Comparing files size limit?

[petermad]

My system just hangs and will refuses to boot into Safe Mode

That's serious IMHO.

Anyway - I don't mean that it is necessarily a video driver problem. But when Windows is running i safe mode, a lot of user settings are overruled, and a lot of services are disabled - so if the problem disappears in TC when Windows is in safe mode, then it was most likely a Windows's setting or a service that caused the problem.

[FoxWolfie]

Can anyone confirm?

I confirm a problem using your text files, but it is not quite the same problem. It is probably related though.

I am using Win XP sp3 with TC 8.0 RC1 32-bit.

When I use CbC on the two text files, it initially displays both files as one long line for each file. If I grab the scrollbar handle and drag to the right, to see the where the actual difference might be, the scrollbar in both files moves the same, as expected. When I drag to about 85 percent of the distance toward the right, the scrollbar handle of the opposite file vanishes and that file goes blank. The text file I'm actually scrolling still remains visible.

When I release the mouse button to stop dragging, both files are visible again, but positioned back to the beginning, instead of staying in the position where I stopped dragging the scrollbar.

There appears to be no way to scroll the lines past about 85 percent without the opposite file going blank, so, if the only difference is near the end of those long lines, there is no way to actually see that. My best guess is that I can drag to see only the first 4,200 to 4,300 characters, before the opposite file goes blank.

It doesn't matter which of the two files I attempt to scroll, as the opposite one will go blank.

Testing in Windows safe mode yields the same results. Choosing different fonts does not help. The CbC tool apparently doesn't like long lines when doing an ASCII compare. Luckily, most normal ASCII files have reasonably short line lengths, and do not show the blanking or scrolling problem.

[petermad]

I am using Win XP sp3 with TC 8.0 RC1 32-bit.

When I use CbC on the two text files, it initially displays both files as one long line for each file. If I grab the scrollbar handle and drag to the right, to see the where the actual difference might be, the scrollbar in both files moves the same, as expected. When I drag to about 85 percent of the distance toward the right, the scrollbar handle of the opposite file vanishes and that file goes blank. The text file I'm actually scrolling still remains visible.

When I release the mouse button to stop dragging, both files are visible again, but positioned back to the beginning, instead of staying in the position where I stopped dragging the scrollbar.

There appears to be no way to scroll the lines past about 85 percent without the opposite file going blank, so, if the only difference is near the end of those long lines, there is no way to actually see that. My best guess is that I can drag to see only the first 4,200 to 4,300 characters, before the opposite file goes blank.

I just tested with TC 8.0 RC1 32-bit under Windows XP SP3 - I cannot reproduce any of this. I can scroll horizontally all the way in both sides without problems http://madsenworld.dk/tcmd/cbcscroll2.png .

EDIT: JFYI - It doesn't matter how I do the horizontal scroll: by slider, by arrow button, by keyboard, or by clicking on the scrollbar - it all works perfectly for me.

Testing in Windows safe mode yields the same results.

Good to know - thanks for testing that.

[gora]

I confirm problem.
Win7 x64, TC rc1 x64
When opening CbC I see the file at the left.
Two click (1,2) on the scrolling button to the right - I see the file at the left.
Still two click (3,4) on the scrolling button to the right - I do not see the file at the left.
Further process of loss of the file at the left occurs through each two clicks.

Checked on real system and on VM, in a normal mode and in Safe mode the behavior is similar.

[ghisler(Author)]

It is a bug in some display drivers. On an old Pentium 90, I even got a complete freeze with very long lines of text. I haven't seen this problem with any newer drivers yet, but appearently you have such a bad driver. I don't think that there is a solution to this problem if there is no driver update.

[sztihamer]

I don't know, but I was the only one who mentioned it that I have an NVIDIA graphics card with the latest drivers installed. Radeon users do get these problems too? The drivers that I use are WHQL so they run trough some testing by Microsoft and if they pass all of their tests the manufacturer gets WHQL certification. Ok enough of that. But what about the default Microsoft drivers? And what about the ones that are provided by the virtualization softwares? They are all faulty?

Also on my GeForce 9600GT I nearly tweaked every setting I can find in the NVIDIA Control Panel and still the same.

