Help! Aperture 3.0.1 Crashing - at end of my rope!

Question

OK - I am at the end of my rope and my problem solving ability. I have an Aperture library with a little under 9,000 images - almost all referenced on an external hard drive (connected via FireWire).
I bought Aperture 3 when it came out (boxed upgrade version). I upgraded from 2.5 (which was causing no trouble). But after upgrading to Aperture 3 (with no problems) Aperture will crash every time I open it... unless I open Aperture without the external drive plugged in, then once Aperture is open, plug in the external drive. Sometimes it crashes right away, sometimes it takes a minute or so. But if I open Aperture with the external drive attached it will crash every time.
Here's what I've tried:
- Upgraded to 3.0.1 - no help
- run in 32 bit mode - no help
- run repair disk (disk utility) on main drive - no errors - no help
- repair permissions - no help
- run repair disk (disk utility) on external drive with referenced files - no errors - no help
- move referenced files to another external drive - no help
- move aperture library to another external drive - no help
- switched external drives among three drives - no help
- run Aperture's repair permissions - no help
- run Aperture's Repair Database - several times never got past 0%, twice did finish - no errors - no help
- run Aperture's Rebuild Database - once finished no errors no help - once never finished - no help
- move Aperture library to external drive and try to consolidate library - didn't finish - no help
- Force update previews for all files - no help
- trashed all preferences - no help
- trashed preference file Apple recommends to re-enter serial numbers - reentered ver 2 and ver 3 serial numbers - no help
- trashed all plug ins - no help
- turned off Faces feature - no help
Here is PART of the crash log from the last time it crashed - when I try to post the whole thing I get an error. I am totally out of ideas, and I am really tired of messing around with this after a week. At this point I'd even try waiving dead chickens over my Macbook Pro! Please, please help! Thank you.
Process: Aperture [1743]
Path: /Applications/Aperture.app/Contents/MacOS/Aperture
Identifier: com.apple.Aperture
Version: 3.0.1 (3.0.1)
Build Info: Aperture-1002221847~1
Code Type: X86 (Native)
Parent Process: launchd [202]
Date/Time: 2010-02-26 00:16:38.483 -0600
OS Version: Mac OS X 10.6.2 (10C540)
Report Version: 6
Interval Since Last Report: 220750 sec
Crashes Since Last Report: 27
Per-App Interval Since Last Report: 44634 sec
Per-App Crashes Since Last Report: 14
Anonymous UUID: 9ECA806B-18AE-4E47-B1D4-EE575700F631
Exception Type: EXCBADACCESS (SIGBUS)
Exception Codes: KERNPROTECTIONFAILURE at 0x00000000b0b4bfdc
Crashed Thread: 23

Answer 1

At last a SOLUTION!! (more or less)
I spoke with Apple this afternoon and learned two important pieces of information.
1. The "processing" that happens when I begin Aperture with the external drive attached holding my referenced image files (which would stop and crash Aperture) is Aperture checking every file in order to use it with Brushes. The Apple rep said the Quartz/video card?? system analyzes every pixel in order to set things up for the Brushes system (and that system was crashing).
2. To stop Aperture from doing this "processing" when you begin Aperture (if it hasn't already been done) open Aperture while holding down the Shift key. This process I think is only done once when your importing images for the first time (or upgrading the database/program).
Once I relayed to Apple what I had already done, and once I understood what was happening, things made a little more sense. One or more files was apparently "corrupted" and was causing the system to crash. So how to determine which? Unfortunately there is no way to determine by the crash log. You have to find it by the process of elimination(!).
For me, I already knew which project and which set of albums had the problem (see my posting above). That still left over 1,000 images. So I took the project and exported it out four times. Then one at a time opened these libraries (holding down the Shift key) and deleted files/emptied trash on each so that in each library I had about 1/4 of the images (first one with the first 1/4, next one with the next 1/4 and so on). Again, each time remembering to hold down the shift key while opening and deleting the excess images.
Once this is done open them one at a time and see which one crashes. Note the images in the one that crashes. Delete all the library copies and redo the above process on the images included in the library that crashed. *And being REALLY sure I had multiple backups of my library on other drives in case things went terribly wrong or I deleted things in the wrong library.*
EVENTUALLY I whittled it down to three versions of an image that I had edited considerably in Aperture (I had a LOT of spot/patch/retouch on them). So, back to the main library, open with shift key down, export out TIFFs of the corrupted versions (so I didn't lose the images) and delete them from the library (remembering to empty the trash). Close aperture, open (without holding the shift key) and IT WORKED!!
OK - so, I am very happy to have finally figured this out but this is FAR from a good solution. The process of resolving this took an enormous amount of time. And I was fortunate to have only 3 versions all of the same image causing trouble. If I had several images in several projects I am not sure I would live long enough to figure it out. Apple REALLY needs to implement a trap in their programming that either passes over images it has problems with or gives an error indicating which one or SOMETHING.
Anyway, I know there are many others who have reported similar problems - I feel your pain - and I hope this helps you.
Now, with all that finally over, I am off to enjoy what looks to be a very feature-rich program!
Message was edited by: Ericw