Shotcut Crashes. MY PC IS NOT THE PROBLEM

Bug
1

So I have a problem with Shotcut just crashing or freezing at random. I edit my videos pretty fast and I do save maybe every 2 minutes. I shouldn’t have to do that.

GPU Processing is disabled, I have my video mode set on 854x480, and here’s my other settings:

Capture

(hopefully that image comes up)

My PC is also VERY capable to run this program like 20 times over (maybe more)
PC Specs:
Processor: Intel 8th Gen Core i7-8700K
RAM/MEMORY: Corsair Vengeance 32GB DRAM
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 1080Ti

And I am sure that’s all you need to know.

There is no reason these crashes should be happening, ESPECIALLY on a PC that can run anything you throw at it with the highest performance an overclocked PC can deliver.

As for the reason it crashes, I don’t know… It just does at any given moment for any reason. I could just switch back from Facebook, CRASH. I can split a clip that’s not even 2min long, CRASH. I can even just leave it open a while, click play, CRASH. How can this go on so long, and with 5 threads (no joke, image below shows what the forum says my post is similar to) and yet we are ALL still getting crashes. I do not care to read another comment about how this program runs so much better on another machine, or it never does that to me, It happens, and it happens a lot apparently.

Do not take this as a hostile thread, This is all coming from someone who has had about 10 crashes within the last 2 hours… and I have lost a lot of editing and has had to go back and do it all over again many times… So yeah, I am a bit perturbed…

Thank you.

1 Like
2

I forgot to get a capture of the other 5 threads that were similar to mine, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.

3

Is there anyone else besides the shotcut team who may have answers for me? It’s been 2 days (well 3 for me since i posted this Thurs but the site says 2) and I’m still crashing randomly. No other apps crash on me, only this one.

4

I had the same problem for a while with no reasonable explanation. Just before giving up on Shotcut I tried again and it started behaving itself. I still can’t explain it, though luckily it’s never got that bad since. Video editors seem to have a mind of their own; they all have their own bizarre quirks.

Sorry this isn’t more helpful, just wanted to say I’ve been there too, pulling my hair out in frustration.

2 Likes
5

Make sure you disable GPU processing.

Here is some advice I offered someone else:

in summary: try changing some things and see if it gets better for you. The problem is either something unique about your computer, or the files you are using.

6

There must be a reason why the crashes are happening, and as Shotcut appears to be working for a lot of people, there’s some combination of Shotcut and ____ that is causing the crashes. Without more information, there’s nothing that the devs can do.

Is there any indication of what’s causing the crash in Shotcut’s Log file? You can probably find it here:

C:/Users/(your user name)/AppData/Local/MeltyTech/Shotcut/shotcut-log.txt

Keeping track of the last few lines of that file every time you have a crash might help narrow things down.

Some other possible pieces of information that might help connect the dots between people who are having issues: (And while it’s easy to say “it can’t be ___ because it only happens with Shotcut,” like I said, it might be Shotcut plus the other thing.)

  • Specific Shotcut versions
  • Specific operating systems
  • Specific file types
  • Specific files (maybe one is corrupted, or maybe Shotcut has a bug that only shows up with specific framerates/etc)
  • Ruling out antivirus and other software that might be meddling
  • Specific graphics cards & driver versions
  • Ruling out flaky hard drives (install & run on a different physical drive)
  • Ruling out flaky RAM
  • etc

Sometimes people have been able to find the cause of a crash by uploading all of the files required to perform a specific set of actions that will reproduce their issue. If someone on a different computer uses the same source files and can’t reproduce the issue, then that does narrow things down to being the user’s hardware or software.

Personally I’ve had huge issues with Shotcut in two situations: the first version of 18.03, and a version on an ancient Macbook (which was most likely the ancient laptop, and not Shotcut’s fault). I still have occasional crashes, probably less than once an hour.

I’ve seen software (not Shotcut) that would crash if it tried to import an image with an odd number for pixel width. It was only a problem for a handful of users, because it wasn’t something that came up for most people. It was only discovered because a pattern was found.

7

Well that’s the thing. I just edited a video the other day, and shotcut did many things wrong with the project.

  1. it crashed a lot.

  2. during one crash, it basically had all my files where I split them, but the video itself shifted and all the clips were I guess you could say shifted a few seconds further than they should have been.

3when exported, all sounds and music were out of sync and would start later than intended. Went back to the project, reloaded it, exported again, and same thing. I even made sure I had everything correctly positioned.

I record, and export all files to an MP3 format and they are only 8 - 45 min long.

Any real info I will have to give you after I get off work

2 Likes
8

I would also like to add that I edited a video yesterday and shotcut worked perfectly

9

If you save iteratively (Save01, Save02, etc), and can produce two .mlt files where one is accurate and the next is wonky, I expect that would also help. I’m no expert at reading MLTs (in a text editor), but comparing two side-by-side would probably help shed some light on what happened.

