VS Ultimate 2018 now closes when left idle.

[Psyphus]

Good evening,

I've been using VS Ultimate 2018 for a few months now and this week it began closing by itself when left idle for about 5 minutes. Before this week, I was able to leave it idle indefinitely and it would only close when Windows 10 did an update or I manually closed it.

How might I fix this problem, since it's quite annoying having to reload it whenever it's idle for about 5 minutes? For the sake of clarity, it's not doing any software updates at the time of these closures.

Thank you in advance for your considerations and suggestions.

- Roger

[Old_Friend]

Have you tried running VideoStudio -- Off-line? Try unplugging your modem. VideoStudio will still be usable. That's always how I work, for privacy reasons.

[tletter]

I've been using VS Ultimate 2018 for a few months now and this week it began closing by itself when left idle for about 5 minutes.

I've never seen this behaviour nor can it be part of normally functioning VS. I'd suggest that you ensure that your AV software is up to date and then scan for malware.

tletter
https://www.youtube.com/user/tletter

[Psyphus]

Have you tried running VideoStudio -- Off-line? Try unplugging your modem. VideoStudio will still be usable. That's always how I work, for privacy reasons.

Good day,

Thank you for your suggestion. I tried your suggestion, but unfortunately VS Ultimate 2018 still closes after about 5 minutes of being idle. Any other thoughts?

- Roger

[Psyphus]

I've been using VS Ultimate 2018 for a few months now and this week it began closing by itself when left idle for about 5 minutes.

I've never seen this behaviour nor can it be part of normally functioning VS. I'd suggest that you ensure that your AV software is up to date and then scan for malware.

tletter
https://www.youtube.com/user/tletter

Good day,

Thank you for your suggestion. I agree. Until last week, I've never encountered that glitch either. I scanned my system for viruses and malware etc. as you suggested, but nothing was found by Bitdefender or Microsoft. Have you any other suggestions?

- Roger

[Davidk]

This sounds like you may be running VS on a laptop.
To be clear, laptops are generally configured to 'screen blank', 'sleep' or 'shutdown' when idle for specified periods of time, as battery saving measures. Desktops can be configured the same way, but power saving is not a focus since for those machines, power is a MUST for operation.

To find the controls for this, go to control panel, power options and check the settings for the plans you have. The timers for screen save, sleep and shutdown can generally be set for periods of 5 minutes, or multiples thereof, or never.

And if you have used VS for a while and this close or shutdown behavior is new, I would bet jelly beans you have had a windows update recently.

[tletter]

I've been using VS Ultimate 2018 for a few months now and this week it began closing by itself when left idle for about 5 minutes.

Are you saying that the operating system closes itself after 5 minutes of inactivity or just VS2018? If the former then check your Power Plan Settings (see image). If the latter then it's unusual.

tletter
https://www.youtube.com/user/tletter

[Psyphus]

This sounds like you may be running VS on a laptop.
To be clear, laptops are generally configured to 'screen blank', 'sleep' or 'shutdown' when idle for specified periods of time, as battery saving measures. Desktops can be configured the same way, but power saving is not a focus since for those machines, power is a MUST for operation.

To find the controls for this, go to control panel, power options and check the settings for the plans you have. The timers for screen save, sleep and shutdown can generally be set for periods of 5 minutes, or multiples thereof, or never.

And if you have used VS for a while and this close or shutdown behavior is new, I would bet jelly beans you have had a windows update recently.

Good evening, David K.,

Sorry for the delayed response. Although I am using a laptop for video editing, this has never been a problem before. Even while working on a personal project that took weeks to create and that I had open during that entire time, this problem did not happen. Since I use my laptop primarily for video editing, I have it plugged-in and kept on 24/7 and I have idle features (shutdown, sleep, hibernate, turn off drive, etc.) deactivated (ie. set to NEVER). I've also had the glitch occur a few times while using Corel VideoStudio.

I looked into the possibility of a recent Windows update, but no new updates happened in that time.

My thoughts are that while my computer surpassed the recommended requirements listed by Corel, the problem is likely that my laptop's processor is a 3rd generation i7 (about 7 years old). I read an article somewhere that most modern software designed for i5's and i7's are intended to be handled by newer generations of those processors (not necessarily old ones like mine), and so my 3rd generation i7 (for example) may not be able to keep up with the processing demands that newer software requires and newer i5's and i7's can still handle.

This explanation seemed to make the most sense to me. Besides that, my laptop has had issues with some other Corel VideoStudio features which baffled Corel's tech support. Especially since (according to them) there's nothing wrong with my laptop or its settings and everything should work fine. ... but it doesn't.

[Psyphus]

I've been using VS Ultimate 2018 for a few months now and this week it began closing by itself when left idle for about 5 minutes.