Seems interesting that only in the first pane is glitching up. If this were a driver issue not only the first panel would be messed up, the second one too!

Why I don't think this is a driver issue? Well here's some more information for you guys! Open up the file1, delete two semicolons, then save it and you will not be able to reproduce the bug.

Check the video demonstration here: http://www.screenr.com/l7A8
I deleted three semicolons instead of two, but I tested it with two and the same effect. It's not glitching up.

Is this still a driver issue? If so then I don't know. I guess I will wait until a new driver revision releases. Can somebody who reproduce the problem test out what I mentioned above please? If this works for you guys then it's probably not a driver issue! I hope so...

Thanks for all the useful feedback guys!

[gora]

Additional information.

I turn off mode ClearType - the problem disappeared!

[sztihamer]

Ok! I did some more tests. What happens if I add another extra semicolon to file1 instead of deleting two. It just makes the content of the first pane invisible. No more glitches. It's gone! You can mess with the scroll bar and minimizing and restoring it it will be the same. The first pane will be completely empty! Also if you resize the window that doesn't help either.

Just take a look here: http://www.screenr.com/y7A8

It's strange how it behaves with just a few edits in file1. Something seems to be wrong here! If you add even more semicolons to the file it will be still the same. Those who can't reproduce the bug add some more semicolons and see if you can trigger the glitch!

[sztihamer]

Additional information.

I turn off mode ClearType - the problem disappeared!

Confirmed! It's indeed there are some problems if you have ClearType enabled. I disabled it and everything went back to normal. None of the above stuff can be reproduced anymore that we mentioned. I don't like having no font smoothing enabled on my display because it's looks ugly. So I guess that means there's nothing to do with graphics drivers, because ClearType has nothing to do with hardware acceleration!

Demonstration: http://www.screenr.com/lHA8
If you disable it it will work just fine. The only thing left is to solve the problem if it is possible.

[Dalai]

I don't like having no font smoothing enabled on my display because it's looks ugly.

Disabling ClearType doesn't mean disabling font smoothing at all. ClearType is just another method of font smoothing. On the contrary, fonts smoothed with ClearType look blurred when using fonts not optimized for ClearType. That's why Win7 (and Vista) uses Segoe UI as default font.

Note that the effect of ClearType is different on different monitors, by experience I found this: on IPS panels fonts are mostly blurred when ClearType is activated, on TN panels ClearType is needed more often to give a better view. That's why I generally disable ClearType on all my systems (I only have IPS panels and a CRT).

Regards
Dalai

[HolgerK]

..., because ClearType has nothing to do with hardware acceleration!

Who knows?
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff561082%28v=vs.85%29.aspx

The DXGK_GDIARG_CLEARTYPEBLEND structure describes the characteristics of a GDI hardware-accelerated ClearType and antialiased text pixel blending operation.

Regards
Holger

[sztihamer]

2Dalai
Of course not! There are more stuffs to do to disable completely the font smoothing in Windows 7. There are some more additional steps to disable it, like some registry hacks in which you tell your system to use another font like Tahoma and unchecking "Smooth edges of screen fonts" in Visual effects. I even used ClearType on a CRT back in the XP days...

2HolgerK
That's nice, I didn't new about that. The only thing is that it's only for Windows 7 or up.

Version: Available in Windows 7 and later versions of the Windows operating systems.

The good thing is that we now what causes the bug in Total Commander, thanks to gora. A lot of people couldn't even reproduce it.

[white]

I turn off mode ClearType - the problem disappeared!

The problem appears when I enable ClearType.
(Windows XP, SiS chipset driver)

[petermad]

It is not just a matter of having ClearType enabled.

I have now tried with ClearType enabled on four different PC's - and it still works OK for me. Two of the PC's are running Windows XP and two are running Windows 7 x64.

One of the Windows 7 computers have a NVIDIA GeForce GT 530 video adapter (driver version 8.17.12.7588).

The three other computers have various Intel Express Chipset video adapters.

[HolgerK]

2petermad

What are your font settings?
Not all fonts are compatible with clear type.
E.g. I can confirm the problem with "Courier New" (default), but not with "Courier".

(Windows 7 x64 / nVidia graphic.)
Regards
Holger