Crystal Reports for VS2010 crashes when mousepointer comes into report area

Question

Hello,
Since last week I have a problem with the Crystal Report application for Visual Studio 2010. When I create a new Crystal report project, and move my mouse into the report design area Visual Studio crashes. If I stay out of this area I can launch my report and see the loaded data in the report, everything else in VS works, but as soon as I move my mouse into the report design area it crashes VS.
When I debug I get the following exception:
System.AccesViolation was unhandled.
Attempted to read or write protected memory. This is often an indication that other memory is corrupt.
  Source=Microsoft.VisualStudio.Shell.10.0
  StackTrace:
       at Microsoft.VisualStudio.Shell.Interop.IVsUIDataSource.Invoke(String verb, Object pvaIn, Object& pvaOut)
       at Microsoft.Internal.VisualStudio.PlatformUI.DataSource.Invoke(String verb, Object pvaIn, Object& pvaOut)
       at Microsoft.VisualStudio.PlatformUI.VsCommand.Execute(Object parameter)
       at MS.Internal.Commands.CommandHelpers.CriticalExecuteCommandSource(ICommandSource commandSource, Boolean userInitiated)
       at System.Windows.Controls.MenuItem.InvokeClickAfterRender(Object arg)
       at System.Windows.Threading.ExceptionWrapper.InternalRealCall(Delegate callback, Object args, Int32 numArgs)
       at MS.Internal.Threading.ExceptionFilterHelper.TryCatchWhen(Object source, Delegate method, Object args, Int32 numArgs, Delegate catchHandler)
       at System.Windows.Threading.DispatcherOperation.InvokeImpl()
       at System.Windows.Threading.DispatcherOperation.InvokeInSecurityContext(Object state)
       at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.runTryCode(Object userData)
       at System.Runtime.CompilerServices.RuntimeHelpers.ExecuteCodeWithGuaranteedCleanup(TryCode code, CleanupCode backoutCode, Object userData)
       at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.RunInternal(ExecutionContext executionContext, ContextCallback callback, Object state)
       at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.Run(ExecutionContext executionContext, ContextCallback callback, Object state, Boolean ignoreSyncCtx)
       at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.Run(ExecutionContext executionContext, ContextCallback callback, Object state)
       at System.Windows.Threading.DispatcherOperation.Invoke()
       at System.Windows.Threading.Dispatcher.ProcessQueue()
       at System.Windows.Threading.Dispatcher.WndProcHook(IntPtr hwnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam, Boolean& handled)
       at MS.Win32.HwndWrapper.WndProc(IntPtr hwnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam, Boolean& handled)
       at MS.Win32.HwndSubclass.DispatcherCallbackOperation(Object o)
       at System.Windows.Threading.ExceptionWrapper.InternalRealCall(Delegate callback, Object args, Int32 numArgs)
       at MS.Internal.Threading.ExceptionFilterHelper.TryCatchWhen(Object source, Delegate method, Object args, Int32 numArgs, Delegate catchHandler)
       at System.Windows.Threading.Dispatcher.InvokeImpl(DispatcherPriority priority, TimeSpan timeout, Delegate method, Object args, Int32 numArgs)
       at MS.Win32.HwndSubclass.SubclassWndProc(IntPtr hwnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam)
  InnerException:
In the event log I have the following error:
Faulting application devenv.exe, version 10.0.40219.1, stamp 4d5f2a73, faulting module gdiplus.dll, version 5.2.6002.22509, stamp 4cc2318e, debug? 0, fault address 0x0001de16.
The strange thing is that just before my holiday everything worked fine, I have made a report without any problems, the week after my holiday (last week) suddenly I get this exception and can't design any report anymore.
At the forum I found similiar posts, I have followed some advice in these posts but nothing helped. I have done the following:
- Reinstalled Crystal Reports;
- Repaired the Visual Studio installation, by running the installer and installed Crystal Reports again;
- Downloaded and repaired the C++ Redistributable package;
- Set folder permission of the project folder to Everyone;
- Download DebugDiag 1.1 and inspect the crash dump for any problems. I am not very familiar with this, thus I can't tell if there's a problem here.
This software comes with the error:
  Error In devenv__PID__1076__Date__08_02_2011__Time_12_42_42PM__68__Second_Chance_Exception_C0000005.dmp the assembly instruction at GdiPlus!ScanOperation::Blend_sRGB_sRGB_MMX+4a in C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\x86_Microsoft.Windows.GdiPlus_6595b64144ccf1df_1.0.6002.22509_x-ww_c7dad023\GdiPlus.dll from Microsoft Corporation has caused an access violation exception (0xC0000005) when trying to read from memory location 0x00000000 on thread 0
My environment:
Windows XP SP3
Visual Studio 2010 Professional
Crystal Reports Version 13.0.1 (latest version)
Database, IDAPI DLL (Borland database).
Please let me know how I can resolve this problem.
Kind Regards,
Marcel

Answer 1

mmmm Very interesting....
We know GDIPlus has bugs in it, I've logged a few bugs now for font rendering issues and each time the Developers come back and say it's a bug in Microsoft's GDIPlus and we can't work around it.
I've never heard of this happening by simply moving the mouse over the viewer. Sorry I assumed it was as we have noted in the Kbase articles. It was one of those strange tasks when quickly moving the mouse over the report objects....
Looking over our code we hook into the mouse events and  which is also part of the Video drivers in a low level so it's likely a combination of your video card drivers and hardware.
What Video card are you using and have you tried updating them?
A great tool is called BelArc Advisor, and it's free, to scan your hardware and get all of the info.
If it's that bad and you are still having problems after updating your video card drivers I suggest you log a case with Microsoft to look into the issue. We can get the PDB's for you if they need them to help debug the problem.
Thanks
Don
PS - Unfortunately the 2 guys who have done most of the work with the mouse movement problem are off on holidays for a few weeks but likely this is the same problem, just more severe in your case.