Windows 7 64 bit Monarch 10.5 Conflicts

[Guy Chowning]

Recently purchased 2 Dell Precision T3500's with Windows 7 Ultimate 64 Bit OS. I attempted to run Monarch 10.5 on both machines. Neither machine was able to run Monarch without freezing (quits responding in the Summary Views).

I went through all compatibility modes that Monarch recognizes with the same results.

I have contacted the Support and left voice mail messages but have not had any contact or reply back.

Does anyone know if Monarch has a 64 bit version that is compatible with Win 7?

Has anyone had success running Monarch on a Windows 64 bit Ultimate version O/S, if so did you have to make a lot of settings changes to get it to work?

Guy Chowning
Systems Alternatives International, LLC
gchowning@sysalt.com
419-891-1100 Extension 162

[Joe Berry]

I have used Windows 7 Ultimate x64 on three different systems along with Monarch v10.5. I have had no problems. My main system with this combination is an HP Laptop. It worked right out of the box on all systems. There were no configuration changes and no hiccups. I have used existing models/projects and created new ones.

The fact that both systems exhibit the same behavior is indeed unusual. Do either work with v10? Any issues with other software? Have you tried running Monarch in XP mode?

Sorry I can't offer more help.

[Guy Chowning]

Thanks Joe,

I have tried every compatibility mode on both machines with no luck. It is indeed unfortunate too because I was trying to demo some data for a group of customers to show them how easy it was to use Monarch but it ended up an embarrassment.

It runs great on my old XP service pack 2 but I have tried everything I know to do and still no luck. Our in house IT group also were scratching their heads, hopefully Monarch Support will return our calls today.

Thanks for the Info.

[jviola]

Joe,

Thanks for responding. We have installed XP mode and Monarch runs fine in the virtual XP mode. I don't know if that helps or not.

[Guy Chowning]

I wanted to let users know that Monarch Pro Version 10.5 coupled with the Windows 7 64 bit will work just fine on small reports. However it does not hold true for larger reports. A typical report size I routinely work with would be 7,500 pages which translates into about 350,000 rows of data with a typical number of columns being 40. These reports may be as great as 60,000 pages but what I describes is typical.

I have spent a significant amount of time trying to get these models & reports to work. I have even sent the exact model and report to the Support Group at Monarch but they were of no help whatsoever, they basically walked me through opening and running one of the Training tutorial reports and models and then saying see it works. That is not support in a real world situation you done have 2 or 3 page reports.

What I have found is that if you bring the computer up in SAFE MODE with net work active, I can run these reports in a reasonable amount of time 1 minutes 19 seconds.

But if I try to run in normal mode the same report and model will take 30 + minutes to run or it will freeze altogether and not complete.

I want to add my appreciation for Gareth Horton help in trouble shooting these issues with me and our Company's internal IT staff.

[AlexM]

Hi Guy,

As a long-term Monarch user, I just wanted to let you know that I have been having similar issues of excessive waiting times and/or freezes with Windows 7 (both 32-bit and 64-bit) and Monarch Pro 10.5 when external lookups are involved which I never had with Windows XP.

By rights, I should have followed this up further with Datawatch but you are obviously doing so. I'll follow the feedback with interest.

Besides firing up XP Mode, the best (i.e. fastest) solution for now was to go back to a Windows XP machine until the whole thing is properly resolved.

Regards
Alex

[Guy Chowning]

Thanks for the reply Alex. I am a very long time user of Monarch, all the way back to when it was DOS based. With each new release I have always anxiously upgraded. But this issue has me totally stumped. I waited till Win 7 came out to take advantage of the 64 bit advantage of Excel but that gain was blown away by the dismal results I am experiencing with Monarch. One extremely odd bit of info I would like to pass along is that when I added process monitor to the mix the speed of Monarch actually improved! As a work around I have this running before I start Monarch, it is a weird work around but it works. This monitoring tool may be found here http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896645.aspx
Let me know if you hear any more on this issue.

Thanks
Guy

[Guy Chowning]

For those of you who maybe interested I have received a final reply from Jack Clemente who is with Datawatch Global Support.

I shall post this for others who are experiencing similar problems that I currently have.

But let me state this clearly that I have the exact same issue on 2 new machines from Dell both machines have Win 7 64 Ultimate loaded with Office 2007 Pro and Monarch 10.5. No other software was loaded other than what Dell puts on their machines. Dell Precision T3500 and Dell Precision T5500.

I shall say that when I boot either machine in SAFE mode I can run Monarch with my test model in about 1.5 to 1.75 minutes. In normal mode this will run in 15-30 minutes or it will freeze altogether.

My next step is to wipe completely the hard drive and install a fresh copy of Win7 64 and only Monarch 10.5

I am determined to get to the bottom of this issue.

For years I have wished Monarch was ported to run in a UNIX environment, I would have said bye to Microsoft long ago!

Thanks for all the replies and emails !

