Question / Help Crash and no file!! Huge work loss

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CampbellChemin

New Member
Hello everyone.
Sorry I don't post a log, but there isn't any. I'm using OBS Studio to capture via hardware (ElGato), and it's been working flawlessly except for two times. (It's a rig exclusively used to record. System load never exceeds 50% either in the CPU or graphics card).

First incident was some days ago, I was doing some tests and OBS froze at "stopping recording". I ended process after some minutes and there was no file. I thought it was weird, but since it was a test I didn't worry too much.

I've recorded several hours since that incident, no problems whatsoever, but today I heard the classic windows 10 pop up window sound and when I looked at the monitor OBS was already exiting to the desktop. There was then a black screen for a brief moment and then back to desktop normally. I could re-launch OBS with no problems whatsoever and keep using it as always.

Problem was... there was NO recording file. I have it setup to output to MKV so I can recover upon crash, and yet... there is no file? It got deleted automatically? I've been browsing through the logs, but there isn't one either for that time... I have one from previous task and then one for the next task. It's like if that recording didn't happen at all, which is a huge problem for me since I needed this for my job and it's all lost.

Any ideas of what might've happened? At this point I don't care about the lost work, I just need to know why OBS doesn't keep the file after crashing and how to solve that.

Thank you.
 
EBrito

EBrito

Active Member
Don´t use MP4. Instead use FLV or MKV.
Any problem recording MP4 and you loose all footage.
 
Fenrir

Fenrir

Forum Admin
Without a log from the session that had issues, it will be impossible to say.

Can you see if you can find one of the logs? Help -> Log Files -> Show Log Files and then find the one that matches the date/time this issue happened.

OBS writes logs and all activity as it happens, starting at launch. If there's no log from the session, then something on your PC deleted it (potentially overly aggressive antivirus) or blocked it from being written. This could also explain the file output issues.
 
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CampbellChemin

New Member
Fenrir said:
Without a log from the session that had issues, it will be impossible to say.

Can you see if you can find one of the logs? Help -> Log Files -> Show Log Files and then find the one that matches the date/time this issue happened.

OBS writes logs and all activity as it happens, starting at launch. If there's no log from the session, then something on your PC deleted it (potentially overly aggressive antivirus) or blocked it from being written. This could also explain the file output issues.
Click to expand...

Ah OK, I thought it was a log by recording. Then I guess it's this one attached. I started a recording at 22:20 approx, 1h45m long: Everything fine. 113GB file output, as usual.
I immediately (more or less) started a new recording, I think it crashed like 10-20 minutes later, can't really tell.

Thanks.

EDIT: Antivirus is legal Eset Nod32. I have no pirated software whatsoever, not even windows. No nothing.
 

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C

CampbellChemin

New Member
Fenrir said:
When you have a crash, do you get the "Oops! OBS has crashed." message?
Click to expand...

I just had this one crash, and it had no warning: Windows sound, obs exits, 2s black screen, and then everything normal again.
First issue OBS got stuck on "stopping recording" for over 5 minutes and I manually ended de process.

Only similar thing between the two is that in both cases output file was missing. Not even corrupt, just missing. Nowhere to be found.
 
Fenrir

Fenrir

Forum Admin
OBS writes files out as they're being encoded, so if something is deleted.... that's indicative of some kind of hardware failure. OBS silently crashing to desktop is also not something that I see happen. Your monitors flickering like that suggests some kind of hardware failure (possible GPU or RAM) that is causing havoc with OBS' normal functions. I am not sure there is much we will be able to do here to help, but I can confirm that without any kind of outside interference, the files being recorded by OBS will not delete themselves if OBS crashes or is otherwises ended without stopping recording first.
 
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C

CampbellChemin

New Member
Fenrir said:
OBS writes files out as they're being encoded, so if something is deleted.... that's indicative of some kind of hardware failure. OBS silently crashing to desktop is also not something that I see happen. Your monitors flickering like that suggests some kind of hardware failure (possible GPU or RAM) that is causing havoc with OBS' normal functions. I am not sure there is much we will be able to do here to help, but I can confirm that without any kind of outside interference, the files being recorded by OBS will not delete themselves if OBS crashes or is otherwises ended without stopping recording first.
Click to expand...

Leaving aside the crash, the first time the file was missing too and OBS didn't crash, I manually ended the process. There was no GPU or RAM issue for sure, I just hit "end" in task manager.

Don't you have any idea of what might've happened in that scenario? Anything so I can somehow check.

By the way, all hardware is new and nothing is overclocked. I usually have HWMonitor open and nothing ever gets hot, I'm talking 40-45ºC for CPU and maybe 57-60ºC for the GPU.

Thanks.
 
