Screenmode refuses to change until reboot

[Leifern]

Hello,

I often get into trouble with my Amiga, but I'm getting better at understanding what is going on, but now I really have no idea. I hope some of you guys will be able and willing to help me out.

Everything has been working quite well for a while until i decided to install a bunch of stuff today. I figured that as long as I keep an eye out on my startup-sequence that I'd be able to revert averything if it went bad, but I'm not.

I've installed:
ReqAttack
SystemPatch2
mcc_betterstring
MCC_nlist
MCC_Toolbar
VisualPrefs
Executive 2.10
StackAttack
FBlit
BlazeWCP
PopupMenuUser
SnoopDOS

My problem is, as the title says, that screenmode no longer changes the screenmode. I am able to "save" and reboot, but after Ive pressed "save" or "use" the system hangs in a strange way. I am able to move around, close old windows etc. but if i try to open a new window it hangs on the "timer"-mousepointer.

SnoopDOS reports 3 FAILS when opening "screenmode":

Screenmode         ToolType       ACTION
Screenmode         ToolType       CREATEICONS
Screenmode         ToolType       PUBSCREEN

If i select a new screenmode and press "use" it reports OK from "screenmode" and "<< IPrefs >>".

I dont' know what this means or what could be causing the FAILS. But i have tried removing all traces of my installs in startup and userstartup but other then one less notice from "Virusz" nothing has changed.

Sorry for going on, but I really hope someone can help me out?

[Matt_H]

Those FAILS on opening Screenmode prefs mean nothing - just that you don't have anything set for those Tooltypes, so nothing to worry about there.

At any rate, that's a lot of hacks you're running. ReqAttack, SystemPatch2, StackAttack, VisualPrefs, Executive, and FBlit are probably the most hacky. Check again that they're removed from startup-sequence and user-startup. Also check the WBStartup drawer. If I had to guess, I think VisualPrefs is the culprit.

Normally, when changing screenmodes, a requester pops up asking you to close all windows except drawers In other words, drawers can stay open, programs can't. Sometimes even iconified programs need to be quit or moved to another screen. It sounds like something is preventing that requester from opening and Intuition is hanging as a result.

By default, SnoopDOS doesn't show everything that's happening. Go to the functions window and enable everything - it might give you some more hints.

[Leifern]

Thank you for the reply, Matt! I've rechecked and removed a bunch of other things as well (anything that upset VirusZ), but nothing has changed. There is no trace of any of the programs in WBstartup drawer.

When everything is enabled in SnoopDOS it also reports a number of FAILS:
WBL      #EXAM_OBJECT           2061AC5             DH0                (and similar)
WBL      #PARENT                    2061A8F             DH0                (and similar)
As well as
Screenmode            FindPort        Screenmode.prefs

Apart from that everything gets OK. When i press "use" i get no FAILs, but at that point the computer really doesn't seem to be doing much. The window that is supposed to ask to close windows never pops up, as you said. When i attemt to open a new program or drawer i get many of the same #PARENT FAILs, but i also get *Tooltype SORT, NO_ICON_POSITION FAILs, and *LockScreen PRONTPUBSCREEN FAIL. After that last fail nothing even tries to happen.

[Matt_H]

Hmm. Unfortunately I'm not seeing anything that gives me any major ideas...

A few things to try:
- delete (or rename) envarc:sys/screenmode.prefs and reboot. This will reset your screenmode to the default PAL:HiRes (or NTSC). Try setting a screenmode now.
- The "please close all windows except drawers" requester will only appear if any such windows are open. Make sure that some such windows are open so that we can be certain the point of failure is related to that function/requester. I think IPrefs is definitely involved, but I can't tell how yet.

Can you tell us more about your base system. Machine type? OS version? Hardware expansions?

[Ancalimon]

Small things annoy the most. When I had such issues with my Amiga, I reinstalled everything from scratch. For some reason I like new beginnings

Try it to detect what the problem is.