Gadwin Printscreen - Monitor Black
I am having an issue with Gadwin Printscreen.
I click the PrintScreen button and my screen goes Black.
Any ideas why?
What I have done so far:
Had the issue and rebooted my PC - It worked fine for a few days after that.
I am having the issue again - I have not rebooted again but I am sure it will work after that
I don't want to keep having to reboot when this issue happens - I have been using Gadwin Printscreen for a few years with no issues - I have not changed any hardware on my PC and I have not changed the version of Gadwin Printscreen I am using
I click the PrintScreen button and my screen goes Black.
Any ideas why?
What I have done so far:
Had the issue and rebooted my PC - It worked fine for a few days after that.
I am having the issue again - I have not rebooted again but I am sure it will work after that
I don't want to keep having to reboot when this issue happens - I have been using Gadwin Printscreen for a few years with no issues - I have not changed any hardware on my PC and I have not changed the version of Gadwin Printscreen I am using
Hi Adam
I do not know any specifics about Gadwin PrintScreen, but I downloaded the setup package for Gadwin PrintScreen 4.6 from http://www.gadwin.com/printscreen/ and unpacked it for a look.
The first thing I notice from the site and prom the package is that this program seems to have been written primarily for Windows XP and was updated for Windows Vista compliancy, but I don't immediately see any mention so far of Windows 7.
The program installs a Windows XP SP2 version of "gdiplus.dll" which is used for "drawing" objects onto the screen, and it is entirely possible that there may be a clash somewhere with a Windows Update patch that has been installed recently. From Windows XP onwards, different versions of such DLL files should be installed to special folders used by "Windows Side-by-Side" operation to prevent conflicts between different file versions scattered around the hard drive, but there is still some potential for clashes if the installer doesn't do this properly.
It's not easy to check this, but the first place to look for clues is the Windows Event Viewer.
Start Menu > Run > and type eventvwr.msc /s > click OK or press Enter key
OR
Right-Click My Computer > Manage > Expand Event Viewer.
Look at the different sections and see if there are any errors or warnings that coincide with the time of the last instance of failure. If there are any, double-click the line and click the little "Copy" button towards the upper right of the popup dialog. Open Notepad and paste into it, then revert back to the popup dialog (you usually have to double-click the line again to bring the dialog forward) and click on the blue link entitled: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp
This should open the Windows Help and Support and try to fetch additional information. Most often it won't give any useful info, but if it does copy the contents and paste into Notepad below the other content. Copy all from Notepad and paste here.
Gadwin PrintScreen uses the Windows Clipboard to store screen captures, but I am not sure whether it also used the Windows Clipboard Service ("clipsrv.exe" in WinXP) to share the copied data between other applications and some of its program functions like sending as an email attachment, printing, etc.
Check and see whether the Windows Clipboard Service is running:
Start Menu > Run > and type services.msc /s > click OK or press Enter key.
Maximize the window and scroll down the list of services looking for "Clipbook".
Double-Click on it and take note of all the current settings, then if it is currently disabled change it to "Manual" or "Automatic" and click the "Start" button.
Reboot and test Gadwin PrintScreen again. If it still fails as before, then the Clipboard Service isn't used by it and you can reset the Service to what it was before and "Stop" it if it was disabled. As I said, this service is NOT the actual Windows Clipboard, it provides the means to "share" what has been copied to the Clipboard with remote computers - and perhaps is used by the program.
From what I can see of your program it is similar to other PrintSreen applications in that it allows you to set it to do certain things after capturing screenshots, and allows you to configure shortcut keys to take your snapshot. There are some possibilities with this, and maybe you should have a look at your settings.
Temporarily change your keyboard shortcut keys to something else and test. Perhaps the ones you have set are conflicting with some other keyboard shortcuts and trying to do something else. Alternatively you could also try and go through the steps manually from within the program window to take some screenshots and eliminate this aspect for testing.
Ascertain what folder is used for "Temporary" files by the program and empty that folder. If it is bulging with files after years of use perhaps the program is stalling badly when trying to store new snapshots there.
If the program is set to perform some preset function like zipping up the image and attaching to a new email, or is set to launch the new screenshot in a separate image viewer when captured, then temporarily change this setting to something like "take no action" and test. If that works without crashing, then you will have a better idea of what might be crashing it.
Personally I would be inclined to ake a note of all my current settings, back up any screenshot images already in a folder used by the program, and then uninstall and reinstall Gadwin ScreenShot, rebooting between the uninstall and reinstall.
If a recent Windows Update is the source of the recent problems, then reinstalling back into the already updated system might resolve this.
