Kontakt 6.7.1 only runs in compatibility mode and otherwise crashes. Does anyone have an idea?

Sophus

NI Support sent me Version 6.7.0, but it doesn't help. Did anyone encounter such a problem and has an idea would could be the cause? Is it possible to let Kontakt create some kind of debug log file with a detailed crash report?

Backstory:

I completely reinstalled the current version of Windows 10 (erased everything), installed all the latest drivers for my hardware (using Snappy Driver Installer) and Native Access and the latest version of Kontakt 6. I switched Windows 10's Defender Firewall and Antivirus completely off, because otherwise Native Access wasn't able to start at all.

Kontakt 6 Standalone starts with the audio setup. After that, the GUI appears completely white and a few seconds later the program crashes. Changing settings in the audio setup do not help. Reinstalling Kontakt didn't help, deleting the registry didn't help. NI Uninstall RegTool did not help. Deleting the files in AppData did not help. Basically, I did everything that was described here https://support.native-instruments.com/hc/de/articles/115004169849-KONTAKT-crasht-st%C3%BCrzt-ab and nothing helped.

The Windows events show only a generic crash report in module ntdll.dll, nothing that would be helpful.

I can start the standalone-Kontakt.exe in Windows 8 compatibility mode, after that it also works without the compatibility mode. Maybe Kontakt is trying to write some settings and only manages it in Windows 8 compatibility mode? As I said, I have completely deactivated the Windows firewall and virus protection, so this should not prevent Kontakt from doing anything.

My programs (DAW Samplitude Pro X5, Plogue Bidule) also crash when scanning the 64-bit VST2 DLL from Kontakt. If I start the programs with Windows 8 compatibility mode, then the DLL is read and works. The VST3 version does not scan and crashes with and without compatibility mode.

My system specifications:

Windows 10 21H2 (Build 19044.1766)

Core i7-3770K CPU

32GB RAM

Motherboard ASRock Z77 Pro3

Audio interface Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 (2nd Gen) with firmware 1051, driver 4.102.4

Graphics card 1: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 (driver version 30.0.14.7360)

Graphics card 2: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti (driver version 30.0.14.7360)

Graphics card 3: Intel HD Graphics 4000 (driver version 10.18.10.5161)

I use six screens, all connected to both of my NVIDIA graphics cards, but I don't think that this is an issue.

Sophus

@EvilDragon Thank you very much for your idea. This is a very good idea to solve many problems, but it didn't solve mine.

But, it seems I found the cause of my problems... the Nvidia graphics card driver.

I checked Kontakt with ProcMon and saw that the crash happened right around some operations including Nvidia drivers. Kontakt tried to access the registry value HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4d36e968-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}\0000\_native instruments/kontakt/kontakt.exe:D3DOGL_EnableConsumerStereoSupport and then crashed.

So I uninstalled the Nvidia drivers and Kontakt worked fine. Windows also automatically reinstalled different Nvidia drivers and it still works fine.

I now have driver version 27.21.14.5671 instead of 30.0.14.7360.

Thank you very much for all your input! There were some great ideas from you all! ☺️

Sophus

I found a similar problem which is discussed here https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/3541/kontakt-player-6-7-1-crash-on-startup

Simchris

In my case my windows 10 issues were originally due to updating 8.1 install to win10 and wall of problems, including two restore partitions created by windows for both versions. Nightmare only solved by clean install of windows. Update from 7 to 10 on two other machines zero issues.

also, i am logged in to pc as admin, and installed native access as admin, disabled one drive, disabled fast start on windows, and not using third party ***** like norton or similar anti virus.

use disk tools to ensure you dont have extra restore partition. I had to delete via command line. Might not be your issue, but the wonky upgrade and partition stuff permanently made one machine here not work right regardless of n.i., adobe, etc.

i have also found installing apps with only one monitor running seems to work best.

Sophus

@Simchris Thank you for your comment. I needed to reinstall Windows 10 from scratch because a forced upgrade to version 21H2 introduced regular bluescreens, at least one every two or three hours. A repair installation didn't help. Thanks Microsoft!

Now I have basically an empty system, all drivers are up-to-date and just a handful of programs are installed. This is why it baffles me, that Kontakt isn't working without compatibility mode. There shouldn't be any broken Windows configurations that could causes this, since it is a clean install.

I'm looking for other people that encountered similar problems because maybe it is a bug introduced in current Kontakt versions. I'm waiting that NI support will send me a downloadlink to version 6.6. Maybe this version will work.

Or there is some problem between my old hardware and modern versions of Windows 10.

Sophus

I found another user with a similar problem

https://vi-control.net/community/threads/kontakt-issues.126614/

EvilDragon

Please try deleting this folder: c:\Users\<your username>\AppData\Local\Native Instruments\Kontakt\Db\

Then see if Kontakt opens fine.

