Vista is tough stuff

LaOs

So, I'm still trying to get used to Vista and it's a bit difficult. The problem that I have now is that it keeps shutting down MSN.

Specifically, when I double click on the taskbar icon to browse my contact list, a window pops up and says "Messenger has stopped working. A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available."

Then it closes the program and says Windows Data Execution Protection closed messenger. And I can't make DEP exclude MSN. Can anyone explain this problem to me and/or offer help?

iTunesIsEvil

What version of Messenger are you using? Is it Live Messenger 8.1? If not, update your version. Vista might not like older versions. Also, it may be pissy about some stuff being stripped out of Live if you used that one app that hacks out the ads etc in Messenger.

You can try disabling DEP altogether. Run cmd.exe as an Administrator. If you're an admin already just type cmd into the Start Menu's search bar and hit enter. Then paste this into cmd and hit enter:

bcdedit.exe /set {current} nx AlwaysOff

Reboot and you should be good...

[edit] I guess I should've mentioned disabling DEP also disables PAE. But unless you're running with 4GB of RAM in a 32-bit edition of Windows that shouldn't really hurt you...

LaOs

I'm at work and don't know what version of Messenger I'm running, but I can check when I get home.

What is PAE?

Thanks for your help.

LaOs

I know this was on the second page--sorry for that.


So, I don't know how to figure out what version of Windows Live Messenger I'm running, but I did download it directly from the MSN website, so I would imagine it's up to date.

How do I turn off DEP? It won't let me make Messenger one of the excepted programs in its protection plan. Help please?

Senjutsu

Control Panels -> System -> Advanced System Settings (it's on the left hand side) -> Click the settings button under Performance Options -> Data Execution Prevention tab -> Change the setting to "Turn on DEP for essential Programs and Services Only".

LaOs

Thanks Senj... It was on that though...

Senjutsu

LaOs wrote: »

Thanks Senj... It was on that though...

Then either you don't have the latest version of MSN, or something else is going on. It shouldn't have a problem running with that setting.

LaOs

I can't find out what version I'm running because I can't bring up the program itself to go to About or whatever. But, I did download it directly from MSN. I'll uninstall and reinstall again and see if it works.

But yeah, it is rather strange. Thanks for trying to help.

LaOs

Senjutsu wrote: »

LaOs wrote: »

Thanks Senj... It was on that though...

Then either you don't have the latest version of MSN, or something else is going on. It shouldn't have a problem running with that setting.

So, I hate bumping this again, but I uninstalled and then reinstalled Messenger (redownloaded it from MSN.com) and am having the same problem. Messenger will run, but when I doubleclick on the task tray icon to open Messenger (to, say, add a contact or whatnot) it closes down. If I don't try to open Messenger from the task tray and leave it minimized, MSN works fine.

The only time I've ever seen the options for DEP, that option Senj suggested was checked. If I check the other option I have, which is to have it run for everything except these excluded programs, it won't let me put Messenger as an excluded program, saying it has to run for MSN.

What might be the problem? Can I turn off DEP completely?

iTunesIsEvil

The command I pasted above turns off DEP completely.

LaOs

iTunesIsEvil wrote: »

The command I pasted above turns off DEP completely.

Right. Sorry, I forgot about that. But, as I asked before, what is PAE? Thanks for your help though.

iTunesIsEvil

PAE stands for Physical Address Extension. Basically what does is allow Windows (or any OS that supports the PAE flag on a processor) to address memory located past the normal limit for a 32-bit OS. So if for some reason you were wanting to shove 8 GB of RAM into a machine that ran 32-bit Windows, you could. You'd be a little crazy, but you could do it.

LaOs

iTunesIsEvil wrote: »

PAE stands for Physical Address Extension. Basically what does is allow Windows (or any OS that supports the PAE flag on a processor) to address memory located past the normal limit for a 32-bit OS. So if for some reason you were wanting to shove 8 GB of RAM into a machine that ran 32-bit Windows, you could. You'd be a little crazy, but you could do it.

Ah. Thanks. That shouldn't be a problem and I'll try that command line when I get home later today. Thanks for your help and explanation of PAE.