Application locks up

[Rich Simpson]

This is a recent development (within the last 3 days) where I am working on an image in Photo 2.5.6, the application locks up the entire PC, and I have to power cycle the machine to begin working again. I can work without interruption as long as Affinity Photo is not running. With in 15 to 20 minutes of launching the application and opening an image (ARW to exposure settings to duplicating the layer once to work on edits, merge down, and Export as a jpg). No new software has been added, no Windows updates prior to Affinity photo hanging up the workstation. I have deleted the app and performed a clean install and it still happens. I have been using the application since April of this year with no issues.

[walt.farrell]

Welcome to the Affinity forums, @Rich Simpson, and apologies for the delayed response.

There shouldn't be any way that a user-mode application such as Affinity Photo can lock up the entire system. The OS (Windows) is designed to protect against applications and keep things running. That implies that the issue is with the OS, or a driver, such as a GPU driver. 

If you're still having this problem, my first suggestion would be to open Settings within Photo (Edit > Settings, or Ctrl+, by default), and on the Performance section disable Hardware Acceleration (OpenCL) if it is currently enabled. Then restart the application and see if that resolves the problem.

Or, alternatively, uninstall 2.5.6 and reinstall 2.5.5 and see if that resolves the issue. (But I would first try the OpenCL suggestion.)

[DDRitter]

Maybe it's the drivers (IDK), but I just experienced a total Hardware lock (no mouse, music playing converts to a single noise sound, nothing worked but pressing reset) after updating to affinity photo 2.5.7 this morning and zooming on an image.

So... something is definitely happening.

Edited December 28, 2024 by DDRitter

[R C-R]

4 hours ago, DDRitter said:

So... something is definitely happening.

Yes, something is happening, but it cannot be anything related to updating AP if your entire computer (Mac, Windows?) locked up unless maybe you somehow managed to download a bogus version containing malware from an unauthorized site.

Where did you get the update from? BTW, the current version is 2.5.7, not 2.5.6.

[DDRitter]

You are right. I updated to 2.5.7 this morning, from the official site, of course.

I was running a lot of software at the time, but since I was actively using AP and I found this thread by googling... IDK. I'm just somehow scared. ^^

I'll update this if it locks again while I'm not using the program (or if it locks again while I'm using it).

So far, so good.

[R C-R]

44 minutes ago, DDRitter said:

So far, so good.

Unfortunately, I think the most likely reason for the complete lockup of your computer is a failing hardware component. Often, this is due to a failing RAM module. You have not said if you are a Mac or Windows user but for either one you should be able to find some sort of hardware diagnostic test that might help pinpoint the cause of this.

Note that if it is a failing RAM module it may be necessary to run an extended diagnostic text for many hours before it shows up.

I hope I am wrong about this & it is something much simpler & easier to fix.

[DragonRR]

Same problem. V 2.5.7.

Complete system lockup, frozen screen, no blue screen, had to power cycle the PC. At the time I was zooming out using CTRL -. However I repeated this action after the reboot several times with no problem.

My PC is completely stable, I use Fusion 360, Autocad, email, word, excel, play taxing games on it - cyberpunk, Warhammer etc..

Note that I have run memtest86 for 8 hrs (recently) with no errors, ditto Prime 95.

No events in the event log other than that the previous shutdown was unexpected.

System temps are low as you would expect with almost no load.

System has no overclock on any component.

Whilst i cannot completely rule out hardware; given a complete lock is really unusual and you have 3 other users reporting the same - I would be 90% sure this is the Affinity software causing this.

Spec:

Asrock Taichi Lite X870

AMD 9800X3D

Corsair 6600MT Titanium RAM - 96gb

Samsung 4TB NVME + others.

MSI 4090 graphics card with latest drivers

Windows 11

[walt.farrell]

1 hour ago, DragonRR said:

Whilst i cannot completely rule out hardware; given a complete lock is really unusual and you have 3 other users reporting the same - I would be 90% sure this is the Affinity software causing this.

The Affinity software cannot lock up the system. One of the functions of the OS is to ensure that a user-level application can't do things like that.

So, if the system is locking up it is either the hardware, or a system-level component like a driver doing it.

That does not mean that Affinity is blameless, of course. It may be doing something such as making a graphics call, and the data it is passing may be:

• legitimate, but confusing the driver, and the driver then locks up the system; or
• incorrect, and the driver is not properly validating it, and is then locking up the system.

Arguably, both of those are the driver's problem in the end, for either having a direct mistake or not properly protecting the system from incorrect user-level data.

Or, Affinity might try to use too much virtual memory, and lock up the system with paging or swapping. Again, arguably, that indicates a Windows issue for not protecting the system properly from that user-level action.

[DDRitter]

I'm almost sure that it's something related with the driver-software communication. I have a brand new PC and the only program that has that behaviour is Affinity Photo (it's the one I use most of the three). The other day It just hanged while I was leaving and the program was asking if I wanted to save the opened files.

No other big programs were open and I only did a few operations.

I also checked my RAM and everything works flawlessly.

I am trying now the disable hardware acceleration option and we'll see if it happens again.

Thanks to everyone who has answered this thread.

[ttb]

I too have recently started having this problem - using affinity photo and randomly the entire PC locks up. Sometimes when using a filter, sometimes when saving my work (really annoying after producing a masterpiece and it's all lost), sometimes just starting the program does it. Most of the time it works OK but I'm losing faith in it. I use many applications and only affinity photo 2 is doing this.

The only thing to have changed recently on my PC is the Windows 11 auto update to version 24H2. Can't remember if I was having this problem before or after the update.