Everything freezes when typing words

[toriatama]

Everything was working fine, then I installed new programs on my PC, uninstalled other and change some drivers, and now everything freezes when I am searching/typing a word in the search bar.

I was using the latest stable version, I've udpated with the latest night build (1.4.1.965.x64), but it continues to freeze...

What can I do?

Thank for your support and this great software (cannot live without it...)!

[void]

There might be a program making many changes to your file system?

Please try sorting by date modified in Everything and monitor your system for file changes:

• In Everything, click the Date Modified column header to sort by date modified.
• Are the results constantly changing? -How often and how many? Usually one or two a second is OK.

Everything likes to keep the database up-to-date.
File system changes are processed before searches.
If there are thousands of changes to process it can cause a search to be unrepsonsive.



Is there a program using 100% CPU?

• Press Ctrl + Shift + ESC to launch the Task Manager.
• Click the Details tab.
• Sort by CPU.
• Are there any programs using 100% CPU?

If there is a program using 100% CPU, Everything may not get enough CPU cycles to complete a search.

Try increasing the processing priority of Everything (not recommended):

• Press Ctrl + Shift + ESC to launch the Task Manager.
• Click the Details tab.
• Select the Everything.exe process (If there is two or more, do the following for all Everything.exe processes).
  • Right click the Everything.exe process and click Set Priority -> High.

There might be a low memory condition? Everything could be paging to and from disk.

• Press Ctrl + Shift + ESC to launch the Task Manager.
• Click the Performance tab.
• How much memory is being used?

[therube]

> I installed new programs
> uninstalled other and change some drivers

Such as?

[dfleiss]

This behavior started suddenly on my Windows 10 machine (v 1909, build 18363.657) yesterday when I upgraded from v 1.4.1.935 to v 1.4.1.965 (both x64). I tried reinstalling the older version but the behavior has persisted. I raised the priority, as suggested, but the behavior has persisted. I rebuilt the database, thinking that maybe it had become corrupted, but the behavior has persisted.

I'm on the verge of uninstalling Everything completely and performing a fresh install.

[void]

Try forcing Everything to build a fresh index:

• In Everything, from the File menu, click Exit.
• In Windows Explorer, navigate to: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Everything
• Delete your Everything.db
• Restart Everything.

Please try reducing the number of threads Everything uses:

• In Everything, type in the following search and press ENTER:
  /max_threads=3
• If successful, you should see max_threads=3 in the status bar for a few seconds.

Experiment with different values, I'm using 3 above, assuming you have at least 4 logical CPUs.
0 = unlimited threads (limited to total logical CPU count)
1 = single threaded
Try setting to any number less than your current total logical CPU count. Closer to 1 will make your Everything searches slow and make the system more responsive. Closer to your total logical CPU count will make your Everything searches faster and system less responsive.

[dfleiss]

I gave that a try and so far, it seems to be working. Thank you!

[toriatama]

Thank you for your support and sorry for the delayed reply:

Is there a program using 100% CPU?
No

There might be a low memory condition? Everything could be paging to and from disk.
No

Note: I have a lot of files on my HHD... files accumulated for 15 years, including many unicode names (asian + russian file names), but Everything was alway performing well, except some random crashes. The index size is 65Mo.

Delete your Everything.db and Restart Everything
Tried. It was working for a while again but then the issue came back

Please try reducing the number of threads Everything uses:
The command "/max_threads=3" is working.
I've tried several values, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (I have 8 logical CPU) but the issues is always here.

Are the results constantly changing? -How often and how many? Usually one or two a second is OK.
Results are not constantly changing

There might be a program making many changes to your file system?
I cannot say what program would do that.
What I've done in case:
I added Everything as an exclusion to my antivirus, antimalware (Eset Internet Security, MalwareBytes Premium, SpyShelter Firewall)
But everything goes on crashing.

For my observations, what I can tell:
I noticed that now, Everything does not display correctly the icons of the files names in the results. All icons are white/generic. When Everything cannot show properly icons, I know that it's going to crash... and it crashes after a few searches, very quickly, 2-10 seconds later. Sometimes, after deleting/rebuilding the index, rebooting, etc. Everything works again for a while and very quickly the issue comes back.

