Premiere Pro CS4, random unexpected crashes

Andy Wason · August 9th, 2009, 03:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Adam Gold

Noa's absolutely right; the more assets you have in the project panel, the more unstable Premiere gets. Premiere also hates titles, stills and graphics; if you have a lot of those, be prepared to save often.

.

Yes Adam I agree, CS4 + all the dynamic link crap work great for 10 minute projects. Get into a wedding or a feature and you're in big trouble.
My most stable system right now is my HP core2 quad 6600 with 4Gb, premiere 2.0 and my old Matrox rt.x100 (which was never stable under any other configuration before). Only good for SD though!
My premiere pro cs4 running on an HP Athlon phenom x4 9150e quad core with 8Gb and 64bit vista is pretty much unuseable. I edited a short (3min) sequence, and the damn thing wont even let me export it. Media encoder gives me an error every time (cant find project file in a a certain location). Probably some vista security issue.

Mitch Hunt · August 10th, 2009, 05:41 PM

I've been working on a VERY resource intensive project. Premiere was crashing over and over. Then I got an idea, and increased the virtual memory exponentially (20GB). And it hasn't crashed once since then! But I guess only time will tell if the problem really has been fixed.

Floris van Eck · August 13th, 2009, 08:06 AM

Just dropping by here.

This is exactly why I switched to Mac and Final Cut Pro a year or so ago. Adobe Premiere CS2 kept crashing all the time and I couldn't figure out why. I had been using Sony Vegas before that and it never crashed. Not once. But I didn't really like the Vegas interface. I just like the old-school Avid like two monitor up and timeline down view which Vegas doesn't have. I have been running Final Cut for over a year now and it practically never crashes. If it does (like once or twice a month) it is mostly because I am also encoding, working in DVD Studio or doing lots of other stuff on my computer (like running Parallels Virtual Machines).

All of this is stupid. Adobe charges you $1599 for the suite. Most of the programs work fine (Photoshop never crashes on me) but Premiere has been crashing since CS2. We are now 2 versions ahead and they haven't fixed it. Now that's a big shame on you Adobe.

I am also convinced that's the exact reason why Final Cut Pro has like 50% of marketshare, followed by Avid and I think Sony Vegas. Premiere Pro is just a laugh. I still hope they fix it one day because I like Dynamic Link and After Effects, Encore and Photoshop.

Andy Wason · August 23rd, 2009, 03:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mitch Hunt

When working on a project, large or small, Premiere will randomly close with no error message. I'm editing HDV footage. My system specs: 4GB 800Mhz RAM, Intel Core 2 Duo @ 3.16Ghz, 1TB RAID 0 hard drive and Vista Ultimate 32bit. Any ideas?

Mitch, as a strat, go into task manager, look at all the processes running and google every one of them.Unisstall everything that you don't want. There's a load of rogue apps on windows that are not well conditioned and can cause problems for premiere.

Pete Bauer · August 24th, 2009, 05:14 PM

Getting past all the OT rants about other software and platforms...
Mitch, how have things been going with CS4 since the virtual memory tweak?

And to chime in with Adam and Andy, Adobe is very clear that CS4 demands a lot of memory (and system specs in general). You'd do better with a 64 bit OS and more RAM, esepcially considering you "only" have a dual core processor and don't have your clip files on a dedicated drive. Many people will not put other software on their editing computer, and at the very least you do need to make sure the system is optimized, lean, and clean. Even simple stuff like regular defragging and CHKDSK can make a significant difference.

All that said, I've been successfully running CS4 Master Collection on a laptop with a mere Core2 9550, 4GB RAM, single drive, and XP32 loaded with other applications -- and successfully edit AVCHD footage. Not as speedy as my main editing box, but gets the job done. So I'm really wondering what else might be the problem with your system. Have you run a quality set of hardware diagnostics, especially Memtest on it?

Dimitris Mantalias · August 25th, 2009, 04:09 AM

Some Premiere CS4 problems can be solved by tweaking, upgrading etc. But the fact is that CS4 is responsible for the majority of problems, because it's a buggy product, simple as that. In different machines, with various setups and different Windows, sooner or later you'll get your crash (almost never occured in CS3). And you'll get your crash without using any external plugins, the standard ones do the job.

Also true about the software slowing down when too many clips are loaded. This is unacceptable for a program that is considered to be for professional use. Not only this never happened in CS3 (at least, not like that), but it is slower at editing and rendering for the exact same projects. One will say that CS4 is slower because it's more complicated, but it doesn't stand out. Exporting a two camera editing with light color correction needs, say, 2 hours in CS3 (I am talking HDV) and 2:40 in CS4. And the bugs in many effects (black screens in time effects) are absolutely annoying.