Are you saying that the operating system closes itself after 5 minutes of inactivity or just VS2018? If the former then check your Power Plan Settings (see image). If the latter then it's unusual.

erase.jpg

tletter
https://www.youtube.com/user/tletter

Hi T Letter,

Sorry for the delayed response. As I explained to David K, it has nothing to do with the Power Plan Settings. I've been using this laptop primarily for video editing for about 7 years now. Over the span of those 7 years, certain new features either did not work or they ceased to work with newer versions of VideoStudio. Corel's tech support, who went so far as to log on to my computer remotely to check my system and its settings, and requested a copy of the system dump file, were baffled as to why VideoStudio failed to function 100% on my system. They found no problems or conflicts or errors with the hardware or software, but some features in newer versions of VideoStudio still did not work 100% on my system.

When I did a lot more research (since May 2019) on what might be the problem, I came across an article or blog post somewhere that talked about software system requirements, and that it's not enough for software makers to list the minimum CPU requirements as "Celeron" or "i3" or "i5" or "i7" (for example), but they need to start listing the minimum year or generation of chipsets as well (eg. 4th generation Intel i5). The reason is that each generation of each particular CPU is better than the previous generation and may even include new features that previous generations did not have, which software companies might use and require for their software and all of its features to work properly.

As such, since my laptop has a 7-year-old 3rd generation Intel i7 processor, it probably lacks the processing power and perhaps even the features that newer i7 processors have, which some Corel VideoStudio features and some of its 3rd party plugins probably require to function properly. So even though my laptop beats Corel's suggested software requirements, it's a false positive because my old processor lacks newer features that are probably necessary for all of VS's features to function properly.

I hope that makes sense. If this is true, then what I need is a new laptop with an 8th or 9th generation i7.

[Davidk]

I don't think it's age you have to worry about - my class laptop for VS runs win7 and is about 5+years old, running an AMD A6 dual core cpu. A core i7 would be a luxury, but Corel hasn't updated VS to take advantage of multiple cores, so even that approach will not get you anything.

The issue/problem I think is one you've outlined - you leave it on 24/7. Back when Bill Gates was a boy, that was a recommended technique to improve the reliability of the computer electronics, esp the CRT display. Now-a-days, CRT's are history and computer electronics are extremely reliable, well able to cope with the 'shock' of power cycles on a daily (or more often) basis.

You may have heard of 'memory leakage', but if not, it's a situation where the OS assigns an app (or components thereof) working memory from a pool (the 'heap') and the app is supposed return that memory back to the pool for re-use when finished. Some don't, and as a result over time the assigned memory gets large but unused, and the size of the pool gradually reduces to the point where it becomes unusable. The problem was identified a decade or more ago as bad programming, and fixes were implemented. But it still happens, and the easiest solution at your disposal is simply to re-boot the computer regularly. It's not going to hurt the hardware any.

So, I suggest that you re-boot the PC daily and monitor the performance of 2018.

[tletter]

it has nothing to do with the Power Plan Settings. I've been using this laptop primarily for video editing for about 7 years now.

Earlier I asked if you're "saying that the operating system closes itself after 5 minutes of inactivity or just VS2018?" You didn't answer that I can find.

Over the span of those 7 years, certain new features either did not work or they ceased to work with newer versions of VideoStudio.

What features? Corel has some add-ins that are problematic.

it probably lacks the processing power and perhaps even the features that newer i7 processors have, which some Corel VideoStudio features and some of its 3rd party plugins probably require to function properly.

Unlikely but as stated some add-ins are problematic.

Somehow you're gone from a topic entitled "VS Ultimate 2018 now closes when left idle" to now stating that the problem is that "certain new features either did not work or they ceased to work". Hence it's hard to understand what issue you're concerned about. In any event, if VS is crashing then check the Event Viewer for related error messages.

tletter
https://www.youtube.com/user/tletter

[Psyphus]

I don't think it's age you have to worry about - my class laptop for VS runs win7 and is about 5+years old, running an AMD A6 dual core cpu. A core i7 would be a luxury, but Corel hasn't updated VS to take advantage of multiple cores, so even that approach will not get you anything.

The issue/problem I think is one you've outlined - you leave it on 24/7. Back when Bill Gates was a boy, that was a recommended technique to improve the reliability of the computer electronics, esp the CRT display. Now-a-days, CRT's are history and computer electronics are extremely reliable, well able to cope with the 'shock' of power cycles on a daily (or more often) basis.

You may have heard of 'memory leakage', but if not, it's a situation where the OS assigns an app (or components thereof) working memory from a pool (the 'heap') and the app is supposed return that memory back to the pool for re-use when finished. Some don't, and as a result over time the assigned memory gets large but unused, and the size of the pool gradually reduces to the point where it becomes unusable. The problem was identified a decade or more ago as bad programming, and fixes were implemented. But it still happens, and the easiest solution at your disposal is simply to re-boot the computer regularly. It's not going to hurt the hardware any.

So, I suggest that you re-boot the PC daily and monitor the performance of 2018.

