Crash'n'burn

**steve.ledger** · 17 January 2008, 07:14 AM

At last! I get a corrupt file - terrific.. And of course it's a VERY IMPORTANT ONE!
Basically an entire days (paying) work down the drain. Strangely even the .BAK won't open.

As is normal for me, I save regularly, usually after every successful operation, or before I'm about to attempt something that could cause Xara to complain.

It was during the (final, as it turned out) Save that Xara complained there was an "error while saving".. Nothing else.

I couldn't even close the error box via the OK button or the [X].
Before I terminated Xara via Taskmanager, I made a second copy of the file.

As expected, Xara couldn't open the file and after a few seconds just froze.

Next came EXPANDXAR.EXE.

Trying this was curious.
The .xar file is 1.8mb - yet the EXPANDXAR process was expanding a 'fixed.xar' of enormous size! I actually had to stop the process (Ctrl+Break) at 2.5GB. Yes 2.4 Gigabytes!

Needless to say, Xara can't open that one either.

Has anyone else come across this problem with EXPANDXAR simply expanding and expanding forever?

I'd post the file here for others to try if it weren't a private client file.
So it looks like I'm destined to redo the entire work...

sigh

**alexbozhenov** · 17 January 2008, 07:43 AM

I have used expander a few times, but never get such results ))
And in most of cases Xara staff helps me to restore corrupted file. Try to contact them, they are very nice people. Somewhere at this forum I posted request to fix my file...

Yes, I found... It was GerryI who help me... Try to PM to him...

**steve.ledger** · 17 January 2008, 07:54 AM

Thanks for the suggestion, yes you are right their are many people willing to help in cases such as these. However, as I mentioned, the file is private and I am not permitted to post it, even to Xara unfortunately.

**handrawn** · 17 January 2008, 10:39 AM

yes Steve - I have had that experience - a month or two back - also got up to the 2/3GB level before killing. Don't have the reference to hand - will dig it out if you want.
It was not my file though it was posted up for help - so I don't know the final outcome.

**handrawn** · 17 January 2008, 03:03 PM

Can't find it - and am busy at present - guess you are too - pita an important file going down - fortunately dosen't happen that often with the latest XXP - you have my sympathies.

My other favorite CG program is Corel Painter - photoshop and inkscape are incredibly useful, but rarely 'artistically creative' for me if you know what I mean.

Anyway Painter often falls over. There is even a section in the manual which deals with what to do if it does.
One thing it will do is incrementally save, and I have picked up the habit of doing this in xara
So on a current project file I am already up to nnnn006.xar after two days - it uses disk space and you have to remember to do it, xara doesn't have an option for it like painter, but it has come to my aid more than once and proved its worth as a way of working.

**Soquili** · 17 January 2008, 05:23 PM

Sledge a few weeks back there was a file posted. When trying ExpandXar.exe on the file it went into a loop and had to be terminated. The resultant file was extremely larger than the corrupt .xar file.

I'll see if I can find that thread, but I don't think there was a fix for the file.

**steve.ledger** · 17 January 2008, 07:22 PM

Thanks guys..

As I said, this is the very first time it's happened to me - and I've worked with more complex files that the one that spat the dummy...
My only thoughts to the reason for the error is that we must save all our files to a NAS system (Network Attached Storage) - and, as it was during the 'save' process that the error ocurred, I'm guessing there was a minor, momentary event on the network which truncated the save process.
I checked the NAS immediately afterwards and access was still available to all other files, so whatever it may have been was over. Perhaps a power dip or something...

**Soquili** · 17 January 2008, 08:07 PM

I found that previous post with the corrupt file. As I thought, there was no input that resulted in a fix. http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthre...ight=expandxar

**steve.ledger** · 17 January 2008, 08:36 PM

Thanks Bill - Yes I recall that one now...
And certainly, it wasn't a (lack of) space issue for me either.
Hard to say if it was a Network glitch or a Xara bug. I'll go with Network glitch..
Seeing as I will have to recreate the work today (oh joy) I will be taking added precautions..

**Soquili** · 17 January 2008, 08:38 PM

Probably not a Xara bug but a missing file element. Lack of space and possible loss of network access to storage location. Either being unable to write the next bytes of the file.

The looping experienced in ExpandXar.exe may be because there is no end of record??

Phil, Gerry, or Charles are you available to comment on that assumption?