Sophus

@EvilDragon Thank you for the suggestion, but this doesn't help. Do you know if there is a switch that allows Kontakt to write a detailed crash log?

EvilDragon

Not to my knowledge, no.

I wonder if deleting stuff from the registry hive for Kontakt to reset any preferences might help.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Native Instruments\Kontakt Application

Back this one up (right-click -> Export) then delete it, then try running Kontakt again. This will reset completely all your audio/MIDI settings and any other options you might've set.

Sophus

@EvilDragon Yes, I already tried that even before contacting support.

Support sent me the NI Support Tool which creates a list of all important files for them to check for conflicts. Maybe they will find something out

They also sent me Kontakt 6.6.1. I still need to scan for plugins in Windows 8 compatibility mode or else they crash BUT now the VST3-version works in Samplitude Pro X5. It still crashes Plogue Bidule though.

Before Microsoft forced me to upgrade to Windows 10 21H2 (which destroyed my Windows installation so I needed to reinstall Windows from scratch) I used Windows 10 2004 and I can confirm than I didn't have any problems at all with Kontakt 6.6.1 on the old version of Windows 10. I'm not sure if I updated to Kontakt 6.7.0. on my old version and cannot say if it ran fine.

Simchris

Hi, just to follow up....be sure to use disk tools to check number of partitions. Clean install of windows and formatting drive only clears the boot partition, not the win 10 restore partition, nor the win 8.1 restore partition. I think my wonky upgrade had four partitions, and took two funky installs to figure out i had to manually delete them from windows command line to end up with single partition, then format, then install clean copy windows 10. Seriously, check how many partitions you have as this is unique funk up of 8.1 to 10 upgrade. If you have that rogue partition, you need to delete before clean install, or start with new hard drive.

Sophus

@Simchris Thank you for you comment. I only have the standard partitions created by Windows 10. I bought a new hard drive and never had Windows 8 installed on it.

Sophus

@Simchris After your comment I thought I just completely delete all partitions on the hard drive and install Windows 10 again. I did this the last time, too, but perhaps something installed incorrectly.

Okay, now I had a completely empty system, only Windows 21H2, the up-to-date standard hardware drivers (but no drivers for my audio interface, just to be sure the problems are caused by it) and 7-ZIP were installed.

I also disabled every security mechanism in Windows like Antivirus, Defender, app and browser protection etc.

I then installed Native Access from the NI website and ran it and... it doesn't start. The tray icon appears in the Windows Taskbar but nothing happens. As soon as I move my mouse over the icon it disappears. The Windows events logged a crash for Native Access.

I restated the system multiple times and tried again and Native Access still doesn't start.

Then I started the Windows troubleshooting and it recommended me to start Native Access in Windows 8 compatibility mode which I did and, of course, it runs fine.

So, now I will test Kontakt, but I don't think that I will get a different result than before reinstalling Windows 10.

Simchris

Ah. So weird. I should mention I'm using Windows 10 PRO vs HOME just out of general paranoia.

Are you logged in as admin user on Windows (I use Microsoft account to make restores, reinstalls simpler and also my Office 2019 perpetual easy to move around with any new install), and install N.A. as admin user, then once installed try running as admin user?

So bizarre. I have it working just fine on a 10th gen Intel box clean install now. I did disable couple of things like hyper threading and fast start, and bitlocker, but that is just because the apps I use tend to still saturate single core before branching out to multiple cores, and so hyperthreading not really useful there.

Also, might be dumb, but make sure using 64 bit installer vs 32 bit installer, if you have choice when downloading/installing.

Sorry no easy answer, just throwing out stuff that might help as I had pain in the ass when Windows 10 came out, and now have a sort of mantra on clean install and doing stuff like disabling USB power saver mode, and wonky stuff like that, setting power usage to 95% vs 100% with Ryzen, which drops temps 10 degrees, etc.

EvilDragon

I wonder if there are some Visual C++ redistributables required to be installed, maybe (doesn't hurt to have the latest one).

Sophus

@EvilDragon Thank you very much for your idea. This is a very good idea to solve many problems, but it didn't solve mine.

But, it seems I found the cause of my problems... the Nvidia graphics card driver.

I checked Kontakt with ProcMon and saw that the crash happened right around some operations including Nvidia drivers. Kontakt tried to access the registry value HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4d36e968-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}\0000\_native instruments/kontakt/kontakt.exe:D3DOGL_EnableConsumerStereoSupport and then crashed.

So I uninstalled the Nvidia drivers and Kontakt worked fine. Windows also automatically reinstalled different Nvidia drivers and it still works fine.

I now have driver version 27.21.14.5671 instead of 30.0.14.7360.

Thank you very much for all your input! There were some great ideas from you all! ☺️