I posted a message a while back about how all versions of Poser make my PC crash... my monitor goes black after a while and I have to re-boot... I got plenty of replies with useful suggestions. I took my PC back to the shop and they have fitted a new, different graphic card and memory chip... it still does it! I am at my wits end!.. they have offered to change the motherboard and processor and I am going to get them to do it! Does anybody have any idea why Poser, and no other application, does this... it is as if the signal to the monitor is suddenly cut... Curious labs won't respond to my many calls, faxes and e-mails... Bob

Hmm..sounds like a hardware problem..as if it was the poser software itself many other people would be asking the same thing...

Does it happen only when you are rendering? Or does it happen when you are working in the program. Noel

I can work for up to 10 mins or more... renders great and fast...several times.. then it just goes...nothing to do with rendering..or content.. I recently reinstalled P4... didn't work.. went after 5 mins.. content, render resolutions, settings.. tried it all...doesn't make a difference.. everything is updated, no conflicts....not the graphic card, memory or monitor.. I've had two of each.... for specs check out my previous message..

I'm at the end of my tether!

my old pc runs poser ok... just slow... thats why I got a new one...and to use the latest textures and models... I can't believe this is happening!... why me! it's a high spec PC that can crash with just basic P4 stuff...but it runs all my other apps fine... including Bryce 3D...

Message edited on: 10/16/2004 18:31

The only thing I can think of that causes applications to act funny is installing with an antivirus program running during the installation. If you are running an antivirus program, turn it off, backup your Runtime folder and do a re-install. If you have a constant on internet connection, disconnect from your computer until the install is finished. If Poser will start, start you virus program and re-boot. See if Poser runs or crashes. If it runs OK, reconnect to the internet. Special note if you are trying to run on any type of network you will have problems.

Must admit antivirus was on when I installed... I'll try it...

Did they check your fan when you had it in the shop? Often, when computers crash or shut down only when Poser is running, it's the fan. The computer slows down or shuts down when it gets too hot. And few programs put as much demand on the processor (and hence generate as much heat) as Poser.

Another thing to check is make sure XP isn't putting your system to sleep. If you have sleep settings on, and don't touch the keyboard/mouse for a little bit (like when rendering) it can shut down everything and a lot of the times it won't come back on :) - Noel

The heat idea is still a possibility though I'm not sure you'd be able to run Bryce renders without a similar effect after a while. Is there any difference between running Poser on a cold, freshly booted state and running it when the machine is already well warmed up? Presumably, it would run a bit longer when starting cold. I don't remember if you are running XP or 98. It would be much more likely to have an application crash the entire OS under 98. I assume that it is entirely dead i.e. you can't alt-tab to another running application. You said it has nothing to do with rendering. Do you mean that even if you work in Poser and don't render it crashes? Did you try running with absolutely everything else off. I know there are references for turning off extraneous services in XP, and of course, no AV, no network, no firewall, etc. Grasping at straws, is your setup directory structure identical, you don't have Poser files referencing stuff that doesn't exist on your new setup (though that shouldn't cause a crash)? Do you have copy of Poser installed in another location - really grasping :-) Did you run the 4.03 update for Poser 4? I can't imagine why something like a bad AGP slot or a faulty motherboard would only act up under Poser. I'd have to guess heat or more likely memory. You could try running a memory defragger. I use FastDefrag and CL used to recommend another one on their site. That way you could monitor the memory usage and see if something (perhaps Poser) is just eating all your memory and try recovering before it drops too low. Again I'm not sure that would cause the crash without any error message except the monitor input. It's frustrating that you can't get a response from CL--I think calling them is going to be the only solution there. Frankly though, I'm really not sure they could suggest anything that hasn't been said here before. Poser 4 is an old application and it normally should just about run on a Etch-A-Sketch in good working order so this is a real puzzler.

It can also happen that weak power supplies cause crashes. Rendering in Poser will max out the CPU load, and modern CPUs use quite a lot of power. A power supply that is not able to deliver that reliably can cause crashes and reboots. This happens especially with fast graphics cards and hard drives.

Power sounds as plausible as anything else at this point. I'm no engineer so I don't know how much the increment in CPU usage is from Poser to say Bryce. If the PS was borderline anyway (defective/undersized) it could happen. I'm wondering though if you have a CPU crash or memory error why don't get a Windows error message (or why the system doesn't just freeze)? It seems as if the thing is cutting off the video or sending out an illegal video signal before the throwing an OS error so you get the video signal error. It's almost as if it is video related. I don't know enough about hardware to know if that's valid. The only other non-expert suggestion I can think of is get ahold of a benchmarking or diagnostics utility that will put a load on the CPU and memory, preferably maxing them out. If it crashes the same way then you should hopefully be able to narrow it down to one or the other. It's fun to speculate on possible causes but I know it's no fun for you. I hope you get it figured out soon.

One way to check to see if the problem is heat is to open the case, and run the computer with the case open. If it's better, the problem is likely heat.

Could be a combination of both heat and power supply, since the fan runs off the power supply. Both should be fairly cheap fixes.

I recently had a fan failure. The computer's only a couple of years old. I've had computers that were a lot older, and the fans were fine, but I guess they're not making 'em like they used to. I only had a problem with Poser. Vue was fine, but Poser slowed to a crawl.

You might try going to PCPitstop.com, and running their diagnostics. It's free, and no adware or spyware will be installed (though you may have to drop your firewall temporarily).

Modern Video cards are power hogs; many require a seperate connection to the power supply to power parts of the GPU and memory. If only one rail off the supply was weak, that could cause the video outage without crashing the system.

That sounds right Dale but I wonder why Poser 4, -- which is supposed to make such low demands on the video card that pretty much any mediocre card will do will do -- would be the only application causing the problem?

... I use Poser 5 on OS X.3 and it's PERFECT ;-)

My machine does that ( acts like someone turned the monitor off) when it gets too hot. My fan sucks... anyways it does it for me with other programs too. I'm usually in the middle of something really important too.

Now have a different graphic card and memory... still crashed!... re-installed P4 with antivurus off, got 3 half hour sessions with no crashes!!... then after another half hour got a blue screen crash... on rebooting I noticed the cpu temp was 54 degrees C.... I think that might be a little hot for an AMD 3200 XP...

Attached Link: http://www.thecardcooler.com/shopcart/CPU_Cooling/cpu_cooling.html

It's been a long time since I wnet throgh the heat thing, but I seem to recall that mine was crashing at around 40+ but I'm not sure. How hot does it get if you do a long render in Bryce? You might want to check with these folks (link). I got a GlobalWin cooler and haven't had any heat related problems since then. I also got an extra case fan as well just to be safe.