Blender does not start at all - Win xp

Hello,

Blender does not start at all.
I tried to start it by clicking on blender.exe.
The console window opens for a short time. Then nothing happens.
When I tried to start it from the console window by typing “blender” I get the massage:
Writing: C:\DOKUME~1\FRANKF~1\LOKALE~1\Temp\blender.crash.txt
I checked this file an it just says “# Blender 2.70 (sub 0), Commit date: 2014-04-10 11:49, Hash f93bc76”

I did not find related entries in Dr Watson, or the eventlog accessible by microsofts management console (MMC). My Virusscanner Bitdefender did not log to have blocked anything at that time, neither.

I also tried to start Blender as admin - did not help.

Any ideas to solve this problem?
Are there settings (for a start from commandline?) I can use to force blender to log in more detail what it does when it starts?

I am using Blender 2.70 on XP with Service Pack 3
AMD Athlon™ XP 2400+
2,5 GB RAM, 2 GHz
Graphic Card AMD Radeon HD 3450

Thanks
Frank

Blender download page says: “If Blender reports an error on startup, please install the Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package. 32bit / 64bit” http://www.blender.org/download/

It’s been awhile but I seem to remember start and crash is the symptom (not just an error report as stated).

Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package (x64)
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=15336

Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 SP1 Redistributable Package (x86)
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=5582

Hope this helps. Welcome to BA Forums.

-Larry

Hi Larry,
thank you for your quick(!) reply.
I checked that: I had Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Redistributable installed, also 2008-x86 9.0.30729.17 and 2010 x86-10.04.40219
Is that enough C++ (or too much?)

Frank

The computer is very old, probably the GPU or its driver does not support Blender. You can try to update your GPU driver, but I don’t think there is much that can be done.

I remember also an issue with special characters in a user name. I can’t tell by your posted path but it does look German. Try creating a user name with non-special characters and launching under that desktop.

By the way: yesterday I found somebody’s question about the new 2.71 test build (32 Bit) and he/she mentioned that it will not run under Win XP (a message with “is not a valid 32 Bit application” pops up).
I found it interesting to know, whether 2.71 will support the old Win XP or not, since I think that could be important for some fellow Blender users out there and they should know, if so.

By the way this is the error message:


is not a valid 32 Bit application
winxp sp3
what’s wrong?

Same here. 2.71 doesn’t work (test builds) or is flaky (buildbot builds always missing libiconv-2.dll and having instability with crashes on smoke and some other sim behavior).

I think it’s time for us XP users to figure out dual booting with some variant of Linux. (Not happy with a forced upgrade that costs $$, so gotta find a free alternative. Yet it must still allow for the old XP OS to be used to run all the other old software and legacy devices.)

Personally I’m looking at the Mate branch of Linux Mint, but if there are any other lightweight alternatives that work well with AMD/ATI chipset graphics, I may be open to suggestions.

Well, I would recommend to upgrade instead of trying to use dual boot or solutions like this, since it is a benefit to have more than 4GB RAM on your system, as well as more than (usually) 1.7GB per application.
(I understand the issues about costs, though.)

But as he said there in the comments (http://www.blendernation.com/2014/05/26/blender-2-71-test-build-released/ ) I also think it would be just nice, when the Blender Foundation could make it official and notify users instead of let them run into trouble. Sure XP is old and it’s no longer supported by MS, but if this is not just an issue with the test builds, users should be informed whether XP support will be dropped.

Edit:
I found an answer. :slight_smile:

We will compile Blender 2.70 with MSVC 2008 still, and do the switch to MSVC 2012/2013 for Blender 2.71. Warning: When we do the switch, Windows XP support most likely will be discontinued.

However it would be still nice to make that official and to state that also on blender.org for everyone clearly to see.
Obviously not everyone reads the “developer meeting notes” (and especially not that of last december).

*** So the answer to all people discovering that the 32 Bit 2.71 test build will not run on their Win XP is that from 2.71 on support for XP is discontinued. ***

You need to install the latest Visual C++ Redistributables Visual C++ V12 for Visual C++ 2013

Latest Supported Visual C++ Downloads
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=40784

VC++ 12 vcredist_x86.exe

With that the ‘official’ Blender 2.71 RC1 will load. I haven’t tested full functionality yet but I did get it loaded. The ‘Legacy’ builds are missing the Libconv-2.dll file.

Just to double check, you are running the 32Bit version of Blender, not the 64 Bit one?

WinXP is 32bit. With Win 7 you get your choice but not XP it’s 32bit only. Just kind of making the statment that support hasn’t ended for WinXP as far as I know it’s still working if you get the latest VC++ redistributable. Cheers

Hi try RC2, there was an error in the RC1 version.
No Visual C++ Redistributables are needed.

http://download.blender.org/release/Blender2.71/

Cheers, mib

There were also 64-Bit versions of XP, but Ronson2k3 is right usually it’s only been 32-Bit.
I tried with my mother’s laptop; she still has one with XP. Indeed: the official test builds before did not work, but the latest RC2 does.

Afaik you can make builds for XP with MSVC 2013, but you have to set that as target (v120_xp in 2013, v110_xp in 2012).

Since the devs mentioned some issues with switching to MSVC 2013, maybe they’ve changed something.
But yes, it is right: while even with the latest VC++ redistributables the official test builds from before do not work, RC2 does.

I get the “…\blender.exe is not a valid Win32 application.” message.
I’m using the ZIP 64-bit version, d/l’d from different servers just to makes sure it wasn’t a bad d/l.
My OS is Win XP Pro x64 (SP2)… so the 64-bit version of XP.
As this OS is based on Windows Server 2003, not the original XP kernel, I’m still getting MS updates (as recently as this past week).

I also downloaded and installed vcredist_x64.exe & vcredist_x86.exe for 2012 per above link.
vcredist_arm.exe was listed as a required d/l on the MS page as well, but running that reports that it’s not a valid Win32 app either.

Fun times… looks like Linux is the only option aside from dropping the $$$ for the new os.

P.S this is with the “official” Blender 2.71 64-bit ZIP download.

@Ran13 that’s indeed strange.
I can only confirm that 2.71 works on XP (as 32-Bit), like stated on blender.org

Did you try the RC2 before? If yes, did it fire the same message?
You write you have the VC++ 2012, but do you also have the 2013?

vcredist_arm.exe was listed as a required d/l on the MS page as well, but running that reports that it’s not a valid Win32 app either.
I wonder vcredist_arm.exe was listed as a required :confused:
But when running this file also fired such a warning maybe you have issues with your connection so that d/l files could be corrupted (same for the Blender 2.71 64-Bit ZIP)…

d/l’d the 32-bit ZIP, and it runs fine.
RE-d/l vcredist’s for 2013. including vcredist_arm.exe. With same results.
_x86.exe & _x64.exe initiate “repair” mode… let 'em do their thing. (???)
_arm.exe still elicits the “not Win32 app” error.
re-d\l’d 64-bit ZIP of 2.71… same result: not Win32 app.

P.S. re-boots 0’plenty throughtout. :wink:

P.S.S.
Never got a chance to test RC’s. Not enough hours in the the day. :frowning:

Just a final word to that:

Windows XP x64 is not supported by the 64 bit builds of blender. They require a full patched vista or newer. and we recommend windows 7 SP1 or newer there

juicyfruit, Tue, Oct 7, 11:26 AM (GMT-3), https://developer.blender.org/T42124#261497