Windows 7 - Crash Win7 pro 64 - Photoshop Cs4

Do you like a challenge?

Sorry guys, first post. I know this is a graphics package crash but I'm lead to believe my problem might be OS related, not program specific. Thought you guys might know what to do.

Ok, this is what I sent to the Adobe Forums as I thought it was only Photoshops fault:

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Anyone got any ideas please on how to stop Photoshop CS4 crashing on Save for Web in 64 bit version of Windows 7?

Running Windows 7, 64 bit Pro with both 64bit and 32bit versions of Photoshop CS4 installed.

The problem: I design a website, add slices etc as I've done for the last 10 years, go to Save for Web and as the dialogue box is opening and the blue bar at the bottom starts to show it loading, it gets just over half way and then crashes, saying the error message 'Adobe Photoshop CS4 has stopped working'. No solution available and then closes. Does this quite a few times (say 20-30%) of the time but not always. Tried the same PS document running 32bit version of Photoshop CS4 and it saves for web fine, never any crashes, only using the 64 bit version of PS. Need 64bit to take advantage of extra memory etc and one of the reasons the machine/ software combo was bought for.

Running a brand new (well about a month or so) Dell T3500 dual Xeon W3505, 12gb ram, Nvidia Quadro Fx 3800, Raptor HD etc built to run Win 7 Pro and CS4 Extended. I suspect the spec isn't to blame, checked all the hardware etc, no plugins that arent standard with a new install, so no obvious reason I can tell of as to why its not working. Not much else installed and started playing up before I installed other bits of software so doent make sense it might be other software cauing any problems.

Put a support query in and basically got told CS4 wasnt tested with 64 bit CS4 and directed to a possible support solution to 64 bit running on xp/ vista with general advice. No use whatsoever.

Firstly, anyone else having the same problem? Secondly, anyone know how to solve this? If its any help, I've pasted the Action Center info on one of the many crashes:


Description

Faulting Application Path: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS4 (64 Bit)\Photoshop.exe

Problem signature



Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: Photoshop.exe
Application Version: 11.0.1.0
Application Timestamp: 499bfd16
Fault Module Name: Save for Web.8BE
Fault Module Version: 11.0.0.12
Fault Module Timestamp: 48d3966d
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 000000000007e1a0
OS Version: 6.1.7600.2.0.0.256.48
Locale ID: 2057
Additional Information 1: 9d66
Additional Information 2: 9d660f0d14b8fce02b9e5a9838f791c7
Additional Information 3: d5f3


The graphics card supports the new GPU features but tried with and without those turned on - still the same problem. Tried all sorts of preferences on and off but still no joy.


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Basically got an answer from one forum user saying the following:

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"Been reading up on that c0000005 error and in all the Operating systems it is a access violation. There are a lot of hits about windows 7 and software not being allowed local access and be saved that way too. What I think is that windows 7 is not allowing it for some reason in 64 bit mode or some security setting in the local needs adjusting?

I found this interesting fact
I was reading where testors were monitoring how windows 7 firewall allows DRM to run in the firewall. All the software they tested asked first for firewall permission (my software on my system asked first so know it is true on my other system). However, according to the testers, with PS CS4 the DRM does not ask to run with firewall premission. Windows 7 just bypasses the asking part and PS CS4 DRM gets firewall access."

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Anyone know if this is a correct answer or any other thoughts? Also, would appreciate and suggestions on how to solve this please.

Thanks.

Musings upon your post:

- It is safe and actually preferable to ignore any and all "technical" advice from the forum user in question.

- The only thing they got right is that 0xc0000005 does indeed mean STATUS_ACCESS_VIOLATION. However, the information is by itself useless as the majority of application crashes are in fact "access violations" (AV from now on). Bad data comes from somewhere, bad data is employed, bad data causes wild memory read or write attempt to somewhere completely funky, OS catches attempt, goes "no, you can't do that", BOOM, crash AV!

- The actual "module" where the AV is being encountered is "Save for Web.8BE". Those 8BE files are executable binaries that Photoshop uses for various purposes such as filters. They are analogous to DLLs. Hence, it could be said that the crash occurred in a Photoshop module called "SaveForWeb.DLL", but that's not news to you either.

- The "exception offset" is in this instance far more interesting than the "exception code" (AV), and the number is 0x7e1a0. In decimal, it means that code precisely 516,512 bytes from the start of "Save for Web.8BE" is where the crash occurred. To an Adobe developer or senior support person, that info is vital because it allows them to look up their source code and find what they're attempting to do at that precise location, and hence why it might be going wrong to the point of crashing.

- The "fault module timestamp" (0x48d3966d) is in a format called "UNIX time", and it corresponds to precisely this: Fri, 19 Sep 2008 12:09:17 UTC. Since your version of "Save for Web.8BE" is now more than a year old, it's possible that Adobe have by now released an updated version which may include bugfixes for this issue. It's worth investigating the availability of such an update.

- While I'm confident that the crash is not caused by a bug in the OS (all CS4 users would be reporting the same thing), it may not be in CS4 either. Your machine could be somehow different from most others running CS4 on Windows 7 in terms of other ancillary code which is somehow interfering with the save and causing a crash. That's a roundabout way of saying "it may be your anti-virus utility so test what happens when you uninstall it completely".

- By far the best and most direct way to troubleshoot this would be to get the attention of somebody relatively senior within Adobe who would take the time to analyse a memory dump generated during the crash. Since they have access to the CS4 source code, they're best-placed to explain why the crash is occurring without guessing and making you jump through trial-and-error hoops in the hope of eventually hitting upon some combination which works.

- If you can't seem to make Adobe treat you seriously, we can give it a shot, but to the best of my knowledge nobody here works for Adobe and therefore we won't have access to their source. To us, their modules will appear to be very "black box". It's worth a shot though, so please consider going through the following procedure to collect the info necessary to attempt to debug the crash:

[2-Int] Generating a memory dump for a crashing process

If nothing else, the memory dump that will be generated during this procedure will be useful to Adobe in trying to understand the issue, should you ever manage to get through to an adult over there.

Very helpful post, thank-you. I'll try and see what I can do and see if I can get Adobe to look into it with the new info you've provided.