GIMP Version: 2.6.10/11
Operating System: Windows
OS Version: Vista - SP1
GIMP Experience: Beginner Level

List any relevant plug-ins or scripts:
GAP

List any ERROR messages you received:
"GLib-ERROR**: gmem.c:176 failed to allocate 2097152 bytes aborting...."

"This application has requested the Runtime to terminate it in an unusual way. Please contact the application's support team for more information."

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I'm completely confused. Yesterday I was making GIF's by extracting frames from a video using the GAP plugin, same as I have been doing since I installed it ages ago. Then when I'd finished I closed GIMP down and logged off. When I tried to open it again today to do some more I get those error messages, then Windows telling me it has stopped working. Every time I get the message though, a different number of bytes comes up.

I've tried un-installing and re-installing both the 2.6.10 & 2.6.11 versions, but I still get the same thing. Can anyone help me, please? I've no idea how to make it work.

Have you tried re-installing GAP? Gimp Animation Package
http://sourceforge.net/projects/gimp-wi ... p/download
Have you tried re-installing GTK runtimes?
http://sourceforge.net/projects/gtk-win/

I've tried redoing GAP a few times since I posted this, and it's made no difference. Just tried the GTK thing, and nothing, same happens, with the same error messages.

From what I can tell by doing some searching is that GLib is part of GTK. No idea how it could have corrupted itself. I don't use Windows so I can't help you with GTK on Win. All I know from the Win-world is that Vista has its own share of issues - and I wouldn't be surprised if it had something to do with this. If reinstalling absolutely everything (GTK, GIMP, etc) doesn't fix it, my best guess is there is some Windows library that must have corrupted itself, and GTK depends on it. The next step may be to reinstall all of GTK's dependencies - including any WIN system files. Doesn't the Win CD allow you to do that without reinstalling?

Since the error says that it can't allocate memory...

Can you open up other applications normally? Any applications which would take substantial amount of memory? Just in case you have hardware issue or problems with memory management...

Bad memory cells should be identified at boot-time. With older versions of Windows, sometimes you just had to reboot every now and then to keep the system stable. XP was pretty solid for me, though. I don't know about Vista. I've heard bad things about it. Win7 is supposed to be good.

I do sometimes get a message on start up that the SYSTEM 32 file is corrupted, and to reboot from disc. But after turning off & on again it works, so I don't know if that *would* have something to do with it. I didn't get that today though.

As for the dependencies and stuff - I really am clueless about most computer tech, so have no idea how to do that. I do know that I didn't get any disc with the laptop when I bought it, I had to burn my own system back up ones, but I'm loathe to go through doing all that again.

Everything else I've been running lately has worked fine - internet, other applications etc. Nothing has closed down on me or refused to start. :/

Isn't System32 like the kernel on Linux? (Can any Windows users confirm/deny that?) If that's the case, I think you'll have to reinstall that file or the OS entirely.

None of that uses GTK, though.

Are you having problems running other applications? It's possible that you've had a ram chip go bad. You can DL http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/ and check your ram.

It's more likely you have data corruption but you should download hijack this and check to see if you have anything strange running. Viruses like to hide out in system32.dll and wreak havoc. The first thing many of today's viruses do is to attack your anti-virus software, rendering it ineffective.

You could also try a good registry cleaner. Corrupt registries can be a big headache.

As others have mentioned, Vista is not the best choice as far as OS's go.

Other than those suggestions, do you have a spare drive around? My recommendation is to load up Linux on a spare drive, dual boot and start weaning yourself off of Microsoft.

Your system is likely corrupted/broken (broken files...). You can't really expect Gimp to work nicely in these conditions. Gimp is the first to demonstrate the problem because it stresses the system a bit more than other applications.

Asseime the aboce is fixed, if the troule persists: if gmem.c can't allocate memory, it's because Windows won't give it the memory to allocate, so:

- check in the process manager for any sign of memory exhaustion (available Free memory very small). How much memory is Gimp using?
- check that you have virtual memory enabled, and enough disk space to support it
- see if the problem is specific to a given image (or does it occur at startup?)

Also broken hard disk is possible (if Gimp is big enough to need caching). Could also explain SYSTEM 32 problems.

Too bad Windows can't tell unless it has S.M.A.R.T. problem reporting in Vista. Most hard disk vendors support something like that. A little thing which is very well catered in Linux but difficult in plain vanilla Windows.

Not the only one (see the various Python installation threads )

I just had to fix a problem with my sons friends Mothers laptop.She had Windows Vista on it also.
She would boot up and windows would tell her it had to shut itself down so it wouldn't be damaged.
I booted her laptop up with the last known good configuration and it works fine now.
You may want to try that.