Adobe Reader XI fails to launch after Install (Solution)

Question

Earlier this week (5/29), I upgraded to Adobe Reader XI on Windows 7, and I experienced complete failure of the application to launch. Reinstalls were attempted as well as the Adobe Reader cleaning tools, but those processes had no effect. After doing some digging, I found the following error entries in the Windows Event Viewer:
Faulting application name: Eula.exe, version: 11.0.0.379, time stamp: 0x505fc5b0
Faulting module name: nvdxgiwrap.dll, version: 8.17.12.6696, time stamp: 0x4d4a29db
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x0000282a
Faulting process id: 0x22f0
Faulting application start time: 0x01ce5e2f79ed2056
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Reader 11.0\Reader\Eula.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\CoProcManager\nvdxgiwrap.dll
Report Id: b7a70181-ca22-11e2-a1d5-b9e8c6ec20d2
This was triggered every time the application was started (either by opening a PDF file or manually starting the application). The culprit here is another executable that is apparently being ran by Adobe Reader XI  called Eula.exe. This executable is exactly what you would expect it to be. It displays a End User License Agreement, but apparently does so poorly. To fix the issue, go to the directory indicated in your Windows Event Viewer error message (in the above it is C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Reader 11.0\Reader, which is located next to "Faulting application path:" and open the Eula.exe application manually.
Read the EULA, agree to it, and you will be able to open Adobe Reader.

Answer 1

Hi Inayal,
That message was from May 31, 2013, several months ago. That log entry no longer exists in my eventvwr. However, I did post the specific error message above, which showed me which application the Adobe Reader was trying to launch but failed, and that is how I figured out which application was holding up Adobe Reader. From what I remember, this is the only message that displayed in the eventvwr regarding Adobe Reader.
Yes, I do have an NVIDIA driver (NVIDIA NVS 4200M). Driver version is 9.18.13.1100 (1/10/2013). However, what I believe you're seeing here is an "Access Denied" failure (code 5) which is returned by CreateProcess in the Windows API. The typical cause of an Access Denied failure is not having both read and execute permissions for the directory/executable you are trying to launch. I would check the code where you are calling CreateProcess or CreateProcessA (if this is C++, if it's something else, then that function is likely calling CreateProcess or CreateProcessA) and make sure you are getting the appropriate elevation to start the application from the Program Files directory. My best guess is that this ShellExecute is running into problems inserted by Windows Vista/7/etc. through a technology called UAC. In order to run this other executable from a system directory (Program Files), you will probably have to ask for "runas" permissions which will prompt the user to elevate your permissions to execute another system executable (this is the user that owns the EULA executable on my machine).
You can read more about User Account Control here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Account_Control
Here's an example of using the "runas" verb with ShellExecute to run another executable and prompt the user for permission to execute another System executable:
In a native Win32 application the same "runas" verb can be added to a ShellExecute() or ShellExecuteEx() call.
ShellExecute(hwnd, "runas", "C:\\Windows\\Notepad.exe", 0, 0, SW_SHOWNORMAL);
Hope this helps.
Thanks,
James