Just installed houdini 11.0.469 on windows xp 64 sp2 on the last two days, without success.
I've searched around the web with these keywords:“houdini 11.0.469”, “windows 64 ”Fatal error“, ”Segmentation Fault" without any luck.
Some said it was due to the nvidia driver, but I have had the latest (275.33) driver installed.
Houdini wouldn't start even a single time.

So I have to come here for help.

Here is the crashlog_user of mine. Every time houdini crashed, a 0kb file named <user>.<Fault_number>.hip was saved in my temporary directory. And the Houdini License Administrator was running and serving ok.

Crash report from bnw; Houdini Master Version 11.0.469
Traceback from Sun Jun 19 23:13:05 2011
Caught signal 11
+0x77ef6554
+0x77ef65d0
+0x78136dfb
+0x70340c18
+0x744c1527
+0x0dcb9bb3
+0x0db691a0
+0x1e08f4bb
+0x1e0c153b
+0x1e0f7acf
+0x1e0fbca7
+0x1e0fbd59
+0x71d94272
+0x71d929e5
+0x71d991c7
+0x71d9ac45
+0x71d9ad32
+0x71d9b105
+0x7167533d
+0x71675cfa
+0x716762ba
+0x71671d97
+0x751223be
+0x7511e682
+0x7512866f
+0x75128aed
+0x750fcd36
+0x732db311
+0x714cb7f5
+0x714cbdef
+0x4000187c
+0x77d5964c

And below is the message inside houdini console when houdini started up and crashed. Just ignored the wrong-displayed chinese character, which said about reinstalling the application, because I think it's not the crucial part.

Error finding shelf files:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “<stdin>”, line 1, in <module>
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\shelfutils.py”, line 8, in <module>
import assetdownload
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\assetdownload.py”, line 5, in <module>
import urllib
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\urllib.py”, line 26, in <module>
import socket
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\socket.py”, line 46, in <module>
import _socket
ImportError: DLL load failed: ÓÉÓÚÓ¦ÓóÌÐòÅäÖò»ÕýÈ·£¬Ó¦ÓóÌÐòδÄÜÆô¶¯¡£ÖØа²×°Ó¦ÓóÌÐò¿ÉÄÜ»á¾ÀÕýÕâ¸öÎÊÌâ¡£

Error finding shelf files:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “<stdin>”, line 1, in <module>
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\shelfutils.py”, line 8, in <module>
import assetdownload
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\assetdownload.py”, line 5, in <module>
import urllib
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\urllib.py”, line 26, in <module>
import socket
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\socket.py”, line 46, in <module>
import _socket
ImportError: DLL load failed: ÓÉÓÚÓ¦ÓóÌÐòÅäÖò»ÕýÈ·£¬Ó¦ÓóÌÐòδÄÜÆô¶¯¡£ÖØа²×°Ó¦ÓóÌÐò¿ÉÄÜ»á¾ÀÕýÕâ¸öÎÊÌâ¡£

Error finding shelf files:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “<stdin>”, line 1, in <module>
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\shelfutils.py”, line 8, in <module>
import assetdownload
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\assetdownload.py”, line 5, in <module>
import urllib
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\urllib.py”, line 26, in <module>
import socket
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\socket.py”, line 46, in <module>
import _socket
ImportError: DLL load failed: ÓÉÓÚÓ¦ÓóÌÐòÅäÖò»ÕýÈ·£¬Ó¦ÓóÌÐòδÄÜÆô¶¯¡£ÖØа²×°Ó¦ÓóÌÐò¿ÉÄÜ»á¾ÀÕýÕâ¸öÎÊÌâ¡£

Error finding shelf files:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “<stdin>”, line 1, in <module>
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\shelfutils.py”, line 8, in <module>
import assetdownload
File “CPROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.469/houdini/python2.6libs\assetdownload.py”, line 5, in <module>
import urllib
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\urllib.py”, line 26, in <module>
import socket
File “C:\PROGRA~1\SIDEEF~1\HOUDIN~1.469\python26\lib\socket.py”, line 46, in <module>
import _socket
ImportError: DLL load failed: ÓÉÓÚÓ¦ÓóÌÐòÅäÖò»ÕýÈ·£¬Ó¦ÓóÌÐòδÄÜÆô¶¯¡£ÖØа²×°Ó¦ÓóÌÐò¿ÉÄÜ»á¾ÀÕýÕâ¸öÎÊÌâ¡£

3040: Fatal error: Segmentation Fault

Saving application data to CDOCUME~1/ADMINI~1/LOCALS~1/Temp/bnw.3040.hip

ps: sorry for my English.

There is a much more recent H11 version, 775. You may want to try installing that version instead. The issue may have been resolved (there's nearly a year between builds 469 and 775).

Thanks twod, 11.0.775 does work.
And during the installation of 775, when c++ redist was installed, I came out a thought that it might be the lack of c++ redistribution component that led to the start-up failure of the 469 version. Because my system was quite “clean” when version 469 was installed.
If I have the time, I may try it out.