Not that successful as a product, if you ask me.

Mitch Hunt · October 28th, 2009, 08:51 PM

Hey guys,

I spoke too soon. Premiere still crashes incessantly with HDV footage. I have some more information that may help.

1. Premiere has been rock solid with SD footage, it's HDV that I'm have all the problems with.
2. When a HDV project is first opened, Premiere works great but after a while it begins to bog down and becomes unstable.
3. The more effects and animations used the more unstable it becomes.
4. It begins to slow down after scrolling through a long list of thumbnails in the project bin, and loves to crash right after closing the title creation window.
5. Seconds before each crash the hard disk activity light will go solid and Premiere will freeze and then crash.

If it will increase stability I'm thinking about separating my two raid 0 drives and getting a external eSATA (any suggestions?) drive. Using the first dive for Windows and programs, the second for the video files and the external for preview files. How does that sound? Thanks!

Adam Gold · October 28th, 2009, 10:35 PM

We've all -- or at least most of us -- experienced all the problems you describe, and all I can say is what I said way back in Post #2: Welcome to Premiere. What you are describing is very typical behavior.

To risk being repetitive, your chip is underpowered, you don't have enough RAM (because your OS won't support it) and your disks are too small and not arranged optimally.

My PC has 8 fast cores and a 7 x 1TB disk array in RAID3, and Premiere still locked up all the time, just as you describe. The only way I made it better was to go to Vista 64 and up my RAM to 20GB. It still behaves erratically, but much, much less than before. Even with this, you need to set your auto-save to 5 minutes or less, and learn how to use it. And even then you need to do a hard save after you do anything complicated that you don't feel like repeating, and be sure to reboot about once per hour to clear the memory leak. Once you establish a good workflow, you'll start to recognize the signs of an impending crash and you can do a quick save and exit before anything bad happens.

To directly answer your question: yes, the disk setup you've described will definitely help somewhat, but won't solve your memory management and CPU problems.

There's really no getting around Premiere's hardware demands. You can't reason with it -- you can only succumb. Those of you who are married know what I'm talking about.

But you know all this already. Every prior response in this thread had told you exactly what you need to do.

Noa Put · October 29th, 2009, 01:36 AM

Quote:

be sure to reboot about once per hour to clear the memory leak

Same here, I"m not sure if the memory leak is causing the problem but can't think of any other reason;after an hour I start to loose audio during playback if I'm playing the timeline. This only happens if I have more then one audiotrack and on one track the audio will go on and off every 10 seconds. Once I reboot the pc the problem is gone. That might be a new feature as premiere is telling me to take a small break? :)

Brian Barkley · October 29th, 2009, 06:01 AM

I am not a computer geek. I'm ignorant when it comes to all the technical talk in here. However, I can tell you that CS3 was much more stable than CS4. In fact, I'm not in love with all of the new features of CS4. For example, making all of the audio levels even in Soundbooth was a feature that I was looking forward to. But I will never use it because it brings up the background noise right along with the low levels of a scene. This is unacceptable. The System Memory thing has been a problem. Rebooting every 2 hours has helped big time. And, currently, my present documentary is running 3 hours (end product to be around 2 hours). So I have six timelines with around 30 minutes each. This has also helped.

I like having all of my assets in the Project Panel. But perhaps I should clear as much as possible.

Thanks to everyone for their input here. I work alone in my basement, in my "man cave", and I have no where else to go in a moment's notice.

Mitch Hunt · October 29th, 2009, 09:04 AM

I just found out that my machine is capable of handling 8GB of ram. So, I might buy Win 7 64 bit and upgrade ram to its max. This along with the hard drive tweaks should help cut down on the crashes, correct?

Does anyone have any suggestions on what e-sata external hard drive (to use for preview files) I should buy?

Marty Baggen · October 29th, 2009, 10:31 AM

Mitch... I've been using a Simpletech external RAID via eSATA for a couple of years.... very reliable with good performance.

A heads up with Windows 7. Apparently there are some known issues (with various motherboards) with onboard eSATA. Oddly enough, my eSATA worked perfectly under Windows 7 RC.

If you discover that once you get your eSATA set up and Windows 7 doesn't recognize it, you may want to consider simply getting an eSATA PCI card... it instantly solves the problem for 20 to 30 bucks.

BTW... I've always had my preview files and source footage on the same RAID without any issues. If you haven't trialed Cineform, I suggest you do. It lightens the load on your system in a big way.

Mitch Hunt · October 29th, 2009, 12:05 PM

How about the Iomega Professional 1TB eSata external drive?