My system: Win10 Pro version 1909
8 Go RAM, Processeur Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4790K CPU @ 4.00GHz, 4001 MHz

What I did not really try yet:
- reverting / downgrading to an older version of Everything.
- deleting and reinstalling totally Everything but I guess it will not change anything
- disabling Everything service and using the program only with admin rights

How I'll be able to fix it!!
Thank you again!

[void]

I noticed that now, Everything does not display correctly the icons of the files names in the results.

This can be caused by a shell extension that doesn't handle really long path names.

Please try the latest version of Everything and enable shell max path:

• In Everything, type in the following search and press ENTER:
  /shell_max_path=1
• If successful, you should see shell_max_path=1 in the status bar for a few seconds.

[toriatama]

First, I just had downgraded to version 1.4.1.877 64bits, and used it a couple of days without bug.

I've now installed the latest 1.4.1.965 (for x64) following your advice, and typed "/shell_max_path=1" successfully, I can see it in the status bar for a few seconds.

I will go on using 1.4.1.965 and will report if the issue occurs again.

Thank you for your kind support.

[toriatama]

Hi,

I was happy with the latest 1.4.1.965 (for x64) until it crashed once again today.
I've updated to the latest 1.4.1.969, deleted and rebuilt the cache, typed "/shell_max_path=1" but it still crashing/freezing when using the program.

Again, Everything does not display correctly the icons of the files names in the results. Files icons are blank/white (generic).
When doing a right click (contextual menu) on a file and try to open its destination, it also crashes immediately.

[NotNull]

Note: I have a lot of files on my HHD... files accumulated for 15 years, including many unicode names (asian + russian file names), but Everything was alway performing well, except some random crashes. The index size is 65Mo.

My system: Win10 Pro version 1909
8 Go RAM, Processeur Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4790K CPU @ 4.00GHz, 4001 MHz

If that is 65 Million Objects (see statusbar when you have no search and no filetr active), you are probably running out of RAM ..

[toriatama]

I have recently upgraded my PC to 16Go RAM, the system memory seems to be sufficient:

https://imgur.com/a/qRfbq4q

PS: I've sent you an email with the log file.

[NotNull]

Ah, you are French (-speaking), where mega-byte = mega-octet (Mo).

That explains it

[toriatama]

Oops, sorry!

[toriatama]

I've tried many ways to delete/rebuild de index, reset the settings, reinstall and reboot, etc. but no way. Still had an issue with icons and Everything was continuously freezing.

Lastly I've downgraded Everything to version 1.3.4.686.x64 =>>> that's fixed the issue!
The re-updated to the latest 1.4.1.969.x64, for now it's working fine.

That's strange, something is causing a bug and I cannot fix it using the same version of Everything. I need to downgrade to a much earlier version and re-update again. Hope it'll help to find the problem.

[void]

Thank you for the debug log.

It is hard to track the issue from the debug logs.
I suspect there is a problem with a shell extension.

Could you please try the latest nightly build and disable icon shell extensions and let me know if the issue persists:

• Please replace your Everything.exe with the latest nightly build.
• In Everything 1.4.1.976, type in the following search and press ENTER:
  /icon_shell_extensions=0
• If successful, you should see icon_shell_extensions=0 in the status bar for a few seconds.
• Close the search window to ensure settings are saved.
• Reopen an Everything search window.
• Does the crash/freeze occur?

If this fixes the issue, please consider trying ShellExView and disabling icon handler shell extensions:
https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/shexview.html

[toriatama]

I've download and installed the latest nightly build.
Now I cannot reproduce the issue, I have to wait for it to happen again, then I will try to the "icon_shell_extensions" fix!
I will update you asap!
Thank you for the kind support!

[toriatama]

The issue appeared again with the last 1.4.1.969 (everything freezes, icons don't show up)
I've update to the latest nightly, 1.4.1.983.x64, issue still there.

I've tried to delete/rebuild de index, reset the settings, reinstall and reboot, etc. but no way.
Also tried "/icon_shell_extensions=0", "/shell_max_path=1" commands, nothing worked.
Still had an issue with icons and Everything was continuously freezing.
I suspected some long file:PATH names causing crashes, and have shortened several long path/file names using powershell to detect them. But it did not help.

Lastly, I came back to the old 1.3.4.686.x64 version, and immediately, Everything is working again, no more crash!
As for previous times, that's the only way I found to make Everything work again properly: downgrading to version 1.3.4.x and next reinstalling the latest version!