Sunday, January 25, 2009

Windows Live Messenger 2009 freezes Windows 7 beta

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If you find that Live Messenger 2009 freezes completely your Windows 7 beta system - seems quite a few people have this problem, I have it on both my ASUS R2H UMPC (Intel 910/915) and Sony Vaio VNG-A115B (ATI Mobility Radeon 9200) - a fix was suggested in the above link to reduce the display adapter hardware acceleration - not ideal, but it seems to work for now.

Right click the desktop, select "Change Resolution", click on the "Advanced settings" link, go to Troubleshoot tab, click "Change settings" button, move the slider left to the third notch and click OK.

Update 29 Jan 2009 : I should've mentioned I've been using Windows Live Messenger 2009 (14.0.8050.1202) and that it seems to work with Standard VGA Graphics Adapter with full acceleration.

Update 17 Mar 2009 : Tested again with Windows 7 build 7057 and it works fine, no need to change the hardware acceleration, kudos to W7 developers!

12 comments :

  1. AnonymousJanuary 27, 2009 at 5:39 PM

    Thanks Dan! This fixed it for me :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousJanuary 27, 2009 at 6:27 PM

    same issue after installing Live Messenger.
    but when i try to change the hardware acceleration i get "Unexpected error - The new settings could not be saved to registry"

    installed on Dell Latitude

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJanuary 27, 2009 at 7:11 PM

    FYI i got this "unexpected error" in Safe Mode - couldn't do anything in a normal boot.
    I can't uninstall live messenger in Safe Mode either for some reason.
    Removed the msn Run setting from the registry and Windows 7 didn't freeze after that.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Dan DragutJanuary 27, 2009 at 7:14 PM

    yes, by default I believe WLM sets to run at login time, you can use Autoruns from Sysinternals.com in safe mode to prevent the WLM running, then restart and you can probably uninstall.

    You have tried with the latest WLM 2009 from http://download.live.com/?sku=messenger, right?

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousFebruary 7, 2009 at 4:28 AM

    Thank you!!! ut is very helpful

    ReplyDelete
  6. Dan DragutFebruary 8, 2009 at 7:28 PM

    Thanks Reza, if you happen to find another solution please let us know as well.

    ReplyDelete
  7. AnonymousMarch 12, 2009 at 12:22 PM

    Boot into safe mode.
    Run msconfig
    Go to the boot tab > uncheck Windows Live Messenger
    Restart
    Voila!

    You can now uninstall WLM as well, or knock your hardware acceleration down

    ReplyDelete
  8. Dan DragutMarch 12, 2009 at 12:29 PM

    Thanks Gary, good tip preventing WLM to freeze your computer if configured to auto-logon.

    Personally I prefer Autoruns from Sysinternal (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx), pretty much the same procedure.

    ReplyDelete
  9. didi's mobile blogMarch 29, 2009 at 7:24 PM

    I have a self built computer with Intel pentium 4, 3.0GHZ ,1.5GB Ram and 1 TB HDD with a 128MB ATI Radeon graphics card. WLK9 works fine with Standard Microsoft generic drivers for the video card but when i installed the driver for windows vista from the ATI website Windows gets frozen.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Dan DragutMarch 29, 2009 at 7:31 PM

    Hi didi,

    had the same problem on an ATI Mobility 9200, the ATI Windows 7 package doesn't even include a driver for my chip, it's only the installer that seems to work.

    The problem's been fixed in Windows 7 build 7057 from torrents (I'll be trying 7068 this week) or alternativelly you would have to wait for RC, people say it might be sometime in June. Untill then, you have to use the slider to fix the problem.

    ReplyDelete
  11. AnonymousApril 16, 2009 at 4:56 PM

    It works for me too. I was 2 weeks trying to fix this problem. I never figured it out.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Dan DragutApril 16, 2009 at 5:49 PM

    That's fixed in later builds, like 7057, most definitely going to work ok in Release Candidate people are saying will be out in May.

    ReplyDelete

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