As you are already using 5.0 one source of possible problems can be the old
version. Most installs work fine, but the odd one sometimes plays up if you
don't uninstall the old version before installing the new one. I don't
expect this to be the problem as this is usually hardware drivers and
programs that are running (anything automatically started on boot that stays
running) when you install the new version. It's usually wise to stop the old
version before the install.
Perhaps David will let you know if there are any other people having
problems with 5.0 and whether uninstall 4.5 then install 5.0 works best.
It may be an interaction between Polar Insight 5.0 and something else
particular to your system. I very much doubt that Vcache is anything to do
with your real problem, it just encourages it to occur.
I had a bad interaction with some well known scanning software that for a
long time would not work unless I physically disabled my DVD & CD-Writer.
This was very repeatable so was much easier to track down, but it still took
many hours to find.
The fact that altering the Vcache settings seems to trigger the problem
suggests you have a nasty instability in your system These can be near
impossible to track down. I suspect quite a few people have the potential to
have these sorts of problems in their systems - particularly PC's where
there are endless combinations of devices and drivers. I'd definitely try
Prime95 as it is used by overclockers to find whether their systems can cope
with extreme timing settings. Any memory/cpu problems soon show up. You can
set it running at start up and continue to work with little noticeable
slowdown in performance it just mops up any spare resources.
You can set it to use upto 90% (enter 100% and it tells you the max) of
physical memory under options->cpu and it will still not effect your general
performance. If your PC has any cpu/memory (or overheating) problems the
program will throw up an error. If there is an error within a minute of
starting I suggest your problem has nothing to do with Polar Insight.
Sadly for us scanning and manipulating huge image files is quite stressful
and is always more likely to expose problems than editting a 3 page Word
document.
Steve
----- Original Message -----
From: "Stan Schwartz" <snsok@swbell.net>
To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
Sent: Wednesday, July 25, 2001 2:37 AM
Subject: RE: filmscanners: SS4000, Win98 and VCache settings
> Thanks. Good ideas here. Stan
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
> [mailto:owner-filmscanners@halftone.co.uk]On Behalf Of Steve Greenbank
> Sent: Monday, July 23, 2001 10:24 PM
> To: filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
> Subject: Re: filmscanners: SS4000, Win98 and VCache settings
>
>
> Changing the VCache settings should not alter the result, only the speed
at
> which you receive the result :- )Except where you hit the Win9x/ME bug
where
> you must set a value less than 512MB if you have more physical memory than
> 512MB.
>
> As this does not apply to you it suggests you have a problem elsewhere.
The
> fact that the new Vcache settings leave more physical memory available
might
> mean you have a physical memory problem in an area of memory not used by
the
> new setting. It may also be due to a physical memory problem being moved
to
> a more critical point. eg. dodgy memory used for picture storage may have
> almost undetectable effect on an image but would crash most programs if it
> was used for program code.
>
> Likely sources are:
> 1) Polarcolor insight problem (try re-installing - anyone else having
> problems - try 5.0)
> 2) Physical memory problem (try a decent memory tester or different memory
> or if you can, remove half at a time) - or try "torture test" in Prime95 (
> ) - this thrashes cpu & memory
> severely.
> 3) SCSI device or driver problem (try re-installing or removing other
> devices)
> 4) BIOS setup issue (careful with this as you can really screw your
machine)
> 5) Problem with a background process (eg.virus program) (remove all
> non-essential background processes)
> 6) Other device or driver problem (disable as many devices as possible -
> physical removal is better)
> 7) Software conflict problem (particularly related to other SCSI devices)
> (temporarily remove other devices)
>
> To check properly you will after to find a set of scan settings that will
> reboot your machine everytime - preferably immediately after just booting.
>
> Otherwise your current setting for MaxFileCache is a bit low and will
> probably slow your machine down. Using a value that is slightly larger
than
> your typical TIFF file can make open & save work much quicker provided you
> don't overly restrict available RAM to the actual programs. This can be
seen
> most clearly during a save operation. (eg 35mm 4000dpi is about 54MB 8bit
> and 108MB 16bit so try around 55000/110000 depending on whether you use a
> lot of 16bit files).
>
> Steve
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Stan Schwartz" <snsok@swbell.net>
> To: "Filmscanners (E-mail)" <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
> Sent: Monday, July 23, 2001 10:06 PM
> Subject: filmscanners: SS4000, Win98 and VCache settings
>
>
> > I use an SS4000 on a SCSI connection with a Win98SE 933 PentiumIII and
> 512MB
> > RAM.
> >
> > I was having some problems with the system doing a reboot in the middle
of
> > scanning a transparency, usually with Polacolor Insight. I posted that
> here
> > a couple of weeks ago and got some suggestions.
> >
> > I also use my computer for speech recognition software (not at the same
> > time, of course). In the process of tweaking the computer for better
> speech
> > recognition, I made some changes in the Vcache settings.
> >
> > After making those "improvements," I was unable to scan a single slide
> > without the system suddenly rebooting. It seems there is a connection
> > between these Vcache settings and the problems I have had.
> >
> > Does anyone have experience with tweaking the Vcache settings for a SCSI
> > slide scanner? I have used a couple of the shareware type programs that
> > suggest values for "power users" and "multimedia" and "low memory
> systems".
> >
> > I just changed the settings in system.ini to:
> >
> > [vcache]
> > MaxFileCache=16384
> > MinFileCache=3144
> >
> >
> >
> > The settings I had been using were min=0, max=131,000 (that was
> > approximate--it was a correct multiple) with chunk size specified as
4096.
> >
> > Now I can finish a scan, but I have no clue what the optimum setting
> should
> > be, or if it should be specified at all.
> >
> >
> > Stan
> >
> >
>
>
>
