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Author Topic: Out of Virtual Memory
Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 12-07-2015 11:58 AM      Profile for Randy Stankey   Email Randy Stankey   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
We have a Christie CP2230 that's starting to give us trouble with virtual memory errors. We have had a Christie tech on site on site and he says he has never seen this type of error before.

Problem started about two weeks ago when we began getting warnings, "Virtual memory low."
Dismissing the warning (using the touch panel) and restarting the system (power cycling) usually cleared it.
This usually only happened in the mornings, at opening, but the warning occasionally showed up in the middle of the day.
Dismissing and restarting took care of the problem.

Last week, warnings started appearing more frequently and would pop up in the middle of the night when the projector was shut down. (from the touch panel)
The display would be locked up. No response from the touch panel. It required a cold start / power cycle to get it working.

This past weekend, we had a complete lockup in the middle of the day, requiring cold start to regain function.

The tech came in last week and upgraded software to v4.3.0(5)
He checked a couple of things but I didn't find out exactly what he did.
The other day, he instructed my boss to go into Windows, using a keyboard/mouse on the USB port to increase the amount of virtual memory available to the system but this has not helped.

It is my guess that we are having failures of physical RAM or physical storage.(HD or SSD). I suppose this is going to need some parts replaced.

Any ideas?

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Pete Naples
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1565
From: Dunfermline, Scotland
Registered: Feb 2001


 - posted 12-07-2015 01:25 PM      Profile for Pete Naples   Email Pete Naples   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Never seen that. Has your tech asked Christie?

What about deleting old software and log packages?

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999


 - posted 12-07-2015 01:34 PM      Profile for Steve Guttag   Email Steve Guttag   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Haven't seen that one either...I would get clear of 4.3.0 (5). It was so bad that Christie pulled it within 2 weeks! 4.3.1 was subsequently issued and 4.4.0 (9) is available. I have only tried 4.3.1 (11). I generally give Christie a month of a version being in the field before loading it on...since they are one-way.

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Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 12-07-2015 01:51 PM      Profile for Randy Stankey   Email Randy Stankey   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Seems like nobody has seen a problem like this.

Don't know if tech has called the mother ship yet.

It just locked up again at the start of the last show. Had to cold start to clear it.
Show ran normally afterward. It did not lock up at the end of the show but,min it locks up again, I will snap a picture of the TCP.

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Ken Lackner
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1907
From: Atlanta, GA, USA
Registered: Sep 2001


 - posted 12-07-2015 01:55 PM      Profile for Ken Lackner   Email Ken Lackner   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I agree with Pete. The Christie TPC runs on Windows. Virtual Memory is hard drive space that is used to temporarily store working files if RAM is full. I would log in to the projector via FTP and see if there are bunches of software packages, backup files, and Interrogator log files in the root directory. All Interrogator files can be deleted if you don't need them and all but the latest software package and backup package can be deleted. I mean, technically you can delete all software packages, but if you ever need to reinstall the software for any reason, it's nice to already have it loaded so you don't have to go fetch it from somewhere.

Hope this helps. Please keep us updated!

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Carsten Kurz
Film God

Posts: 4340
From: Cologne, NRW, Germany
Registered: Aug 2009


 - posted 12-07-2015 04:41 PM      Profile for Carsten Kurz   Email Carsten Kurz   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Interesting. Randy - How old is this Christie?

As it is 'only' the TPC having that issue, I guess it's annoying, but not necessarily a show stopper. It could indeed be a defective component, or just a working memory being filled up. Christie should have means to find out the real reason.

- Carsten

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Marco Giustini
Film God

Posts: 2713
From: Reading, UK
Registered: Nov 2007


 - posted 12-07-2015 05:14 PM      Profile for Marco Giustini   Email Marco Giustini   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Is there a way to fully reinstall the TPC? Maybe replacing the CF card?

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Dave Macaulay
Film God

Posts: 2321
From: Toronto, Canada
Registered: Apr 2001


 - posted 12-07-2015 07:56 PM      Profile for Dave Macaulay   Email Dave Macaulay   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
You shouldn't dismiss it as "just" the TPC. The Christie TPC is an integral part of the projector, not an external control panel like a Barco DCTP. You can start a projector in an emergency using a TPC from a different one but that isn't totally simple.