Good morning, David K.,

Thank you for your response and suggestion. I remember those days when it was recommended that computers stay on to prolong its lifespan, and when desktops had a turbo button, and MS-DOS 6.x was recommended for running Windows 95, and Apple sued Microsoft for copying their interface, and Intel decided to call their processor "Pentium" instead of "80686," and when Plug N Play was new, and when Adlib sound cards were being replaced by the revolutionary and relatively new SoundBlaster sound cards (although other options briefly appeared for a time; I do miss my SB AWE32). Good times.

I should clarify my statement,

Since I use my laptop primarily for video editing, I have it plugged-in and kept on 24/7 and I have idle features (shutdown, sleep, hibernate, turn off drive, etc.) deactivated (ie. set to NEVER)

What I meant is that while working on a video-related project (or a PaintShop related project), I have my laptop plugged in and kept on 24/7. I'm not always working on a project, so it does take breaks between projects (that is, it's turned off, rebooted, the software is updated (if available), etc.). So it is rebooted and turned off regularly, and it shouldn't have that problem.
I also upgraded my HDD to SSD and reinstalled Windows 10 and Corel, but the problem remained unchanged on that laptop.

OS: Windows 10 (64-bit)
Motherboard: Toshiba Satellite P855 [2012]
Processor: Intel Core i7-3630QM CPU [2.40GHz]
Memory: 16 GB SODIMM
Video Card: integrated Intel HD Graphics 4000 + dedicated 2GB NVIDIA GeForce GT 630M
Sound Card: Realtek [High Definition Audio]
HDD: 512 GB SSD
Display: Toshiba (build-in)
Corel Software (Newest Version): VS Ultimate 2018; PSP Ultimate 2019

I recently bought a new laptop, so I'm in the process of reinstalling everything. When I installed older versions of Corel and tested them, I noticed that all the features on VS Ultimate X5, X9, 2018 that did not function on my old laptop worked perfectly on my new one, which is epic.

Once I have everything installed, I'll open that project that kept crashing and relink the files. My hope (based on everything functioning normally thus far) is that it will work, too.

Thank you!

[Psyphus]

it has nothing to do with the Power Plan Settings. I've been using this laptop primarily for video editing for about 7 years now.

Earlier I asked if you're "saying that the operating system closes itself after 5 minutes of inactivity or just VS2018?" You didn't answer that I can find.

Over the span of those 7 years, certain new features either did not work or they ceased to work with newer versions of VideoStudio.

What features? Corel has some add-ins that are problematic.

it probably lacks the processing power and perhaps even the features that newer i7 processors have, which some Corel VideoStudio features and some of its 3rd party plugins probably require to function properly.

Unlikely but as stated some add-ins are problematic.

Somehow you're gone from a topic entitled "VS Ultimate 2018 now closes when left idle" to now stating that the problem is that "certain new features either did not work or they ceased to work". Hence it's hard to understand what issue you're concerned about. In any event, if VS is crashing then check the Event Viewer for related error messages.

tletter
https://www.youtube.com/user/tletter

Good morning, tletter.

Thank you for your response.

Regarding your first question, it's only VideoStudio 2018 that closed. Windows 10 did not close, but I did try numerous soft reboots and numerous cold reboots to see if that would fix the problem.

Regarding your question about what features, it was often third-party features like SmartSound (VS Ultimate X5), which functioned initially but then stopped functioning indefinitely. When X5 was uninstalled, the computer rebooted, and X5 reinstalled, it still would not function. Windows 8 or 10 was reinstalled, X5 would again function initially but then it would again cease to function indefinitely.
Other third-party features that would not even function/run included Boris Grafitti 7 (VS Ultimate X9, Ultimate 2018), New Blue Titler Pro 5 (X9, 2018), and Boris Continuum Complete (2018).

Regarding your third question, my initial question is still the focus because it works but has some issues.
The relevance of the other examples is found in the context in which I mentioned them. That is, the article or blog that I read somewhere that argued that older processors lack the processing power and/or features that exist in newer processors, and most software companies that use newer CPU features in their products often fail to mention it in their system requirements. This perhaps explains why, although my laptop meets all of the system requirements, VS Ultimate 2018 closes when left idle. It would also explain (in retrospect) why some newer third-party features ceased to function or never functioned at all. (Please note that I often use terms like "perhaps" or "might" or "may" et al. when referring to things I'm uncertain about.)

As I noted to someone in an earlier post, Corel's Tech Support examined all of those things (and more). They did a full diagnosis, they downloaded the dump file and checked the error logs, they checked for any hardware and software issues that might be causing the problem. They found no reason why this (or any problem) should exist. Everything on that laptop is fine, and it meets the requirements.

That being said, as I noted to David K, I recently invested in a new laptop and installed Corel VideoStudio Ultimate X5, Ultimate X9, and Ultimate 2018. All of the features of X5, X8, and (thus far) 2018 work fine on this new laptop, which I expected because it has a newer i7 processor. So while the problem was never resolved on my older i7 laptop, it might not be an issue on this newer one---notice that I wrote "might" ... I will not know for certain until I work on a video in VS Ultimate 2018 (like the one I was working on in May) and leave it idle.
That will have to wait until tomorrow, though. I have other priorities that presently need attending.

Thank you.