Running houdini at home on a laptop with Vista I get this random problem where Houdini 9.0.xxx refuses to start. hmaster.exe just crashes before even the splash screen has appeared. If it happens no amount of retries will get it to open but rebooting and trying again seems to fix it. H8.2.xx will start every time no trouble even after H9 has refused.

Anyone else seen this? Its hard to report as its so random and occasional.

Yes! I get this. The hamster dies (hmaster, really) immediately upon trying to start any of the 3D apps. It starts Mplay and Hkey fine.


Windows Vista 32bit
on a Dell Inspiron 9200 (ATi Radeon Mobility 9700)
Catalyst drivers around May this year:
- Driver Packaging Version 8.36-070314a3-045540C-Dell
- Provider ATI Technologies Inc.
- 2D Driver Version 7.01.01.622
- Direct3D Version 7.14.10.0489
- OpenGL Version 6.14.10.6465
- Catalyst® Control Center Version 2007.0322.2238.38535

I have this too.
toshiba qosmio
nvidia 7600 go, vista 32
core2 duo

That's almost the exact same spec as my laptop, but I think this is a vista issue not a hardware one.

Still its good to no its not just me. Vista is evil, all linux fanatics feel free to flame vista. :twisted:

well, I got vista a few months ago because I needed something that would keep up with sound cards / audio software etc and also do 64-bit. I've discovered that just about everything I've tried to run on it, even start up and shut down is slower / much slower.

The only thing that runs faster is the actual applications which allocate 64 bit, and use all the memory, once they are running anyway.

So, I'm switching to linux-64 and I've been plesantly suprised by how far the audio software and hardware has come since I last checked.

Anyone have any recs on video editing software for linux?

H8 seemed to work fine though although 3ds max crashes a lot more (ironic since it's made for windows), been too scared to try H9

Actually, the 64-bit builds of Houdini should have more usable crashlogs. It would help if these were sent in if anyone could try out Vista 64-bit. (Keyframe?)

FWIW, I run a Vista 32-bit desktop at home and don't seem to have any problems. Mind you, I don't really push Houdini through its paces though.

I think in my case it might've been the driver. It used to work with the driver that comes with the installation disks. The official Dell-sanctioned Catalyst driver might have been the thing that screwed it. I don't know. Or a Windows Update that probably happened in past few weeks broke it.

edward
FWIW, I run a Vista 32-bit desktop at home and don't seem to have any problems. Mind you, I don't really push Houdini through its paces though.

The only paces I've put it through are opening it and looking at new stuff in the help…. I really haven't done anything serious with it at all yet…

I suspect drivers too, since that's what it always is, but I've got it running nicely with H8 so until I'm ready to bin H8 I don't want to mess with them.

It's definitely a driver issue …I had to get the .69 drivers (geforce)
cause the newer ones were beta. The hmaster wouldn't load either. So roll
back and enjoy. :lol:

I mucked with my Ati drivers, trying to roll back and forward and installing whatever I could find on guru3d.com and I ended up back where I started - on driver 8.360.00 and it was crashing. I left it alone for a few days in total resignation but I just tried it now and it worked!

For some reason it insisted on spending a minute running hsvg.exe but it pulled through. I have no UISCALE or Preference set, so I was surprised to see hsvg.exe running, but it works now.

9.0.750.

My question is will it always run. What I'm seeing is totally random. One day it works the next it doesn't. Do a reboot and it works again. Is that the behaviour you guys have?

yup, that's certainly the behavior I have. Usually when I install a new build it won't work. I'll try it again a few days later and it'll work. :?:

It's not supposed to work that way!?

All… this…. time….

Is there a solution now for this problem ?

I don't know for sure but if I run my browser before opening Houdini it seems to be more likely to open…. I haven't any proof of this yet, i just noticed it may be connected.. just a hunch.