are you running exactly? Are you able to update to a newer version (posted at the top of the board)?

MC18 is still in beta so some unexpected behavior can be expected, but not as often as you describe.

Can you list your system specs and OS version?

From the help menu under Logging, you can enable Logging. When it crashes, open it again and go straight to the Help/Logging dialog, click report a problem. There will be a file on your desktop that you can attach to a forum post. Hopefully, someone can find the cause from the crashes from that log.
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JimH

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #2 on: January 20, 2013, 07:23:48 am »

Which version are you running exactly? Are you able to update to a newer version (posted at the top of the board)?

MC18 is still in beta so...
It hasn't been in beta for a couple of months.  The build on the Download Page is always the most stable.  The build on the MC18 board sometimes has fixes it doesn't have.

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Updates
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JimH

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #3 on: January 20, 2013, 07:35:01 am »

The crash occured when I was converting about 100 music files from FLAC to ALAC.  The conversion was going fine when all of a sudden my computer went dark (i.e. completely shut off). 
That may be a hardware problem.

What is the full version number of MC18?
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InflatableMouse

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #4 on: January 20, 2013, 08:55:32 am »

It hasn't been in beta for a couple of months.  The build on the Download Page is always the most stable.  The build on the MC18 board sometimes has fixes it doesn't have.

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Updates

Oops sorry!
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glynor

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #5 on: January 20, 2013, 09:44:49 am »

The conversion was going fine when all of a sudden my computer went dark (i.e. completely shut off).

Was it actually off (no fans, no lights, nothing) or did the screen just go dark and wouldn't come back up?

Both are likely hardware problems of some kind.  The former is serious (that shouldn't ever happen, it could be a cooling problem).  The latter may be a video card driver, or something wrong with the sleep/suspend system.

You may want to try this...

Download Prime95 from here and install it.
Run the Torture Test.  Let it run for a few hours, at least.
See if it happens there.
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mseeley

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #6 on: January 20, 2013, 06:05:28 pm »

So, I have MC up and running again, however, it crashes every time I try converting my files.  I am in the process of converting my flac files to alac (about 10,000 total) and my computer completely shuts down (computer, fan, everything, not just monitor) after 300 or 400 files have been converted.  I am using MC 18.0.106 (and Windows 7), which I believe is the most current version?  No other programs/processes that I conduct on the computer cause a crash - nor even other processes I conduct within MC 18 - it only happens when I am converting files.  I've made sure to close all other programs and shut off any unnecessary processes in the background, to conserve processing power, but that has not helped.

Glynor - does this still sound like a hardware issue?  Also, what does the program do that you provided a link to?  Thank you for your help!
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glynor

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #7 on: January 20, 2013, 07:10:20 pm »

Yes, it does.  Shutting down like that usually means that the CPU has overheated to the point where its protective circuitry kicked in to prevent it from physically melting.  Not always, and there could be something else going on, but that would be my first guess.

It is a tool designed to allow your computer to participate in the Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search (GIMPS), but it also has a handy Torture Test tool, that will test your computer by making it do hard math, and then checking the results against the known correct answers.

Basically, it'll max out your CPU cores and test them.  It is handy as a stability test, because the math it does is quite complex, and exercises many of the different math functions in the CPU.

Your computer should be able to run that test successfully essentially forever without having any errors.  If it has an error (or it shuts off), then your computer can't do math properly (its primary function) and it is broken and needs to be repaired.  It is one of the "standard tests" done in the overclocking community to see if the overclock is stable.  The "standard" (such as it were) is that a machine should be able to go for at least 24 hours running that test constantly with no errors or overheating to be considered stable.

You probably don't need to go that long, as most errors are exposed in the first 3-5 hours of running the test.

If you want to see the actual CPU temps while you are running the test, you can use this tool:
http://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/

It shouldn't go much above 70 deg C for long.  Certainly not up in the upper 80s.
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JimH

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #8 on: January 20, 2013, 07:58:08 pm »

18.0.112 is current.
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mseeley

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Re: Media Center keeps crashing
« Reply #9 on: January 20, 2013, 10:39:18 pm »

Glynor, it looks like you are right.  I haven't run the torture test yet, but took a closer look at the fan vents and there was a fair amount of dust clogging the holes. Once I cleaned them out and made sure the computer had plenty of ventilation room, I've been able to convert files with no issues. I will still run the test to make sure my computer is not damaged, but for now all looks good. Thanks for you help!
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