Thumbnail Crashing System

[Tom H]

Hello,

I seem to be having a bit of a problem.

I have some video clips in a folder. When I open that
folder, it starts to give you the little preview
thumbnails of each of the clips, and then it eventually
crashes explorer. (not Internet explorer) Of course it
resets itself and comes back (minus some of the icons in
the lower right corner of the screen.

Now I can't figure out for the life of my why this has
started. I don't have any other programs installed that
mess with settings like this, or programs that want to
take control of the thumbnail process.

Now, of course, if I change that folders setting to Icons
or anything but thumbnails, it never crashes. Is there
some setting in Windows somewhere that I could look at or
maybe increase the size of or something?

This one just baffles me.

I'm using WindowsXP Pro SP1
P4 2.8Ghz
1024gb DDR
390GB Disk Space with over 200 still empty
ATI AIW Radeon (With latest drivers)
SB Audigy 2 (With latest drivers)
Pioneer DVD (Latest Firmware)
Plextor 40/12/40 CD-RW (Latest Firmware)
Plextor DVD-RW PX-708A (Latest Firmware)
Zip100 (IDE)

I think thats all that should be relevent for specs of
the machine if you needed to know.

Thanks for the help in advanced!

Take Care, Tom.

 

[Tom H]

Ok, thanks anyway!

I decided to try the horrible task of seeing if one of
the files in that directory was the bad boy.

After going through maybe 200 of the 400 files in there,
I finally found the one bad boy that caused the
problems. Seems the file was bad. Now that poses a new
question. I have had bad video files in the past. I work
with them all day long. Most of them I'm putting into
the system from a video camera for commercials and spots
and stuff like that. But in the past, they just would
not product a thumbnail. Now why was this one single
file able to take down explorer each and every
time?!?!?! Is this a case of "Now that it aint broke,
don't try to fix it?" Windows never stops to amaze me
anymore.

Will the questions never stop?!?!? Hee Hee!

Thanks for the help
Take Care, Tom!

 

[francis gerard]

Hello,

I seem to be having a bit of a problem.

I have some video clips in a folder. When I open that
folder, it starts to give you the little preview
thumbnails of each of the clips, and then it eventually
crashes explorer. (not Internet explorer) Of course it
resets itself and comes back (minus some of the icons in
the lower right corner of the screen.

[snip]

exact same problem here... it's one of *many* explorer bugs. there are
literally hundreds of serious bugs in explorer, and thousands in the OS
itself... not a joke, and not funny either, apparently the joke's on all us
windoze users who paid $hundreds$ for this high futz-factor, glitz and
glamour, but no substance piece of shit OS.

 

[francis gerard]

Hello,

I seem to be having a bit of a problem.

I have some video clips in a folder. When I open that
folder, it starts to give you the little preview
thumbnails of each of the clips, and then it eventually
crashes explorer. (not Internet explorer) Of course it
resets itself and comes back (minus some of the icons in
the lower right corner of the screen.

Now I can't figure out for the life of my why this has
started. I don't have any other programs installed that
mess with settings like this, or programs that want to
take control of the thumbnail process.

oh yeah... the workaround for the explorer-thumbnail crashing bug is to
disable thumbnail caching in explorer, then delete the 'thumbs.db' file from
the bad directory

- launch explorer, tools menu, folder options, view tab, check the box 'do
not cache thumbnails'

- open command (DOS) console on the folder with the bad thumbnails

- type 'del /f /ash thumbs.db' (no 'quotes')

note - if need be, you can also delete & refresh all thumbnail cache files
by entering 'del /f /s /ash \thumbs.db' at the command console

yes it's safe to wipe-out all the thumbnail cache files, and if thumbnail
caching remains enabled, explorer will simply re-create the thumbs.db file
whenever you open a folder containing cacheable objects (images, videos,
etc). reasons you might want to recreate/refresh the thumbnail cache is
when it gets corrupted, as per this article, or if you change the image
quality of thumbnails and then existing thumbnails no longer display
properly.

i curse M$ and this sad excuse for an OS

 

[francis gerard]

Hello,

I seem to be having a bit of a problem.

I have some video clips in a folder. When I open that
folder, it starts to give you the little preview
thumbnails of each of the clips, and then it eventually
crashes explorer. (not Internet explorer) Of course it
resets itself and comes back (minus some of the icons in
the lower right corner of the screen.

[snip]

exact same problem here... it's one of *many* explorer bugs. there are
literally hundreds of serious bugs in explorer, and thousands in the OS
itself... not a joke, and not funny either, apparently the joke's on all us
windoze users who paid $hundreds$ for this high futz-factor, glitz and
glamour, but no substance piece-o-crap OS.

 

[Steve N.]

Ok, thanks anyway!

I decided to try the horrible task of seeing if one of
the files in that directory was the bad boy.

After going through maybe 200 of the 400 files in there,
I finally found the one bad boy that caused the
problems. Seems the file was bad. Now that poses a new
question. I have had bad video files in the past. I work
with them all day long. Most of them I'm putting into
the system from a video camera for commercials and spots
and stuff like that. But in the past, they just would
not product a thumbnail. Now why was this one single
file able to take down explorer each and every
time?!?!?!

