Calibre 2.0 Crashing at start up

[Agni]

Sorry for my English.
I installed the software version 2.4.0.
It runs for a long time. At least 10 minutes.

[Image violates guidelines for size - MODERATOR]

With the release of last year, there were no problems

[eschwartz]

If anyone has important functionality that has broken due to, say metadata website changes, broken/missing drivers (for instance the Kobo H2O), etc. and the libimobiledevice breakage around iOS8, and wants to patch calibre 1.48 with the changes, you can run calibre from source, as mentioned earlier, using the directions here: http://manual.calibre-ebook.com/develop.html

However, make sure to clone the following repository instead. I have set up a backports branch.

git clone git://github.com/eli-schwartz/calibre
git checkout -b WinXP-backports

This is absolutely not official or sanctioned by Kovid Goyal, and I cannot commit to anything -- but as of now, I think all three changes should work just fine, and I am open to suggestions of other changes to be patched. (As long as they simply fix changes that were broken by outside sources. I am not personally going to port over calibre features and updates.)

This should allow a central way to manage calibre 1.48 hotfixes, although I do not know how much desire there is....

[Hocus Locus]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

git clone git://github.com/eli-schwartz/calibre
git checkout -b WinXP-backports

[...] This should allow a central way to manage calibre 1.48 hotfixes, although I do not know how much desire there is....

Thanks kindly for the branch, I will set myself up! Doffs to Kovid Goyal for the excellent work, I understand the plight of the developer who is drawn along by support libraries. Despite your best efforts there will always be a 'trailing edge' of obsolescence over time. Just a bit to add to this 'save XP megathread' (smile), a personal viewpoint some may find interesting or amusing.

I've been with desktops from the mid 70s pre-PC days (Z80 S100 CP/M, Solaris-Linux) and have embraced nearly all of the strides in processor and OS architecture. I've helped folks keep old machines working, suggested many an upgrade. But in the years immediately following 2001 (9/11 of course) something began to change in the way I view technology. I started asking myself -- what if? -- in some uncomfortable ways.

Since ~2008 when I switched from Windows 2000 to XPSP3 (a serious hold out), I evaluate every piece of software or hardware in terms of autonomy from Internet and disaster survivability over performance.

If the music of comfortable civilization stops, I have come to the conclusion that the most recent generation of hardware -- with its extreme component miniaturization, fast clocks and extravagant cooling requirements, will begin to fail. We will not see the lifespan that we've come to expect from well-kept motherboards that are now 10-15 years old. Change an electrolytic capacitor now and then of course. Engineering has run amok. Due to (deliberate, perhaps) shortfalls of cooling and mindful design, many things, especially laptops and notebooks, are cooking themselves to death.

So with the spare time and meager funds I might have spent on acquiring a single monster graphic card and mega-machine to play the latest version of Shootemup-Delux... I am trying to gather many spare machines, motherboards, monitors and notebooks and a set of essential software that runs on them, some of which might still be in good working order in some 20-100 years' time --- *if* the music stops tomorrow.

As you may have guessed, stripped down XPSP3 is my present chosen 'entry-level post-apocalypse' Windows OS version. There are so many old machines that run it acceptably well and Windows 7, some not at all. Long after the gamer mega-machines have self-destructed in a shower of sparks, or with a silent whimper, we will need reliable ways to read ebooks, and bestow on the generation after next at least a few working computers.

If the worst does happen it won't be pretty. If it does not... some day I will be just a silly old man surrounded by practically-useless junk. Oh wait, I think that was yesterday!

Actually I am trying to install Calibre on my bank's ATM machine. 95% of them run XP.

[JSWolf]

But what will you do if you install XP and find you are no longer allowed to activate it? I've seen plenty of working hardware made obsolete just because the software to run it is no longer made. So if XP cannot be activated, you'll be wishing all that money on old hardware was used to buy something more current.

Not all new computers are going to crap out in a short time period. A lot of the problems are user error or user choice. Some like to overclock and that can cause a shortened lifespan. They buy a case too small and the cables are all over the place and in the way. There are ways of keeping today's hardware going.

I have a computer that's been going for a bunch of years with no problem. It's not the latest and greatest, but the processor will run whatever I need to run. So I can run Qt5 and that means I can run the latest Calibre and Sigil. I can run Windows 8.1 if I want and so on.

Older laptops do die a lot due to overheating. Newer laptops do not get nearly as hot. So really, It's not a case of new is crap and old is better. It doesn't matter how reliable old is if it's too obsolete to run the software you want. The way I look at it, if you cannot run Qt5, it's junk. Junk being something that isn't up to the job.

[HRR]

Having had the same problem, I have ordered a new Windows 7 computer. What is the best way to move everything (software, additions, library) from old XP machine to new Win7 machine?

[BetterRed]

@HRR -

Download latest version of software from here Download calibre and install it.

