Project 2003 crashes when using filters

Niek,
MS Project 2003 (Standard, Pro?) is relatively stable, not known for regular crashes.
Does it crash with EVERY project on this PC?
Alexandre

Hi Alexandre,

We use 2003 Professional, which is indeed relatively stable.

The PC’s have been used for quite a while by full-time schedulers who have had no problems with 2003 until a few weeks ago. (The entire department has received exactly the same updates (via Radia) but only three users have the problem.)

Their problems seems to be completely unrelated to the mpp because every schedule crashes.

I’ve found a similar issue in the MS blog: http://www.microsoft.com/communities/newsgroups/en-us/default.aspx?dg=microsoft.public.project&tid=7fbf5ffe-1959-4f25-99ad-aa775230e0bc&p=1

Cheers,

Niek.

I am running 2003 Standard and getting similar problems. However out of 14 people working with it here only I have the problem.

I think it may be memory related?

Will more RAM solve this?

Regards,

Paul

Paul, Nieck,
I am arunning MSP 2003 Pro and 2007 Std on a AMD Sempron 3000+ based Compaq des ktp, with Windows XP Home SP2, and my MSPs do not crash often.
What is the size of your project files? Both number of tasks and file size, please; your problem could come of a too large number of views, tables, filters, etc... being saved in the file, have a look at Tools, Organize and see how big are the lists in the rightmost column.
In case, send the file to my email box: afaulxbriole@orange.fr
Hope this helps,
Alexandre

I’m afraid the problem is not memory related as it occurs with any size file; even one with just two activities.

On my laptop (HP NC4010 with 1Gb RAM) I run up to 25Mb schedules with >10,000 lines and a huge stack of views, filters, modules, groups, etc. etc. and I’ve got no issues.

On the PC’s that have the problem we have done a complete re-install so all the filters, tables and views are back at the default values. (the problem persists)

I suspect it is related to an MS Office patch (not even necessarily MSP) because these users had no problem until a few weeks ago.

Normally, I’m a pretty resourceful guy, but in this case I’m clueless to be honest.

Cheers,

Niek.

Nieck,
so the only way is to install a fresh MS Windows and MS Office with no patch on your PC
Too bad, that means a good full day of unnecessary work
Alexandre

Nieck/Alexandre,

My file sizes are typically 20mb, about 3k -4k lines and a few views filters etc.

The reason I thought memory was some of the MSP messages told me to close other applications blah blah.....

I have increased the virtual memory and it seems somewhat better.

I am going to try having my laptop upgraded to 1gb RAM from 512mb. I’ll let you know if it helps

Paul,
you should try to reduce the file size by deleting anu unnecessary item in Tools, Organize; 20 mb is not in proportion with your number of tasks, and much to big for MS Project
Alexandre

Paul,

Also remove any unused baselines because these can take up a quite some space.

Also, a "save as" to another file name can help in reducing file size. A 4000-line schedule should be around 6-8Mb.

H.T.H.

Niek.

Thanks Chaps,

Paul

We have found the problem!

It is not specifically related to MSP 2003; in fact you’ll probably have the same issue in MSP 2007 as well. Using any pull-down menu in a cell will cause a restart.

The combination with MS Project and HP fingerprint software (ProtectTools) turns out to be a bad one. Disabling the fingerprint device seems to be an effective workaround for now. To be continued...

H.T.H.

Niek.