XBMC won't Start and hangs my laptop

I've been using XBMC on a HTPC for a while now but I just don't get this. I bought a new laptop a few months back, a Toshiba Satellite R850-169. Has 6GB RAM and a sandybridge I5-2410M and is using the integrated HD3000 graphics.

Basically, when I try to run XBMC nothing happens, the process appears in task manager but the XBMC main window doesn't load. As well as this, after around 30 seconds, my whole PC hangs and gets to a point where I can't even shut down the PC without holding on the power button.

Now, I CAN get it to load. It will load if I open XBMC as soon as the laptop boots up. If I do this, it works flawlessly, playing DVD/Blu-Ray rips perfectly. If I leave it for a while

I would guess something that's loading at start up is conflicting with XBMC for some reason (hence it works if I load it as soon as the PC starts - before the conflicting program starts), but I have no idea what it could be!

I looked around the forum, looked at like 10+ pages of threads with to no avail. Has anyone got any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

Try posting a debug log. Most likely it is going to be a video driver issue. Make sure you are using the latest version from the manufacturers website, not Windows update.

Assuming you mean the file: %APPDATA%\XBMC\xbmc.log
...
...

00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: -----------------------------------------------------------------------
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: Starting XBMC (11.0-BETA2 Git:20120120-f76c547), Platform: Windows 7, 64-bit (WoW) build 7600. Built on Jan 20 2012 (compiler 1600)
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: Intel® Core™ i5-2410M CPU @ 2.30GHz
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: Desktop Resolution: 1366x768 32Bit at 60Hz
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: Running with administrator rights
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: Aero is enabled
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: special://xbmc/ is mapped to: C:\Program Files (x86)\XBMC
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: special://xbmcbin/ is mapped to: C:\Program Files (x86)\XBMC
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: special://masterprofile/ is mapped to: C:\Users\Jamie\AppData\Roaming\XBMC\userdata
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: special://home/ is mapped to: C:\Users\Jamie\AppData\Roaming\XBMC\
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: special://temp/ is mapped to: C:\Users\Jamie\AppData\Roaming\XBMC\cache
00:30:50 T:3824 NOTICE: The executable running is: C:\Program Files (x86)\XBMC\XBMC.exe
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Local hostname: Jamie-Laptop
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Log File is located: C:\Users\Jamie\AppData\Roaming\XBMC\xbmc.log
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: -----------------------------------------------------------------------
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Setup SDL
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Found screen: Generic PnP Monitor on Intel® HD Graphics Family, adapter 0.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Primary mode: 1366x768 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 320x200 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 320x240 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 400x300 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 512x384 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 640x400 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 640x480 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 800x600 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 1024x768 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 1280x600 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 1280x720 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 1280x768 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 1360x768 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Previous line repeats 2 times.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Additional mode: 1366x768 @ 60.00 - Full Screen
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: load settings...
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: special://profile/ is mapped to: special://masterprofile/
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: loading special://masterprofile/guisettings.xml
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Getting hardware information now...
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Checking resolution 11
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Loading player core factory settings from special://xbmc/system/playercorefactory.xml.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Loaded playercorefactory configuration
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Loading player core factory settings from special://masterprofile/playercorefactory.xml.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: special://masterprofile/playercorefactory.xml does not exist. Skipping.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: No settings file to load (special://xbmc/system/advancedsettings.xml)
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: No settings file to load (special://masterprofile/advancedsettings.xml)
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Default DVD Player: dvdplayer
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Default Video Player: dvdplayer
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Default Audio Player: paplayer
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Disabled debug logging due to GUI setting. Level 0.
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Log level changed to 0
00:30:52 T:3824 NOTICE: Loading media sources from special://masterprofile/sources.xml
00:31:00 T:3824 NOTICE: initializing playlistplayer
00:31:00 T:3824 NOTICE: DONE initializing playlistplayer
00:31:01 T:4568 ERROR: CRemoteControl::Connect - failed to connect
00:31:02 T:3824 ERROR: unmatched parentheses in substring(Container(510).ListItem.Property(RunningTime),min
00:31:03 T:3824 ERROR: ADDON: extension 'downloader\' is not currently supported for service addon
00:31:04 T:3824 ERROR: Previous line repeats 1 times.
00:31:04 T:3824 NOTICE: initialize done
00:31:04 T:3824 NOTICE: Running the application...
00:31:04 T:3824 ERROR: Control 1 in window 10099 has been asked to focus, but it can't
00:31:04 T:4276 NOTICE: -->Python Interpreter Initialized<--
00:31:04 T:4748 NOTICE: -->Python Interpreter Initialized<--
00:31:04 T:3824 NOTICE: ES: Starting event server
00:31:04 T:4716 NOTICE: ES: Starting UDP Event server on 0.0.0.0:9777
00:31:04 T:3824 NOTICE: starting zeroconf publishing
00:31:04 T:4716 NOTICE: UDP: Listening on port 9777
00:31:06 T:4276 NOTICE: StorageServer Module loaded RUN
00:31:06 T:4276 NOTICE: StorageClient-0.9.1 Starting server
00:32:17 T:3824 ERROR: Control 1 in window 10099 has been asked to focus, but it can't
00:32:17 T:3824 NOTICE: Storing total System Uptime
00:32:17 T:3824 NOTICE: Saving settings
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: stop all
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: ES: Stopping event server
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: stopping zeroconf publishing
00:32:18 T:4716 NOTICE: ES: UDP Event server stopped
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: stop sap announcement listener
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: clean cached files!
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: unload skin
00:32:18 T:3824 ERROR: ADDON: extension 'downloader\' is not currently supported for service addon
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: stop python
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: stopped
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: destroy
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: closing down remote control service
00:32:18 T:3824 NOTICE: unload sections
00:32:19 T:3824 NOTICE: destroy
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10013 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10014 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10015 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10016 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10017 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10018 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10019 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10107 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10115 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 WARNING: Attempted to remove window 10104 from the window manager when it didn't exist
00:32:19 T:3824 NOTICE: closing down remote control service
00:32:19 T:3824 NOTICE: unload sections
00:32:19 T:3824 NOTICE: application stopped...