See these manual pages regarding transfer of data

How do I backup calibre?

How do I move my calibre library from one computer to another?

BR

[Hocus Locus]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

But what will you do if you install XP and find you are no longer allowed to activate it?

Thanks kindly for your reply. I held out with Windows 2000 so long partly because it was the last version that didn't need to "call home". Held off on XP until SP3 because that is when the black hat community started putting out reliable bootleg distributions that were hotfixed and critical-patched up to the minute with activation logic and nags disabled. So when I upgraded to a new system with OEM version of XP, and despite being the owner of a shrink wrapped XP on the shelf, I re-installed and have been using the bootleg. All the while, I've been helping my customers install and activate and hotfix their Genuine XPs, a process that at times has taken hours and countless clicks even with a good Internet connection, for which you can never get paid for all the hours you spent.

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Not all new computers are going to crap out in a short time period. A lot of the problems are user error or user choice. Some like to overclock and that can cause a shortened lifespan. They buy a case too small and the cables are all over the place and in the way. There are ways of keeping today's hardware going. [...] Older laptops do die a lot due to overheating. Newer laptops do not get nearly as hot. So really, It's not a case of new is crap and old is better. It doesn't matter how reliable old is if it's too obsolete to run the software you want. The way I look at it, if you cannot run Qt5, it's junk. Junk being something that isn't up to the job.

I have a couple of Acer netbooks that (for example) run XP fine but choke on W7, they are on the verge of being viable candidates for survival IF I manage to replace their dinky-fan forced air method with a plate of aluminum to carry away and distribute the heat.

I'm in it for the long haul. I lost everything awhile ago and had to start over, but in a few years I've managed to gather several complete systems and the parts to assemble a few more.

A great deal of it is clock speed, density and and how processor load relates to temperature and how quickly one influences the other. There has been a constant push to increase the clock. I remember when computers had no moving parts whatsoever. There was even a time when a sufficiently large convection heatsink could perform as well as a fan. We have gone past that now to where processor heat is generated in such a small area that it must be actively carried away. The comfortable temp gradient that used to be projected for all conditions is now a variable equation, a compromise expressed in terms of idle, normal and temporary peaking load. Now you risk seriously reducing the lifespan of your machine if you install a cpu-intensive screensaver.

Only with liquid immersion could we see the ultimate lifespan of these components achieved, return to "no moving parts" level of reliability once again. Too bad that the materials do not fare well when exposed to workable liquids. If the manufacturers would make this a priority and put out whole systems that could be immersed, I'd drop everything and go that way.

A "generational computer" is one that is likely to last at least a whole human generation with proper care. We could do it. We just don't want to, because as everyone knows, this technological paradise will last forever and the next one will be even faster and thinner! As Corey Ford once said, with the current trend of miniaturization it will not be long before computers disappear altogether.

I seek to build generational computers. It involves some re-engineering. I choose to work with the hardware of the previous slower-clocked era, and collect software that runs on them.

[JSWolf]

When you help others keep old hardware going, do you tell them they cannot run everything they may possibly want to run because the hardware is too old to do so? Do you tell them that some program are no longer allowed to run on XP? This is tuff they need to know and it's unfair if you don't tell them.

[BetterRed]

I wish people who want to perpetually argue about computer operating systems would find themselves a computer operating system forum in which to argue, rather cluttering up a forum that is supposedly dedicated to an ebook management application.

I find Bleeping Computers is a good place to have ongoing discussions about the relative merits or otherwise of different OS's, file systems and the like.

BR

[PeterT]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

I wish people who want to perpetually argue about computer operating systems would find themselves a computer operating system forum in which to argue, rather cluttering up a forum that is supposedly dedicated to an ebook management application.

I find Bleeping Computers is a good place to have ongoing discussions about the relative merits or otherwise of different OS's, file systems and the like.

BR

I find it especially annoying when this, like the thread in General on a guide to using an ereader with Linux digress this way. I do wish folks would start dedicated threads for these 'discussions'.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by PeterT

I find it especially annoying when this, like the thread in General on a guide to using an ereader with Linux digress this way. I do wish folks would start dedicated threads for these 'discussions'.

@ PeterT - the song says it takes two heels to click. So, when two mods are in furious agreement, what then... do they bash other peoples heads together

[JSWolf]

I thought this thread was about Calibre 2.0 not working on Windows XP. And if I am correct, this thread has gone as far as it can go since the information as to why Calibre 2.0 doesn't always work with XP has been explained in multiple threads.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I thought this thread was about Calibre 2.0 not working on Windows XP. And if I am correct, this thread has gone as far as it can go since the information as to why Calibre 2.0 doesn't always work with XP has been explained in multiple threads.

Moderator Notice
Totally agree - that's why I am closing it - its outlived its usefulness.

And it seems to be a magnet for those who want to ride their philosophic hobby-horses up and down between the lines of an argument.

BR