Autodesk Inventor - driver keeps stopping

[pcrawley]

On one laptop only: Space navigator SE (latest drivers) and Autodesk Inventor 2010 sp1. Windows XP Pro with all the sp's and hotfixes.

After starting Inventor the navigator does not work at all (although the lights are on) - until the task-bar 3d connexion icon is clicked. Now the device works until the mouse is clicked anywhere in the Inventor UI. After clicking the mouse, the navigator won't work again until the task-bar icon is clicked.

Needless to say it's pretty unusable! Have tried with Inventors ribbon & classic UI. Have several navigators in the office attached to workstations and they all work fine - so tried swapping navigators to see if it was device specific... it's not.

Any ideas anyone - please?

[UtaSH]

Hi pcrawley,

if I understood you correctly the problem is machine specific? Did you try enabling all antivirus software and any firewall?

[pcrawley]

Yes - it is machine specific - which is what makes it so frustrating. All other computers are workstations, this is the only laptop. I'm guessing you mean "disable" rather than enable - but either way, we tried with and without antivirus and firewall.

[UtaSH]

Yes, I meant disable. Sorry for the typo.

Did you try one of our demos (Start -> Programs -> 3Dconnexion -> 3Dconnexion 3DxWare -> Demos). Do they worl properly or do you have similar problems?

Can you please try in Inventor if the buttons work correctly?

[atm5465]

I seem to be having the same problem. I have been looking, and this seems to be the first other post that sounds like the same issue.

The 3d mouse works very slow, to the point where it is not-useful. If I open the control panel, and click calibrate, then the 3d mouse will function properly until I click on something else in the Inventor UI.

This problem started when we upgraded to Inventor 2010. It worked fine in previous versions of inventor.

I have the latest version of the driver.

My computer is a desktop 3 ghz Pentium 4, with a Nividia Graphics card. it's a coupple years old, but does ok in inventor, other than this issue.

I'm running XP 32 bit.

everyone in the department upgraded to 2010 at the same time, no one else has a problem. Altho, the rest of the computers are intel core 2 processors if it makes a difference.

Any help would be great.

[UtaSH]

Hi,

could you please check if there is a change if you unload the 3DxInventor addin? (Tools -> Addins).

Does it make a difference if you use the classic UI or ribbon UI?

We have heard of this problem, but could not yet reproduce it in our lab. If you could us provide with as much information as possible that would be great. (graphic card driver version?, service packs?, ... ?). You mentioned that your colleagues do not see the problem. So where is the difference to their machine/software?

[atm5465]

I Tried turning the add-in on and off a few weeks ago. Neither way fixed the problem.

I am having this problem in both the Classic and Ribbon UI.

The graphics card is: NVIDIA Quadro FX 4000 (256MB Version 5.40.02.17.17)

This is the only computer in the department having this problem. We are all using Inventor 2010, and several of us are using the same 3d motion controllers, and the same drivers.

This is the only P4 left.....

I tried starting up inventor 10(version previous to 2009) the other day and the motion controller worked great in that.

any help would be great.

[UtaSH]

We have heard that a virus scanner could interfere with the driver of the 3D mouse. Did you try the situation after stopping the virus scanner? Which virus scanner software are you using (version)?

[rstadie]

We have just seen a case where this happend due to a task named "NTRtScan.exe". atm5465 - can you see this task in taskmanager?

[atm5465]

I don't find the NTRtScan.exe that you mentioned.

We are running Symantic Endpoint Protection software.

I turned the protection software on and off, this did not make a difference. This afternoon I will uninstall the Symantic software completely and see if that has any effect.

-Alan

[atm5465]

Sorry for the delay,

I did completely uninstall our virus protection software. This did not help the problem. I still have very slow response with the 3d mouse in inventor, but other applications seem ok. If I'm in inventor and click on a different program, but keep inventor in the background where I can see it, I can see the model rotating fine. It's only if I have the inventor UI activated that the 3d mouse does not work properly.

Is there some other application that could cause the issue?

Any other ideas/help would be great.

-Alan

[rstadie]

Maybe this will help to identify the culprit:
Open the task manager and activate the following columns (View -> Select Columns):
I/O Reads
I/O Writes
I/O Other
Then enable Options -> Always On Top

You will see changes in the I/O columns when touching the cap of your 3D mouse. Can you identify any other process than 3dxsrv.exe that counts up in any of the mentioned columns when touching the cap (while Inventor is in the foreground)? What happens if you end these processes?

[atm5465]

I do not see any other tasks that have a direct relationship to input from the 3d mouse.

There is a program jqs.exe that i thought might, but it seems to count just as fast doing other things as well. (and it's counting by 1's, while the 3dxsrv counts hundreds at a time)

I tried ending the jqs.exe anyways, it didn't make a difference.

[jrcrane]

Sorry for the delay,

I did completely uninstall our virus protection software. This did not help the problem. I still have very slow response with the 3d mouse in inventor, but other applications seem ok. If I'm in inventor and click on a different program, but keep inventor in the background where I can see it, I can see the model rotating fine. It's only if I have the inventor UI activated that the 3d mouse does not work properly.

Is there some other application that could cause the issue?

Any other ideas/help would be great.

-Alan

I am having the same issues as atm5465 is having in Inventor. We are running the same anti virus scanning software also but when I first seen this issue was when corporate pushed down IE 7.0 upgrade. Afterwards, I noticed this slow response in Inventor and not in other cad systems. One thing that I can do to get it to work is open the 3d connexion control panel and not clicking in the Inventor window. Once I select something inside that window the control panel hides and I have the problems of slow response using my Traveler. I have updated my drivers for the Traveler and made sure I have SP1 for Inventor 2010 and continue to have this issue. Please help.

Thanks,
Reggie

[atm5465]

Since you posted this I have tried un-installing IE7. Doing this did make a noticeable difference in the performance of the 3D Mouse.

(Note, i don't normally keep IE running, just had it installed....)

However, It is still slow and jerky, just not as bad as it was. I have been trying it with a single part, if I open an assembly it still just sits there.

Windows pulled IE6 out of a hat or something, should I try un-installing that too?

I tried looking at the I/O counts again as well. I noticed that my anti-virus software is doing something with the I/O. I tried uninstalling the anti-virus again, thinking maybe having that and IE7 both uninstalled would make a difference. The antivirus did not make a difference.

jrcrane - Maybe you could try uninstalling IE7 and see if it helps you out?

Does the improvement without IE7 give anyone any more ideas?