Make sure you are using the Confluence skin, enable debugging in settings and then post the log to pastebin.com and link to it here.

Changed to the confluence skin
...and http://pastebin.com/fMDwyG55

Just updated my graphics driver as you said before. It wouldn't update to start with, had a non-standard driver (Toshiba-modified?). So had to uninstall before I could update. Done that and the WEI GPU score has gone up by 0.9 (Toshiba suck)

But yeah, still hasn't helped with my issue...

It looks like when windows sticky notes app starts up xbmc shuts down.


I'm just guessing, but remove that from your startup and see what happens.

stoli Wrote:It looks like when windows sticky notes app starts up xbmc shuts down.

Code:

02:30:39 T:3344 * DEBUG: CWinEventsWin32::WndProc: Focus switched to process C:\Windows\System32\StikyNot.exe
02:30:39 T:3344 * DEBUG: CAnnouncementManager - Announcement: OnQuit from xbmc
02:30:39 T:3344 * DEBUG: GOT ANNOUNCEMENT, type: 4, from xbmc, message OnQuit

I'm just guessing, but remove that from your startup and see what happens.

Removed sticky notes from startup using msconfig. Still the same thing happening..


EDIT:
I just noticed something though... The debug log isn't updating unless I actually get XBMC to open. (open it when the PC starts). Chances are - there's nothing in that debug log that's causing the problem.

Scenario A: I load XBMC as soon as windows starts: XBMC has loaded ok without any fatal errors and the debug log updates fine
Scenario B: I load XBMC later on, XBMC doesn't actually appear on screen (even though the process appears in the task manager) and there are no changes to the debug log.

EDIT 2:
Noticed something else, my PC doesn't hang unless I open task manager after trying to open XBMC in scenario B. If I try to open XBMC and leave task manager closed. XBMC still isn't open, but the PC doesn't hang.

Also, same thing happens in PLEX, so it isn't anything specific to that install of XBMC

So when the hang happens nothing is written to the log file?

stoli Wrote:So when the hang happens nothing is written to the log file?

Yup, seems like it doesn't get far enough to edit the log.