If you are conversant with the registry, then it is usually a good idea to delete program keys created by Gadwin software, such as:
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Softwar
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Softwa
after uninstalling the application and rebooting, but before reinstalling it.
If none of the above help, then we can explore things a bit deeper.
Bill
I do not know any specifics about Gadwin PrintScreen, but I downloaded the setup package for Gadwin PrintScreen 4.6 from http://www.gadwin.com/printscreen/ and unpacked it for a look.
The first thing I notice from the site and prom the package is that this program seems to have been written primarily for Windows XP and was updated for Windows Vista compliancy, but I don't immediately see any mention so far of Windows 7.
The program installs a Windows XP SP2 version of "gdiplus.dll" which is used for "drawing" objects onto the screen, and it is entirely possible that there may be a clash somewhere with a Windows Update patch that has been installed recently. From Windows XP onwards, different versions of such DLL files should be installed to special folders used by "Windows Side-by-Side" operation to prevent conflicts between different file versions scattered around the hard drive, but there is still some potential for clashes if the installer doesn't do this properly.
It's not easy to check this, but the first place to look for clues is the Windows Event Viewer.
Start Menu > Run > and type eventvwr.msc /s > click OK or press Enter key
OR
Right-Click My Computer > Manage > Expand Event Viewer.
Look at the different sections and see if there are any errors or warnings that coincide with the time of the last instance of failure. If there are any, double-click the line and click the little "Copy" button towards the upper right of the popup dialog. Open Notepad and paste into it, then revert back to the popup dialog (you usually have to double-click the line again to bring the dialog forward) and click on the blue link entitled: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp
This should open the Windows Help and Support and try to fetch additional information. Most often it won't give any useful info, but if it does copy the contents and paste into Notepad below the other content. Copy all from Notepad and paste here.
Gadwin PrintScreen uses the Windows Clipboard to store screen captures, but I am not sure whether it also used the Windows Clipboard Service ("clipsrv.exe" in WinXP) to share the copied data between other applications and some of its program functions like sending as an email attachment, printing, etc.
Check and see whether the Windows Clipboard Service is running:
Start Menu > Run > and type services.msc /s > click OK or press Enter key.
Maximize the window and scroll down the list of services looking for "Clipbook".
Double-Click on it and take note of all the current settings, then if it is currently disabled change it to "Manual" or "Automatic" and click the "Start" button.
Reboot and test Gadwin PrintScreen again. If it still fails as before, then the Clipboard Service isn't used by it and you can reset the Service to what it was before and "Stop" it if it was disabled. As I said, this service is NOT the actual Windows Clipboard, it provides the means to "share" what has been copied to the Clipboard with remote computers - and perhaps is used by the program.
From what I can see of your program it is similar to other PrintSreen applications in that it allows you to set it to do certain things after capturing screenshots, and allows you to configure shortcut keys to take your snapshot. There are some possibilities with this, and maybe you should have a look at your settings.
Temporarily change your keyboard shortcut keys to something else and test. Perhaps the ones you have set are conflicting with some other keyboard shortcuts and trying to do something else. Alternatively you could also try and go through the steps manually from within the program window to take some screenshots and eliminate this aspect for testing.
Ascertain what folder is used for "Temporary" files by the program and empty that folder. If it is bulging with files after years of use perhaps the program is stalling badly when trying to store new snapshots there.
If the program is set to perform some preset function like zipping up the image and attaching to a new email, or is set to launch the new screenshot in a separate image viewer when captured, then temporarily change this setting to something like "take no action" and test. If that works without crashing, then you will have a better idea of what might be crashing it.
Personally I would be inclined to ake a note of all my current settings, back up any screenshot images already in a folder used by the program, and then uninstall and reinstall Gadwin ScreenShot, rebooting between the uninstall and reinstall.
If a recent Windows Update is the source of the recent problems, then reinstalling back into the already updated system might resolve this.
If you are conversant with the registry, then it is usually a good idea to delete program keys created by Gadwin software, such as:
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Softwar
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Softwa
after uninstalling the application and rebooting, but before reinstalling it.
If none of the above help, then we can explore things a bit deeper.
Bill
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
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Here's the command line arguments from the program's help file, just in case we need to refer to them later:
Command-Line-Arguments.htm
Command-Line-Arguments.htm
ASKER
BillDL,
I will try your suggestions if it happens again. It has not happened since I opened the question.
FYI - I am using Windows XP
I will try your suggestions if it happens again. It has not happened since I opened the question.
FYI - I am using Windows XP
ASKER
I will try your suggestions if it happens again. It has not happened since I opened the question.
FYI - I am using Windows XP
FYI - I am using Windows XP
Thank you Adam. Let us know if it does return again.
ASKER
Any ideas what is causing this?