Forums Bug Reports After 2 months of Vista, constant crashes

I was running mIRC fine with Vista for a good while, until I noticed my logfiles/config files weren't being changed.

Once I moved my folder from Program Files to D:\ , that problem was solved.

A few days ago, I rebooted after running Windows Update, and when I connected to my normal server, mIRC crashed.

I started the program again, but cancelled auto-connect, and after waiting for 10 minutes, no crash.

I connected manually, joined no channels, just idled in the status window, and 30 seconds later, mIRC crashes.

I've tried disabling Aero Glass, run in compatability mode for XP, 2000, and 98, running as Administrator, and adding to the DEP exception list. All of these things did not prevent crashes.

The program crashes consistently 30 seconds after connect, and the only other noticeable difference in operation is a lag between running the program (the program window pops up) and the auto-connection starting.

Is this enough information to get started on a diagnosis? I really feel this problem happened suddenly -- I haven't done any major changes in hardware or software in the last few days other than a memory upgrade.

Not a lot to say here, i run vista on a dual core box, and mIRC 6.21 runs better on this box than it did on my XP box. Seems to be a lot of varied problems on vista, *touch wood* not had any.

At the beginning of your post you stated that you performed a windows update, and the issue started afterwards. Then near the end you said no major changes in hardware/software.

Personally, i would concider and issue starting right after a windows update somewhat linked to the software changes (even if you dont concider them major, you still admitted to the update right before it started which tells me you acknowledge the suspect timing)

Anyway, that said, it could be useful to provice a little more information on the particular updates that you processed at that time. You could also try rolling back / uninstalling those particular updates, if the issue stops after the rollbark/uninstall then you can try adding them back one at a time to see if there is any specific update that is causing the issue.

Alternatively it could not be related to the updates at all, judging from your post i am assuming you never rebooted after moving mirc to d:, not until performing updates that may have required the reboot. It is possible that something in windows that is causing the issue was no activated until after the reboot. But it certainly doesnt hurt to rule out the updates as a direct or indirect cause.

Thanks for the reply Om3n.

I've consulted my logs, and the crashes started on Apr 1, 2007. Joke's on me, I guess.

The day before (3/31), I installed an update that reads: "Install this update to resolve reliability issues with some USB hardware devices and controllers." I don't think that's the issue.

A few days after (4/3/2007), I installed an update that solves: "A security issue has been identified that could allow an attacker to compromise your Windows-based system and gain control over it." It could be this, but I am not technical enough to go into it. The link given is here: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=84687 -- It talks about some Elevation of Privilege vulnerabilities, but until I started having crashes, I was not running this program as Administrator.
I will roll back this update and see what develops.

I reboot my computer often, and I had in fact rebooted many times since moving to D:\mIRC on 3/12/2007.

I've uninstalled both the recent updates with no successs. I also tested my memory for errors using memtest86+, and the memory passed all tests after an hour. (3gb is a lot of memory to test...)

Here is the error message I receive every 30 seconds after connecting:

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: mirc.exe
Application Version: 6.21.0.0
Application Timestamp: 4565c21f
Fault Module Name: ntdll.dll
Fault Module Version: 6.0.6000.16386
Fault Module Timestamp: 4549bdf8
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 0006089e
OS Version: 6.0.6000.2.0.0.256.4
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: 74e7
Additional Information 2: beea8309ec58a0464c96405b75577c80
Additional Information 3: 79f5
Additional Information 4: 58fd9e46ef49b5eb4e29e4b0a859e72c

Is there anything I can do short of wiping Vista and going back to x64?

Have you tried installing a clean copy of mIRC 6.21 with no scripts/dlls/etc. to see if the problem continues? If your mirc.ini or other mIRC files were damaged in some way this may be the cause of the problem. The lag you mention between running mIRC and auto-connecting could indicate this.

I just did that, and I haven't crashed yet. Thanks for the idea!

I wasn't running an excessive amount of scripts, so I'm probably going to go through and start comparing the clean install to my old install, and see what went wrong.

I would guess that a "poorly designed" DLL is causing the problem, focus your attention on those scripts that use DLL's.