Captivate Stability

[mcheek]

Is there some way to overcome the instability that Captivate 2 exhibits during use? I save my projects VERY often, but the program still becomes unstable and requires shutdown and restart.
Thanks!

[Captiv8r]

Hi mcheek

From where I stand, it's hard to answer that question. Personally, I've never known Captivate to be unstable. Then again, I don't do things such as:

* Record really long projects (100+ Slides)
* Work on projects while they are stored on a network
* Record using Full Screen mode

Any of these things can make Captivate appear to be unstable. Perhaps if you can fill us in on how you are using it we might offer some clues.

Cheers... Rick

[mcheek]

Thanks for the note, Rick!
My project is nowhere near 100+ slides, but i do have a lot of branching in the project. Only minimal full motion use as well.
It seems that after a period of time, Captivate becomes unresponsive. For example, I will try to edit, then save a project. When I attempt to open another project, Captivate tells me that the project is unsaved and prompts me to save it. I then save the project (again), and retry opening another project. Again, I receive the same prompt to save my work. I then have no recourse but to close Captivate and then restart it.
Also, I'm curious if there will be updates to the application and whether these will/are available for download.
Best,
Mike

[Timbre4]

There is something to this; the suggestion to save a project gets a bit haphazard (multiple instances) under some circumstances.

Relatedly, if a project won't open, you may be asked to save it (again) and then it may or may not open. If I open a known good different project, then try to open the desired project it will now open.

My project is 59 slides with audio for each and it refuses to preview. This is the subject of a separate post....

[Timbre4]

UPDATE:

When confronted by known good projects failing to open as "corrupted", loading anothe project works but also a restart of the program seems to cure this as well.

Another discovery was that when no MP3 files could be imported ("faled to decode" or similar msg), a re-start allowed MP3 files of any values I cared to introduce.

Maybe stability is not the correct term; flakiness comes to mind.

[Timbre4]

Relatedly: Preview / Publish

If you are seeing black screens alternating with bits of screen or gibberish, this is Captivate rendering your preview. It can take a LONG time in which case, you may think that it's no longer running properly. But it should ultimately provide the preview. Just don't think about doing anything on that PC while this is going on.

I could barely get switched to another PC via KVM switch it had such a hold on the PC.....

[Guest]

I infrequently see stability above 75 to 100 slides with motion but the irritating thing is the need to retstart the whole Machine because another instance of Captivate appears to be running. I've tried stopping the obvious services but don't have the full list... does anyone know what all the services are so I can manually stop them instead of restarting the whole machine?

[Shnoogins]

@ black-eye-

I used to use End It All, but a google search showed that TaskPower replaced it.

PCMag Article-
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1853852,00.asp

"Features include:

• View DLLs used by an application or task. This lets you see exactly which modules an application or task is using.
• View network usage and bandwidth. This enables you to see how much data is being sent through the network adapters in your computer.
• Close or kill any or all applications or protect applications from being terminated. This allows you to end one or many processes with a single click of a button while keeping your protected programs up and running.
• Export data to use with other applications or save for historical purposes.
• View CPU and memory usage by applications, tasks, and services. This enables you to quickly determine which process are hogging resources and shut them down if they're unnecessary."