Product Page: Professional Desktop eSATa/USB Hard Drive: External Hard Drive by Iomega

Newegg.com: Newegg.com - iomega Professional 1TB USB 2.0 / eSATA External Hard Drive 34280 - External Hard Drives

Marty Baggen · October 29th, 2009, 12:18 PM

Mitch... I would strongly urge you to get an external RAID, as opposed to a single eSATA drive.

Simpletech and others, are makes of dual drive (or more) RAID enclosures, preconfigured and ready for connection.

The responsiveness of a RAID 0 is superior to a single drive configuration.

August 24th, 2009, 05:14 PM	#20
Pete Bauer Wrangler Join Date: May 2003 Location: Eagle River, AK Posts: 4,100	Getting past all the OT rants about other software and platforms... Mitch, how have things been going with CS4 since the virtual memory tweak? And to chime in with Adam and Andy, Adobe is very clear that CS4 demands a lot of memory (and system specs in general). You'd do better with a 64 bit OS and more RAM, esepcially considering you "only" have a dual core processor and don't have your clip files on a dedicated drive. Many people will not put other software on their editing computer, and at the very least you do need to make sure the system is optimized, lean, and clean. Even simple stuff like regular defragging and CHKDSK can make a significant difference. All that said, I've been successfully running CS4 Master Collection on a laptop with a mere Core2 9550, 4GB RAM, single drive, and XP32 loaded with other applications -- and successfully edit AVCHD footage. Not as speedy as my main editing box, but gets the job done. So I'm really wondering what else might be the problem with your system. Have you run a quality set of hardware diagnostics, especially Memtest on it? __________________ Pete Bauer The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. Albert Einstein Trying to solve a DV mystery? You may find the answer behind the SEARCH function ... or be able to join a discussion already in progress!

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August 10th, 2009, 05:41 PM	#17
Mitch Hunt Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Broken Bow, NE Posts: 145	I've been working on a VERY resource intensive project. Premiere was crashing over and over. Then I got an idea, and increased the virtual memory exponentially (20GB). And it hasn't crashed once since then! But I guess only time will tell if the problem really has been fixed.

August 13th, 2009, 08:06 AM	#18
Floris van Eck Major Player Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: The Netherlands Posts: 993	Just dropping by here. This is exactly why I switched to Mac and Final Cut Pro a year or so ago. Adobe Premiere CS2 kept crashing all the time and I couldn't figure out why. I had been using Sony Vegas before that and it never crashed. Not once. But I didn't really like the Vegas interface. I just like the old-school Avid like two monitor up and timeline down view which Vegas doesn't have. I have been running Final Cut for over a year now and it practically never crashes. If it does (like once or twice a month) it is mostly because I am also encoding, working in DVD Studio or doing lots of other stuff on my computer (like running Parallels Virtual Machines). All of this is stupid. Adobe charges you $1599 for the suite. Most of the programs work fine (Photoshop never crashes on me) but Premiere has been crashing since CS2. We are now 2 versions ahead and they haven't fixed it. Now that's a big shame on you Adobe. I am also convinced that's the exact reason why Final Cut Pro has like 50% of marketshare, followed by Avid and I think Sony Vegas. Premiere Pro is just a laugh. I still hope they fix it one day because I like Dynamic Link and After Effects, Encore and Photoshop.

August 25th, 2009, 04:09 AM	#21
Dimitris Mantalias Major Player Join Date: May 2009 Location: Arta, Greece Posts: 342	Some Premiere CS4 problems can be solved by tweaking, upgrading etc. But the fact is that CS4 is responsible for the majority of problems, because it's a buggy product, simple as that. In different machines, with various setups and different Windows, sooner or later you'll get your crash (almost never occured in CS3). And you'll get your crash without using any external plugins, the standard ones do the job. Also true about the software slowing down when too many clips are loaded. This is unacceptable for a program that is considered to be for professional use. Not only this never happened in CS3 (at least, not like that), but it is slower at editing and rendering for the exact same projects. One will say that CS4 is slower because it's more complicated, but it doesn't stand out. Exporting a two camera editing with light color correction needs, say, 2 hours in CS3 (I am talking HDV) and 2:40 in CS4. And the bugs in many effects (black screens in time effects) are absolutely annoying. Not that successful as a product, if you ask me.

