New charts crashing OpenCPN

[Pentos]

Hi Folks,

Newbie here so hoping someone might be able to help.

I recently acquired a Panasonic Toughpad FZ-G1 specifically to use as a chartplotter.
I installed OpenCPN V5.0.0 and then bought and installed the oeSENC chart set "British Isles and France Atlantic 2019", encompassing all of UK coastal waters and W France.

All seemed well initially - acquired a good GPS fix etc. Then, once we set sail the programme appeared to become overwhelmed. My guess would be that assimilating the moving data - speed, location, weather etc - was too much, and the result was that first the program crashed then the tablet itself.

My question then, as I suspect this may be the problem, is there a way to load only the charts necessary for the immediate location, rather than have the program load them all (over 1700 by my count)?
NB The 'Charts' menu in 'Options', appears to allow only the import of entire directories rather than Individual chartsets.

Or am I doping something else entirely wrong?
Any/all help very gratefully received.
Spec of tablet below.

Cheers

Pentos

Panasonic Toughpad FZ-G1AA-52CE
Windows 10
4GB RAM
Intel Core i5-3437U CPU 2 cores @ 1.90ghz

[sdowney717]

Maybe not enough ram?
being Win10, can you install malwarebytes and do a scan?

Malware can do lots of odd things.

[StuM]

OpenCPN doesn't load all of the charts into RAM.


I've got it open at the moment with the Australian OeSENC (800MB) and CM93 (2.6GB) chart sets.


It is using around 240MB of RAM in total according to Procexp.

[Pentos]

Hey,
Thanks for your input.
I don't think the RAM can be upgraded on the toughpad.
I rarely use windows (not a fan tbh) so not clear on what malwarebites might be. Antivirus scanner?
Do you think virus activity might be causing the issue?

[Pentos]

Thanks for your reply Stum.

When I first login in to opencpn, I get what I take to be a time-critical welcome notice to the oesenc data I bought. When I then access the main page of OpenCPN it appears to have loaded all the charts from the set and overlaid them on the simple vector for the entire UK. This make zooming in or out a painfully slow process, usually followed by a package crash. Is it supposed to load ALL. the charts like that?

Cheers

Pentos

[bcn]

Pentos,

are you using the latest version of OCPN, 5.0.0+9065270, and the latest version of the plug-in, 3.2 ?

If this is the case, can we see your log-file, please?

Can you try to switch OpenGL Off?
There might be some newer driver for your onboard graphics available. Windows does not bring always the most recent one nor updates to the latest version. Might even happen that a W10 update reverts to a former version of a driver.
Is it always the same place or some specific chart that triggers the crash? Here the log can give some hint.

You can change the level of detail shown when zooming out or in using the detail slider from Options|Display|Advanced. Or invoking it by using the "D" hot-key.

As a way-around solution you might use is single chart mode to zoom in and then go back to quilted. The "Q" key toggles the setting. Ugly, but while we look for a permanent solution it can avoid a crash.

Hubert

[Pentos]

hi BCN

Thanks for your input

I can confirm I'm using the latest versions of both, as you say.

Ive tried reducing the detailing of both raster and vector and this has produced a little improvement.

Open GL was already off (at least in the OpenCPN settings).

I'm afraid I don't know how to produce a log file for this - little help?
(I ditched Windows a number of years ago, and while I know my well around OSX and linux, can't remember much at all about how MS works)

Cheers

Pentos

[bcn]

Pentos..

then you should enable OpenGL.

From the tool bar the Help/about button ("?") will show you the location of the log and the configuration file. From there you can copy the content directly as well.

Under Windows you might need to deactivate "hiding system files" at the "view" options of the Windows File Explorer in order to see the programData directory and its content.

Hubert

[Pentos]

Hi Hubert

I've reactivated open GL.

I'm in "programdata>opencpn" but there are several options.
There is an Opencpn.log text file which presumably I simply copy and paste into a post here?
However there is both an opencpn configuration settings file, as well as a configs file folder containing an xml file.Which would be of more use to you?

Cheers

Pentos

[bcn]

What we would like to see is the OpenCPN.log file. With the crash.

The configuration file opencpn.ini does not hurt neither for complementary information.

The screenshot is from macOS but yours should look like very similar.

[Pentos]

Hi Hubert
Log and ini files attached.
Im aware though, that this log doesn't contain the crash data and I've been unable to replicate it since a few days ago when it happened.
Is there a way of accessing an older log file?
Cheers
Pentos

[bcn]

Pentos,

OpenCPN rotates the log . The former one is the opencpn.log.log

So in the is moment the system is running without the crashes?
Will be difficult then to guess what happened.

Hubert

[Pentos]

Indeed.
But at least I know how to grab the log if/when it happens next.
Do you know if there is a min sys req to run the app?
Cheers agin for your help
Pentos

[bcn]

Pentos,

OCPN runs on a RasPi. Or on other small ARM systems. Old Win XP machines.

Depending on the type of charts - details especially in case of vector charts - more memory helps, but your system shall be ok. Screen resolution does influence.

W10 is a power hog of course, but with 4GB and and your (old) i5 processor you should be ok.

Quick zooming or panning with a lot of charts is stress for the system.
What does the Windows task monitor tell you? Are there other processes or applications you can stop while navigating?

Hubert

[Pentos]

Thanks for the reminder.
Ive now identified a couple of (seemingly) unnecessary apps that have been stopped.
TBH I'm seriously considering installing linux and running it from that instead.