PDF Printer Crashes

[dpollard]

Hi Guys,
I'm a relatively new user to Bullzip. I finally got sick of PDFCreator

My users have reported that Bullzip Printer crashes now and then. They can't tell me the exact steps to make it happen.
When I try and make it crash I can't do it.

I found the following event in the Application log.

This is from my RDP Server Windows 2008 R2 SP1 but I believe Windows 7 Workstations are doing a similar thing.
I should work on the Remote Desktop server problem first and it Impacts more users.

Has anyone seen errors like this before?
Any Ideas how I could further diagnose this?

Thanks in Advance for any assistance.

Regards
David

Log Name: Application
Source: Application Error
Date: 07/01/2015 11:43:00 AM
Event ID: 1000
Task Category: (100)
Level: Error
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: ServerName.MyDomain.local
Description:
Faulting application name: gui.exe, version: 10.8.0.2282, time stamp: 0x5406d50c
Faulting module name: audiodev.dll, version: 6.1.7601.17514, time stamp: 0x4ce7b722
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x00001bf0
Faulting process id: 0x41d8
Faulting application start time: 0x01d02a12d86db40f
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files\Bullzip\PDF Printer\gui.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\system32\audiodev.dll
Report Id: 2135da93-9606-11e4-8103-00155d020a0f

[jr]

Hi David,

I have just had a support request from a Dutch user with a similar problem. It happened approximately 20% of the time when users pressed one of the browse buttons in the application. They also had the problem on a Windows Server 2008 R2. It only happens if users are connected using RDP. It does not happen if someone is logged in on the console.

My suggestion is that we do a remote support session to work on this together. I cannot reproduce this problem in my development environment or any of the test servers. I will contact you via email.

Best regards,
Jacob

[jr]

RESOLVED (maybe):

By forcing the setup to use .NET 2 instead of .NET 4 the problem has gone away. It is suspected that 3rd party programs are registering DLLs for rendering thumbnails on the system and these make the common dialogs crash when browsing for a save location.

Regards,
Jacob

[jr]

I can see on the internet that many other software packages are experiencing this problem with .net 4. As a possible fix I have created a possibility to force the use of .net 2 instead of 4.

When you install it you should use the command line switch /USEDOTNET20 like this:

Setup_BullzipPDFPrinter_VERSION.EXE /USEDOTNET20

You can get the latest version here:

http://www.bullzip.com/products/pdf/download.php

Please let me know if it changes anything

Regards,
Jacob

[dpollard]

Hi Jacob,
Just to complete this thread. I have had no reported crashes since making the changes to the way Bullzip is installed.

So it is all good.

Thanks again for your help and determination to figure this one out.

David

[jr]

More research shows that other people have this problem with the common dialogs for opening and saving files. It seems to be a problem related to Windows Server 2008 R2. Even Notepad have been reported to have the same issue.

It may help to change the DEP (Data Execution Prevention) setting. Here is a Microsoft article about DEP.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/875352#5

Ohter users report that it helps to change it from "DEP for all programs and services except those I select" to "DEP for essential Windows programs and services only".

Please post your own observations here.

/Jacob