October 28th, 2009, 08:51 PM	#22
Mitch Hunt Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Broken Bow, NE Posts: 145	Hey guys, I spoke too soon. Premiere still crashes incessantly with HDV footage. I have some more information that may help. 1. Premiere has been rock solid with SD footage, it's HDV that I'm have all the problems with. 2. When a HDV project is first opened, Premiere works great but after a while it begins to bog down and becomes unstable. 3. The more effects and animations used the more unstable it becomes. 4. It begins to slow down after scrolling through a long list of thumbnails in the project bin, and loves to crash right after closing the title creation window. 5. Seconds before each crash the hard disk activity light will go solid and Premiere will freeze and then crash. If it will increase stability I'm thinking about separating my two raid 0 drives and getting a external eSATA (any suggestions?) drive. Using the first dive for Windows and programs, the second for the video files and the external for preview files. How does that sound? Thanks!

October 28th, 2009, 10:35 PM	#23
Adam Gold Inner Circle Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Woodinville, WA USA Posts: 3,467	We've all -- or at least most of us -- experienced all the problems you describe, and all I can say is what I said way back in Post #2: Welcome to Premiere. What you are describing is very typical behavior. To risk being repetitive, your chip is underpowered, you don't have enough RAM (because your OS won't support it) and your disks are too small and not arranged optimally. My PC has 8 fast cores and a 7 x 1TB disk array in RAID3, and Premiere still locked up all the time, just as you describe. The only way I made it better was to go to Vista 64 and up my RAM to 20GB. It still behaves erratically, but much, much less than before. Even with this, you need to set your auto-save to 5 minutes or less, and learn how to use it. And even then you need to do a hard save after you do anything complicated that you don't feel like repeating, and be sure to reboot about once per hour to clear the memory leak. Once you establish a good workflow, you'll start to recognize the signs of an impending crash and you can do a quick save and exit before anything bad happens. To directly answer your question: yes, the disk setup you've described will definitely help somewhat, but won't solve your memory management and CPU problems. There's really no getting around Premiere's hardware demands. You can't reason with it -- you can only succumb. Those of you who are married know what I'm talking about. But you know all this already. Every prior response in this thread had told you exactly what you need to do.

October 29th, 2009, 06:01 AM	#25
Brian Barkley Major Player Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Overland Park, KS Posts: 233	I am not a computer geek. I'm ignorant when it comes to all the technical talk in here. However, I can tell you that CS3 was much more stable than CS4. In fact, I'm not in love with all of the new features of CS4. For example, making all of the audio levels even in Soundbooth was a feature that I was looking forward to. But I will never use it because it brings up the background noise right along with the low levels of a scene. This is unacceptable. The System Memory thing has been a problem. Rebooting every 2 hours has helped big time. And, currently, my present documentary is running 3 hours (end product to be around 2 hours). So I have six timelines with around 30 minutes each. This has also helped. I like having all of my assets in the Project Panel. But perhaps I should clear as much as possible. Thanks to everyone for their input here. I work alone in my basement, in my "man cave", and I have no where else to go in a moment's notice.

October 29th, 2009, 09:04 AM	#26
Mitch Hunt Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Broken Bow, NE Posts: 145	I just found out that my machine is capable of handling 8GB of ram. So, I might buy Win 7 64 bit and upgrade ram to its max. This along with the hard drive tweaks should help cut down on the crashes, correct? Does anyone have any suggestions on what e-sata external hard drive (to use for preview files) I should buy?

October 29th, 2009, 10:31 AM	#27
Marty Baggen Major Player Join Date: May 2005 Location: monroe, or Posts: 572	Mitch... I've been using a Simpletech external RAID via eSATA for a couple of years.... very reliable with good performance. A heads up with Windows 7. Apparently there are some known issues (with various motherboards) with onboard eSATA. Oddly enough, my eSATA worked perfectly under Windows 7 RC. If you discover that once you get your eSATA set up and Windows 7 doesn't recognize it, you may want to consider simply getting an eSATA PCI card... it instantly solves the problem for 20 to 30 bucks. BTW... I've always had my preview files and source footage on the same RAID without any issues. If you haven't trialed Cineform, I suggest you do. It lightens the load on your system in a big way.

October 29th, 2009, 12:05 PM	#28
Mitch Hunt Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: Broken Bow, NE Posts: 145	How about the Iomega Professional 1TB eSata external drive? Product Page: Professional Desktop eSATa/USB Hard Drive: External Hard Drive by Iomega Newegg.com: Newegg.com - iomega Professional 1TB USB 2.0 / eSATA External Hard Drive 34280 - External Hard Drives

October 29th, 2009, 12:18 PM	#29
Marty Baggen Major Player Join Date: May 2005 Location: monroe, or Posts: 572	Mitch... I would strongly urge you to get an external RAID, as opposed to a single eSATA drive. Simpletech and others, are makes of dual drive (or more) RAID enclosures, preconfigured and ready for connection. The responsiveness of a RAID 0 is superior to a single drive configuration.