October 13, 20178 yr The upcoming v2.4.8 update (tomorrow depending on last release candidate tests), includes additional hints during boot to help assess where it is stuck. Basically, black screen = trainer not ready/not running, dark grey = trainer booting up, just wait for the trainer process to do it's thing - this is normal. This shall help us find out what exactly is going on, otherwise help you wait patiently for the trainer process to startup. Last but not least, the upcoming v2.4.8 runs with the GTN Trainer 6.41 and we've spotted something there which might induce a 'stuck' trainer at boot, which we are dynamically fixing at run time.
October 16, 20178 yr Author Hi v2.4.8 seemed to be working well, just fired up xplane 11 and I am back to black screens. Anything I can try?
October 16, 20178 yr Hi, we are having similar hiccups on our end this morning, so this time, it is easier because we can monitor and track (debug) on our machines. We're working on this and I'll keep you posted. Please note easy doesn't mean quick! This is a kind of bug which is hard to trace precisely and this takes the time needed.
October 16, 20178 yr Author No problem, will post any news when possible, by the way I did a reinstall of the program and on loading Xplane my screen came up ready to use, don't know if this helps at all.
October 16, 20178 yr Usually restarting the device (either changing a setting like TCAD which reboots the device, or changing aircraft) helps, but this morning we are facing a case where even this won't work always. Usually we never encounter this 'black screen' issue but once In a while and this is expected during development. So this is something we are actively looking since this morning.
October 16, 20178 yr A quick update: today was both a bad day, and a good day. Since we've started developing the GTN many months ago, we've never had a black screen issue, only once in while. Today while working on the next update, we've never been able to get anything else than a black screen! Always! This is the bad news. The good news: we've had our systems ready for debugging and we've been able to trace and find the most probable cause for the 'black screen'. It was a very nasty condition that we were lucky to stumble upon I order to discover its roots, but hopefully, the fix we've found today seems holding now. We'll conduct more tests and issue an update soon. Please make sure to understand it is a probable cause which our fix seems getting rid off on our systems, and I certainly hope this is the same root cause happening on yours!
October 20, 20178 yr Hi, I wanted to follow up before releasing the update which we have delayed a little as you might have noticed. We've decided to take additional time to investigate and the last 2 days brought to light a number of spots of interests. In effect, I can't ignore there could be a bug in our code which triggers from time to time (bad combination of conditions, like for example a lock held at the wrong time on a file preventing further progress to the rest of the program), but thorough code review and debugging sessions leads us to think the nature of the problem is Windows related, when the system/ram is under either high-stress or high-fragmentation. Therefore, I'm wondering, and pardon me if you've already mentioned it: Do you run 32 or 64 bit X-Plane, and is this XP10 or XP11? Does this happen immediately on first flight after rebooting the computer, or only after having used the simulator for while and trying to change aircraft?
October 20, 20178 yr Hi Jean-Luc. I am running the 64 bit X-Plane 11.10, the latest beta. When it happens, it is usually the first flight after starting up X-Plane and changing aircraft does not help. Usually, after rebooting the computer it will be okay and the 750 will start up. Hope this helps. Thanks, Howard
October 20, 20178 yr Hi Howard, and usually, when starting up X-Plane first flight, is this after having used the computer for other things during a while or not? I suspect fragmentation being the cause, in that the memory gets so fragmented, that the trainer fails loading some of its DLLs, but again, this might be unrelated to the issue in general, just that we've been able to successfully repro the trainer hang/stuck (the black screen). We're further mitigating the trainer process and how we interact with it in many ways for the next update so as to lower our footprint, and basically, lower probable cause being our interactions with the process.
October 20, 20178 yr No Jean-Luc, I typically only use this computer for X-Plane and some very minor internet browsing.
October 21, 20178 yr Author Running X Plane 11.10 beta, problem seems to occur after a windows reboot but not exclusively. Sometimes reinstalling the plugin works, sometimes starting xplane without the plugin works.
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