Zot 5.05 standalone crash on launch

takiefer

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: zotero.exe
Application Version: 5.0.0.0
Application Timestamp: 5a8c7c41
Fault Module Name: d3d11.dll
Fault Module Version: 6.3.9600.18437
Fault Module Timestamp: 57aca29d
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 000913fb
OS Version: 6.3.9600.2.0.0.256.48
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: 2242
Additional Information 2: 2242c8f4c5fb66b0417a175b3d8f506b
Additional Information 3: f8cf
Additional Information 4: f8cf816423590510cb6e206194340c9e
----------------

Win 8.1x64 machine. Previously syncing great with Zotero 4 until you ended that service. Reluctantly "upgraded" to 5.0.

5.0 never worked once on my Win8.1 machine; crashes instantly on every startup. Most of the time it just evaporates after a brief flash of the icon in the task bar. Every third or fourth launch attempt I get the Windows error detection dialog with the above details. 5.0 works on my Win7x64 machine.

Have tried multiple reinstalls of both 4 and 5. Version 4 works great after reinstall, but won't sync. Have reinstalled display drivers and performed windows update in attempt to ensure DirectX is good as d3d11.dll is DirectX 11 file.

Why can you not continue syncing support for 4.0 users? I have been a faithful customer and just need reliable syncing that I used for the past 8 years to continue.

adomasven

Does it work if you hold the [Shift] key while loading Zotero? If it does, go into Zotero Preferences -> Advanced -> Config Editor and set "layers.acceleration.disabled" to false, then try restarting Zotero normally.

takiefer

[Shift] key worked to open it. Config Editor "layers.acceleration.disabled" was already false. I toggled it to true. Then, when I restarted I briefly got window saying
"Installing Word for Windows Integration." Based on some other previous cases in the forum, I think it is something in the Word plug-in that is the problem. The install script was crashing when trying to install the Word plug-in.

adomasven

What graphics card do you have and what version of drivers?

takiefer

Intel HD Graphics 4000 (on the motherboard)

Same issue with driver version 15.33.18 and 15.36.35 (latest).

dstillman

@adomasven can confirm, but if you suspect this is from the word processor integration installation, you can, with Zotero closed, try opening prefs.js from your Zotero profile directory in a text editor (e.g., Notepad) and add these lines:

user_pref("extensions.zoteroWinWordIntegration.skipInstallation", true);
user_pref("extensions.zoteroOpenOfficeIntegration.skipInstallation", true);

But I'm afraid the simplest answer here is that very few people use Windows 8.1 — most people use Windows 10 or Windows 7 — and no one else has reported this, so you're probably mostly on your own here. The last update to 8.1 was four years ago, and mainstream support ended in January 2018. If possible, I'd strongly recommend updating to Windows 10.