10

You might try running Shotcut from a Linux live DVD/USB. If it works then the problem is definitely not the hardware.

11

I assume you mean MP4?
Also, as MP4 is the container into which you pack your video and audio streams, can you describe the codec settings you chose?

12

Same for me, Shotcut randomly crashes when I edit a video and my pc isn’t a problem

1 Like
13

Yet Shotcut functions perfectly fine on many other PCs.
How can this be?

You haven’t mentioned anything about the hardware you’re running, the Devs will not be able to comment unless you give them a clue.

Have you disabled GPU processing?
Can you list the steps that produce a crash every time? Supply a file that crashes Shotcut. Can you post the log file (as a ZIP)?

14

I have a core i5 7600k CPU, GTX 1060 3G and 16gb of ram, 1tb of disk space and windows 10

15

OK, that’s going to help.
But;
Have you disabled GPU processing?
Can you post the log file (as a ZIP)?
C:\Users\***********\AppData\Local\Meltytech\Shotcut\shotcut-log.txt

16

My Components:

Processor: Intel 8th Gen Core i7-8700K
RAM/MEMORY: Corsair Vengeance 32GB DRAM 3000MHz C15
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 1080Ti 11gb GDDR5X
Motherboard: ASUS Prime Z370-A
Hard Drives (SSD as well):

  1. Seagate 4TB Barracuda SATA 6GB/s 128 MB Cache
  2. Samsung 850 EVO 1TB SATA Internal SSD

and that is all my components.

As for generating files, It’s random… there is no way to duplicate it.

Other things mentioned that I must answer apparently:

GPU Processing IS OFF. I already showed that in the OP…

Shotcut version: 18.03 and below. ALL OF THEM. Seriously, not joking.

Operating system is Windows 10 Home.

File types I use are MP4 and MP3 for sounds and music.

Specific files are deleted after upload to my channel is complete to save room.

Antivirus is not meddling and I don’t run any other software when editing.

Graphics card driver version is: Geforce Game Ready Driver 388.13 ( I also downloaded 391.35 today)

Shotcut runs the same on both hard drives (Tedious process for the same results… They’re the same crap this should be ruled out)

RAM is 32 Gigs… and my computer is detecting both outputs of my 16gig sticks…

etc. what else is there? I mean don’t be lazy here, we just want it to work on all machines and not just yours like every program out there…

and to bdubu: English please, or a link to a tutorial would be nice, Not all of us have that kind of knowledge here. I’m just trying to edit videos for my YouTube gaming channel

and to Steve_Ledger: Just cause something works for you, doesn’t mean it works on others. and really, who actually uses GPU Processing? No one since it is not recommended in the first place.

and if you want a log file, here: https://pastebin.com/fxdJy2WJ

All im getting this time though is nothing but lag and performance issues from shotcut.

I hope it helps because I gave you everything you asked for,

17

Hi Danny, welcome to the crazy world of open source software. : ) There are some friendly people here, and some ornery people; some people who know a lot, and those of us who are interested in learning; there are people who speak many languages (even Linux!). We can all come together to share the challenge and frustration of troubleshooting.

The information you posted is a big help. The devs have a limited amount of time to work on bug fixes, so making things as easy for them as possible means that they can scan through your specs and your log file, and if they see anything obvious, either fix it or let you know what you’re doing wrong. If nothing is obvious, well, it’s largely up to you to do tests until you determine the issue. And by “tests” I mean: doing something slightly different; crash. Slightly different again; crash. Etc. Uninstall and reinstall. Edit the same files on a different computer. In a different building. On a different day of the week.

I don’t completely understand the log file myself; but the last line about autosaving suggests that the issue might have something to do with the autosave (duh). Which unfortunately is still potentially a lot of things. If/when Shotcut crashes again, please check the log again and post the last few lines (and the last few lines of the autosave file, if there is one!). My first thought was that the drive that it was trying to autosave to might be getting full because of temporary files. Are either of your drives near to being filled up? Do you have any auto-backup software or anything else that might run every few minutes? (you already said that antivirus wasn’t an issue, but there might be other things, i dunno, Skype checking to see if it needs to be updated or something.) My second thought is if Shotcut has an issue with special characters in directory names, like the “…” of the “A Whole New World… of Hurt” directory in one of the source file paths.

Good luck, Danny; I’ll keep posting ideas if I come up with any.

2 Likes
18

Capture2

I do not use Skype (Don’t even know why that matters since they are 2 totally different programs) and Discord is up to date (Since it’s another voice/video communication software I thought I would chuck that in there)

I do not run any backup softwares running.

that one where you said I have special characters in it, the project just slows down.

19

Ah, so the log file you posted wasn’t from a crash, just from a slowdown?

20

You are correct, but it does point to meaning that different PCs can be the reason for issues not encountered by the majority of users.

Right again, not recommended - but people like to try things and it’s often overlooked that it was enabled.