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Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 12-07-2015 10:14 PM      Profile for Randy Stankey   Email Randy Stankey   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
The projector is three, going on four, years old.
Has just turned over to 8,000 hours on it.

On the last failure, I snapped a pic with my cell phone.
Not a great quality image but it's enough to document and time stamp the incident:
 -

When it gets to this screen the TPC becomes unresponsive. The only way to fix it is to power the projector down and restart.

I have recommended replacing the CF card on the grounds that flash memory only has an average life span of 100,000 R/W cycles and that a few bucks spent on a new flash card is well worth the potential trouble it could save. It couldn't hurt? Could it?

I'm going to recommend to my boss that the software be updated to replace that depricated version and to have the system checked for old files and clean them out if necessary.

The boss comes in tomorrow morning so I'll be able to tell him then.

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Marco Giustini
Film God

Posts: 2713
From: Reading, UK
Registered: Nov 2007


 - posted 12-08-2015 04:56 AM      Profile for Marco Giustini   Email Marco Giustini   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Dave,

The TPC is a Windows computer. The error Randy posted is a Windows error, nothing to do with the projector. It may be a Christie application which is misbehaving but it won't have anything to to with the PIB, ICP, Enigma etc.

Randy,
You should be able to restart the TPC by unplugging and replugging it. That should keep your projector on while Windows reboots.

Any chance you got a virus or something on that TPC? I know you seldom plug a USB stick in it but sometimes you do for upgrades or logs and after all it's just a Windows PC.
This is why I'm wondering if Christie had an ISO file or similar which could be burnt on the CF to start afresh.

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Dave Macaulay
Film God

Posts: 2321
From: Toronto, Canada
Registered: Apr 2001


 - posted 12-08-2015 07:34 AM      Profile for Dave Macaulay   Email Dave Macaulay   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Agree that it's a Windows computer.
But the projector will not start without one.
Connecting another S2 Christie's TPC allows you to switch on the projector, then you can unplug the TPC and return it to whence it came. Doing much else will cause confusion as the TPC is a bit more than a dumb terminal talking to the projector. It knows a lot about its projector and one can easily cause problems on both the "new" one and the original one if you go much past powering up the "new" projector.
Once turned on, a server can run shows because it communicates with the PIB and ICP, not the TPC.

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Mitchell Dvoskin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1869
From: West Milford, NJ, USA
Registered: Jan 2001


 - posted 12-08-2015 09:24 AM      Profile for Mitchell Dvoskin   Email Mitchell Dvoskin   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Try googling "windows virtual memory minimum too low how to fix". This appears to be a somewhat common Windows issue unrelated to Cinema applications.

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Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99


 - posted 12-08-2015 10:35 AM      Profile for Randy Stankey   Email Randy Stankey   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
It was okay, this morning when I came in to work but, if it locks up again, I will try unplugging the TPC. I don't like doing a cold shutdown unless I have to. Sometimes it happens while the lamp is lit. This will save the wear and tear.

Good to know it's a 99% chance that the problem resides only in the TPC.
I feel a little bit quizzical to find out that such an expensive piece of equipment runs on Windoze XP.

I doubt the possibility of a virus. We never do anything to the projector except general cleaning and maintenance like changing filters and replacing the xenon lamp. The only time anything is plugged into any port on the projector is when technician does it or when he instructs us to. Nobody has done anything but daily operation and maintenance functions in about a year.

It interesting to imagine that problems like this might be solved by copying the projector's configuration files to a new CF card that contains a fresh, up-to-date operating system and swapping out the old CF card. If that's true, problems like ours might be solved in minutes. [Smile]

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Marco Giustini
Film God

Posts: 2713
From: Reading, UK
Registered: Nov 2007


 - posted 12-08-2015 01:03 PM      Profile for Marco Giustini   Email Marco Giustini   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
maybe it was not done intentionally. Maybe the technician USB stick had a virus on it, it can happen.
I'm sure Christie can provide either a new CF or an image to be burnt on the existing CF.
I'm confident it's a minor software issue on Windows.

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Marcel Birgelen
Film God

Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012


 - posted 12-08-2015 01:27 PM      Profile for Marcel Birgelen   Email Marcel Birgelen   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
If you get this error message on any system running Windows and you're not clearly overusing the system, then this is an indication of some process is running rampage and eating all your memory. A software upgrade could be a solution, maybe it fixes a memory leak which causes this. It's most likely not being caused by a faulty CF card.

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