Glad you got it sorted out

It depends on what part of the file is corrupted. If the header is
corrupt it will problably not produce a thumbnail, but if the header is
ok and the data portion of the file is corrupt the system will have
problems trying to read the data portion. Unfortunately it seems that it
doesn't take much to make Explorer crash and reload. In my thinking the
shell (explorer.exe) should be robust enough to recover from a data read
error and report accordingly but not crash and reload. At least Windows
is designed to reload the shell when it bombs out, the benefit is that
you don't usually need a restart to keep working and open apps are
usually unaffected. The detriment is that some background processes
don't restart automatically when the shell reloads, that's why some
items are missing from the Notification Area (aka System Tray, lower
right end of taskbar). Also unfortunate that the things missing after a
crash and reload of Explorer usually are a/v and a/sw active protection
(in my experience), so a restart would be prudent anyway to keep
protection active. At least this Windows behaviour allows you to save
data and restart without loss of data, so it's not a totally terrible
design.

There are a number of things that can cause file corruption but I'd
start with doing thorough disk checks to make sure your drive is not
developing bad blocks. Running the disk diagnostic utility from the
drive manufacterer isn't a bad idea either.

Is this a case of "Now that it aint broke,
don't try to fix it?" Windows never stops to amaze me
anymore.

Will the questions never stop?!?!? Hee Hee!

The more we learn the more questions arise. Nothing wrong with that.

Thanks for the help
Take Care, Tom!

You too,
Steve

 

[Hilary Karp]

Write your own or use something else.

Hello,

I seem to be having a bit of a problem.

I have some video clips in a folder. When I open that
folder, it starts to give you the little preview
thumbnails of each of the clips, and then it eventually
crashes explorer. (not Internet explorer) Of course it
resets itself and comes back (minus some of the icons in
the lower right corner of the screen.

[snip]

exact same problem here... it's one of *many* explorer bugs. there are
literally hundreds of serious bugs in explorer, and thousands in the OS
itself... not a joke, and not funny either, apparently the joke's on all us
windoze users who paid $hundreds$ for this high futz-factor, glitz and
glamour, but no substance piece-o-crap OS.

 

[Kelly]

I hear that!

To the OP:

For AVI:

AVI Search Remove (Line 74) Causes Explorer to Crash
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm

Thumbnail issues:

If you are using TweakUI: Go to: Explorer/Thumbnails
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/downloads/powertoys.asp

And move the slider back to a lower setting (2 notches from highest)
Also Change 96 to 32.

Then go to Windows Explorer/Tools/Folder Options/View and check: Do not
cache thumbnails.
Then go to: Start/Search: thumbs.db. Once found, delete it.

or.....run this edit:

Disable Thumbnail Cache (Line 25)
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm

/xp_tweaks.htm

Taskbar Repair Tool Plus!
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/taskbarplus!.htm

Write your own or use something else.

Hello,

I seem to be having a bit of a problem.

I have some video clips in a folder. When I open that
folder, it starts to give you the little preview
thumbnails of each of the clips, and then it eventually
crashes explorer. (not Internet explorer) Of course it
resets itself and comes back (minus some of the icons in
the lower right corner of the screen.

[snip]

exact same problem here... it's one of *many* explorer bugs. there are
literally hundreds of serious bugs in explorer, and thousands in the OS
itself... not a joke, and not funny either, apparently the joke's on all
us
windoze users who paid $hundreds$ for this high futz-factor, glitz and
glamour, but no substance piece-o-crap OS.

 

[francis gerard]

Write your own or use something else.

how trite and thanks for contributing nothing of value to this discussion

move on

 

[NoNoBadDog!]

It is not the OS...one of the video files is corrupt. Try moving them one
at a time from a command line to a new forlder, and then try to open the new
forlder after each move. When the new folder crashes, the last file you
moved there is the corrupted one.

BTW, I concur that if you are gonna b*tch about Windows, then either buy a
Mac, switch to linux, or writye your own OS if you think you cna do better.
How many cars are recalled every year? How many consumer products are
recalled every day? Yet you are willing to chunck Windows because you have
a corrupt file that causes the thumbnail view to crash? Get a life...

Bobby

Write your own or use something else.

Hello,

I seem to be having a bit of a problem.

I have some video clips in a folder. When I open that
folder, it starts to give you the little preview
thumbnails of each of the clips, and then it eventually
crashes explorer. (not Internet explorer) Of course it
resets itself and comes back (minus some of the icons in
the lower right corner of the screen.

[snip]

exact same problem here... it's one of *many* explorer bugs. there are
literally hundreds of serious bugs in explorer, and thousands in the OS
itself... not a joke, and not funny either, apparently the joke's on all
us
windoze users who paid $hundreds$ for this high futz-factor, glitz and
glamour, but no substance piece-o-crap OS.

 

[Hilary Karp]

As much value as you did. It strikes right to the point. Take your
rants elsewhere.