Unexpected error opening catalog

[rogerkeith52]

I have my photos in a single catalog and Lightroom 5.7 will not open it because of the lock file.  I tried to delete the lock file is several ways without success because the process was being used by another application. I tried looking in Sample Manger and stopped a process, but this still did not let me delete the lock file. I would like to talk to a service agent and am willing to upgrade to the cloud application, but I need to solve this problem first.

How do I get someone on the phone?

[Just Shoot Me]

Is LR closed completely when you are trying to delete the LOCK file? Reboot and try again.

If LR is crashing on opening that could be a GPU option problem. See this post on how to disable the GPU option manually.

Could not call C function

[Just Shoot Me]

Oh you are using LR 5. No GPU option in that version, sorry for the confusion.

[Per Berntsen]

As far as I know, there is no phone support, only chat.

But there's a good chance that we can help you here on the forum.

If a lock file is present when you launch Lightroom, you should not get the Unexpected error message, but a message saying that the catalog is open in another application. Exactly which error message are you getting?

I tried looking in Sample Manger and stopped a process

Do you mean the Task Manager? What process did you stop? The one you need to stop is lightroom.exe, if it's running.

To make sure that no interfering processes are running, restart your computer, and then, before you do anything else, try deleting the lock file.

[rogerkeith52]

I have tried to delete the lrcat.lock file and get the following error.  I looked up this error and go a message that REGUtilities software could fix the error listed below, so I did that for about $1.26. I shutdown immediately afterwards and rebooted.  I check the Task Manager upon reboot and could see not LR processes running, but I still got this error.  My Lightroom version is 5.7.  I still have the download file "Lightroom_5_LS11_win_5_7" I use to upgrade from previous versions.  Would it help to run this?

[Per Berntsen]

Reinstalling in not going to fix the problem.

And I'm not familiar with I/O device errors, and don't know what that means.

But here's a workaround:

Create a new folder, it can be anywhere on your computer. Name it something like Lightroom Catalog 2.

Then copy the catalog file (whose name ends with .lrcat) and the previews folder (ends with .lrdata) to the new folder.

Double-click the .lrcat file in the new folder, and Lightroom should launch.

[Just Shoot Me]

It looks like you have a folder/file permissions problem. check the properties and Security tab of the properties window of the folder the catalog is stored in to see if your username is listed and has Full Control.

[rogerkeith52]

I have tried to change the permissions in the folder and drive that contain

the catalog, but it will not let me. I tried to run Lightroom as an

administrator and that does not work either.

On Sat, Jun 10, 2017 at 6:08 PM, Just Shoot Me <forums_noreply@adobe.com>

[Just Shoot Me]

rogerkeith52  wrote

I have tried to change the permissions in the folder and drive that contain

the catalog, but it will not let me.  I tried to run Lightroom as an

administrator and that does not work either.

On Sat, Jun 10, 2017 at 6:08 PM, Just Shoot Me <forums_noreply@adobe.com>

Then look at the TOP Level folder that folder is a Subfolder of for proper permissions. If the TOP level folder is restricted then you can't change the subfolder permissions.

I must ask where and how you got a message about this REGUtilities software. In any event DO NOT CLICK on whatever link is provided. More than likely your system is infected with something and need to be cleaned.

[rogerkeith52]

Something happened overnight and I was able to delete the lock file.

Lightroom 5 launched normally a few minutes ago. I do not know what

happened to cause this problem, and I do not know what happened to fix it.

The Backup file in the same folder as the catalog did not have critical

information in it when I when to be last night and It did this morning.

Chat complete from my end with not correct solution. Thanks to every one

who contributed.

On Sun, Jun 11, 2017 at 4:55 AM, Just Shoot Me <forums_noreply@adobe.com>

[Joe Foe Toe]

Just a hunch, maybe a reboot freed the .lock file from the clutches of a background process.

[Joe Foe Toe]

Roger, I'm just onlooking on this one, but I wanted to give you a heads up that many Internet sites seed error messages into Google to try to get you to purchase their registry clean-up software, and that rarely solves problems.

[rogerkeith52]

I was aware it might not work, but I did not have much to loose. Thanks