From: Datawatch Global Support [mailto:helpdesk@datawatch.com]
Sent: Wednesday, January 20, 2010 1:02 PM
To: Jeff Viola
Cc: Support US
Subject: WIN 7 64 Bit Monarch 10.5 Conflicts

Hello,

We have certified Monarch 10.5 for numerous environments, including Windows 7 64-bit.
We are unable to replicate the conflicts you describe in any of our 64-bit environments.

Have you tried using Monarch 10.5 on your other Windows 7 64-bit machines?
If so, can you help us replicate the problem by providing additional details, or steps to replicate?

We looked at possible scenarios similar to “strange” problems in Windows 7 and found some interesting references you might be interested in.
http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7performance/thread/298a06de-fff5-499a-85b8-6f730a61802c/
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/6152/use-advanced-tools-to-troubleshoot-performance-problems-in-windows-7/

It appears other software can have these environmental issues with Windows 7 too – Office, for example:
http://www.sevenforums.com/microsoft-office/28907-when-outlook-word-open-w7-x64-slow.html
http://preempalverec.wordpress.com/2009/11/24/slow-saving-from-office-applications-with-windows-7/
http://forums.techarena.in/ms-office-support/826170.htm

If we can not replicate the problem, we will be forced to conclude that it is something specific to your setup.


Kind regards,

Jack Clemente
Datawatch Global Support
Tel: 1-978-441-2200
http://www.datawatch.com
Information Made Easy

http://www.monarchforums.com
The Online Community of Monarch Users

[Data Kruncher]

This is clearly a particularly challenging problem.


other than what Dell puts on their machines

It wouldn't surprise me in the least to learn that this is where your problem lies.

I had a terrible problem trying to install the Office Web Components software to work with legacy applications and Office 2007. In the end, removing the Dell software on my Latitude laptop was the resolution, and I was able to install the OWC software without issue.

Of course this might not be your underlying issue, but if it looks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck... :D

Good luck with this. Nothing like the razor's edge, huh? ;)

[Guy Chowning]

I have ran my test model & report in safe mode and have consistently completed in 60 seconds or less.

By all accounts the experts tell me that this definitely points to a software conflict?

Okay how do I begin to compare safe mode versus normal mode to identify the process that are preventing this from running this way in normal mode?

Are their utilities that aid in this process, if so what are they?

Thanks again for all the emails and replies.

[Grant Perkins]

Guy,

In theory the differences will be in whatever is loaded by the startup file, perhaps specifically by the Dell pre-loaded part of the that file rather than any corporate installs.

The first port of call might be to disable any firewalls and virus check utilities to see what difference, if any, they make.

You might also, assuming you have the access rights, get some clues about where the conflict lies from the Monarch log file (see the Help - Hidden Settings - for further information ) or the Windows Events log.

From what you have identified the difference seems to be something in the additional drivers loaded when not in Safe mode. I guess that these days that might still be a long list to work through though some may be more likely candidates than others ... :(

[Joe Berry]

Guy,
I would give SysInternals Suite a try. It has three utilities that may well isolate the culprit. The three are:

ProcDump
v1.72 (January 19, 2010)
This new command-line utility is aimed at capturing process dumps of otherwise difficult to isolate and reproduce CPU spikes. It also serves as a general process dump creation utility and can also monitor and generate process dumps when a process has a hung window or unhandled exception.

Process Explorer
v11.33 (February 4, 2009)
Find out what files, registry keys and other objects processes have open, which DLLs they have loaded, and more. This uniquely powerful utility will even show you who owns each process.

Joe

Process Monitor
v2.8 (November 3, 2009)
Monitor file system, Registry, process, thread and DLL activity in real-time.

These are Microsoft utilities now and can be downloaded or run online at:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/default.aspx

Another thought is the Autoruns utility in SysInternals. Have you checked to see what is automatically loaded at startup? For all Dell, HP, etc systems my first line of defense is PC Decrapifier to remove the free and sometimes troublesome junk vendors load.

Hope that helps.

[Guy Chowning]

The issue only happens when Monarch is ran on a PC that is greater than a dual core. When it is ran on a single core or a dual core it does not have the symtoms descibed throuh out my posts.

[AlexM]

As per your experience, Guy, I can confirm too that whilst Monarch 10.5 basically works OK on Windows 7 - whether 32-bit or 63-bit with an Intel Core 2 chipset on the different HP PCs I've used - with fairly low-level report analysis, working with large sets of data (as I do) is a complete non-starter.

My best option for performance was really to have access to a second Windows XP PC. Windows XP mode on Win 7, though OK, ran slower and would require resetting the database links.

No doubt one could go through the various workarounds proposed to get to the bottom of the matter but I'm not sure many of us have that level of patience. Besides which, it's probably only a short matter of time before v11 comes out which may cure these issues and hopefully give us a few more exciting features. Fingers crossed!

[Guy Chowning]

I will keep my fingers crossed that version 11 does this, in the mean time I have reverted to a dual core XP machine which I exextended the warranty. Maybe 2012 we will see a new release!