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CampbellChemin

New Member
Hi again! I was browsing around windows event viewer, and I think I found the error that caused this. Apparently it is something Graphic Card's driver related, I don't know why it happened though or how to solve it (if it ever happens again, let's hope it doesn't).

  1. First there is a warning:
    1. Origin: Dwminit
    2. Description: Apparantly it closed the desktop window manager (sorry, i'm translating from spanish on the go). Exit process code: 0xc00001ad. ID of main display device: NVidia GeForce GTX1060 3GB.
  2. Then information:
    1. Origin: Desktop window manager
    2. Description: The desktop window manager registered the session port.
  3. Then, 1s later, the ERROR:
    1. Origin: Application Error
    2. Description:
      • Name of the app with errors: dwm.exe; version 10.0.16299.15
      • Name of the module with errors: dwmcore.dll; version 10.0.16299.192
      • Exception code: 0xc00001ad
All I had opened at the moment in that PC was OBS (with the log uploaded some posts above), task manager and CPUID HWMonitor. Since all the capturing was being made through hardware devices, I must assume it's something system related.

BUT, there are still two questions:
1. Why did it happen and will it happen again?
2. Why didn't the recording stay in its folder?? This is the main issue, since it's an MKV I could've easily used it... but no, work got lost. Considering we know the issue is now graphic card's driver related (for some reason), the fact that the file is missing has to be OBS' fault, right?

Thanks!


EDIT: I see dwm.exe is aero? Disabling aero (if possible at all) should avoid this issue from happening again?
 
Fenrir

Fenrir

Forum Admin
I am just not seeing how OBS could delete a file like that. It has to be something to do with windows error handling and how it thinks it's helping by closing/deleting the open file handle perhaps?

@R1CH might have more insight on this one.
 
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CampbellChemin

New Member
Boildown said:
You've double checked and this file doesn't exist?

What about this one?:
Click to expand...

Yeah, they don't. I usually empty the folder after copying over LAN so there isn't much to get lost into. I had like 2-3 files at the moment and they weren't there. :/

EDIT: Well the second one was there. The lost file is the one that was supposedly written at 00:04 after the crash. There was no crash at 00:21.
 
Boildown

Boildown

Active Member
CampbellChemin said:
Yeah, they don't. I usually empty the folder after copying over LAN so there isn't much to get lost into. I had like 2-3 files at the moment and they weren't there. :/

EDIT: Well the second one was there. The lost file is the one that was supposedly written at 00:04 after the crash. There was no crash at 00:21.
Click to expand...

Well that checks out then. We know it can write files sometimes, and somehow the file when it crashed the file wasn't written. First I've heard of this problem occurring with a non-MP4 file. Maybe MKV is vulnerable to crashes too? In that case, try FLV instead.
 
C

CampbellChemin

New Member
Boildown said:
Well that checks out then. We know it can write files sometimes, and somehow the file when it crashed the file wasn't written. First I've heard of this problem occurring with a non-MP4 file. Maybe MKV is vulnerable to crashes too? In that case, try FLV instead.
Click to expand...

I always used to use FLV, but now I need multiple audio tracks, and FLV is a no go. :/
As of now I'm just constantly wishing that nothing will make OBS crash.
 
FerretBomb

FerretBomb

Active Member
I understand OP was recording to MKV, just offering some further info.
Even if MP4 crashes, it just renders the file unreadable/unusable because the container format stores all of the rate and other descriptor info at the very end of the file. MKV/FLV do not. Also, if MP4 crashes it still leaves a full-size file in place... it's just full of unusable garbage data without the descriptors.

I'll echo in saying that it sounds like an over-eager antivirus, or possible human error. I've never had OBS straight-up simply never create an output file. Even when I had a HDD hardware-crash during writing, there was still a file there after the NTFS indices were corrected and recovered.
 
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CampbellChemin

New Member
FerretBomb said:
I understand OP was recording to MKV, just offering some further info.
Even if MP4 crashes, it just renders the file unreadable/unusable because the container format stores all of the rate and other descriptor info at the very end of the file. MKV/FLV do not. Also, if MP4 crashes it still leaves a full-size file in place... it's just full of unusable garbage data without the descriptors.

I'll echo in saying that it sounds like an over-eager antivirus, or possible human error. I've never had OBS straight-up simply never create an output file. Even when I had a HDD hardware-crash during writing, there was still a file there after the NTFS indices were corrected and recovered.
Click to expand...

To be honest I don't understand it either. My antivirus is Eset Smart Security (Nod32), and I've looked through it and I can't find anything that could cause this, although who knows what feature would cause that (in case it's its fault). Maybe it's some Windows 10 security option? Which seems weird also tbh, but... I don't know.

I haven't had a single OBS crash since starting this thread, so can't tell further info, but I'd discard human error because I double and triple checked everything both times it happened. :/

Thanks!
 
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