Luminar 4 hangs on the splash screen after the update: solutions
Answered
Hello Everyone,
We're currently investigating this issue and we will do our best to provide a solution.
Please, kindly try the solutions listed below if you're facing this issue:
First, please try the following solution:
- Turn off Windows Defender Firewall: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4028544/windows-10-turn-windows-defender-firewall-on-or-off
- Either turn off your anti-virus or add Luminar to its list of exclusions. Consult your anti-virus manual for help.
Please make sure to do that for all the security software you have on your computer.
If you have the Avast firewall, try switching it to private mode additionally.
Besides, please download Process Explorer via the link below and kill all processes related to your antivirus software:
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorer
If none of these help, please perform the following steps that may help resolve the issue:
1. Reboot your PC.
2. Uninstall Luminar.
How to uninstall an app on Windows 7 (click this text to open link).
How to uninstall an app on Windows 8 (click this text to open link).
How to uninstall an app on Windows 10 (click this text to open link).
3. Clear your registry:
- Visit https://www.ccleaner.com/ccleaner/download?pc
- Scroll down to the bottom of the table and click Download from CCleaner.com in the first column.
- Once the download has finished, launch the file and install CCleaner on your computer.
- Launch CCleaner.
- Click Registry on the left.
- Click Scan for Issues in the lower left. Wait for the scan to finish.
- After the scan has finished, click Fix Selected Issues in the lower right.
- Close CCleaner.
4. Type %appdata% in Search (folder Roaming should open).
Find the folder “Luminar 4” and rename it to "Luminar 4 old". Please note that this folder contains your license for Luminar 4, as well as your Custom and downloaded Looks. You will be later to access them later if necessary.
5. Go to Pictures folder and rename the folder called "Luminar 4 Catalog" (if you have your Catalog anywhere else, find it and rename it to "Luminar 4 Catalog old").
Open the folder and locate the file with .luminar file extension. Change the name of this file to "Luminar 4 Catalog old" as well.
6. Reboot your PC.
7. Download the latest version of Luminar from here: https://downloads.skylum.com/luminar4/win/Luminar4Setup_offline.exe
- Right-click on the Luminar icon.
- Go to Properties > Compatibility.
- Enable 'Run this program in compatibility mode for: Windows 8' checkbox.
- Press 'Ok'.
If the steps above don't help, could you please let us know your hardware configuration and send it via https://skylum.com/support?
- Press the Windows logo key + R.
- Type msinfo32 in the dialog box that opens and hit Enter on your keyboard.
- In the window that opens, make sure you have System Summary highlighted on the left.
- Click File > Export.
- Type the name of the file (you can choose any you like), save it somewhere where you can easily find it and attach this text file to your reply to the contact form.
N.B. The links are clickable and show the screenshots that can guide you, if necessary.
Here is the video tutorial on how to retrieve your system info: https://www.loom.com/share/97aff7951ee3412daa020f1d88eb36e8
Besides, please send us event logs:
- Reproduce the issue.
- Press the Windows logo key + R.
- Type eventvwr in the dialog box that opens and hit Enter on your keyboard.
- In the window that opens click the triangle next to Windows Logs on the left. A directory tree should open.
- Click Application in the directory tree.
- In the main part of the window find the two topmost entries marked with Error named Application Error and .NET Runtime.
- Hold CTRL and click your left mouse button on each entry to select them both.
- Right-click on any of the two selected entries and click Save Selected Events.
- Name the file, save it, and attach it to your reply to the contact form https://skylum.com/support
If nothing helps, you can install Luminar 4.2.0 following the link below.
https://downloads.skylum.com/luminar4/win/Luminar4Setup_offline_420.exe
We will do our best to fix this issue asap.
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Interesting thought. The one that doesn't work has a NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER w/ 8GB RAM. It runs other software like skunk. Current drivers.The other box (that ver 4.3 works on) also has an upper end mobuie nVidia card. If that's the problem, there is nothing I can do about it.
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After re-installing the previous version of L4 yesterday it worked very well... till this afternoon when I went to launch it and same banana - the program stalls on the splash screen! @##$%$@ I have now written to Skylum and asked for a refund. I no longer have the energy or patience to try and make this software work. -
Hello Stephen,
Please do the following to get Luminar up and running:
- Make sure Luminar is closed.
- Locate your Luminar Catalog folder. The default location is C:\Users\%username%\Pictures\. If you specified a custom location for your catalog, search your custom location.
- Rename the Luminar Catalog folder. Choose any name you like. Don't remove this folder.
- Press the Windows logo key + R.
- Type %appdata%\Luminar 4 in the dialog box that opens and press Enter on your keyboard.
- Next, remove all the contents in Luminar 4 folder you opened in Step 5. Please note that this will remove your user looks and workspaces, so back up the folder into the safe location before removing it if necessary. You can then put your looks and workspaces back later.
- Start Luminar. It will ask you to complete the initial setup. While performing the setup, leave the location of the catalog at the default.
- When Luminar has loaded, click File > Catalog > Open > navigate inside the folder you renamed in Step 3 > double-click Luminar Catalog.luminar file. Your previous catalog should load.
Please note: File > Catalog > Open is for opening catalog files, not photos. If you try to open a photo like this, you will receive a Database Opening Failed error.
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Yep, Steven Jackson! You don't have a problem, but a very nice solution. The point is that, in some cases, the solution could become a problem. Imagine a software that detects the performance improvement possibilities that your video card is capable of. So, this software deposits on your GPU much of the work that was previously performed by the CPU. If the software is not well designed to work with your powerful solution, then the software will turn your solution into a problem. In fact, the problem will the software itself, but in practice, it transferred the issue to your GPU. I have no way of knowing if this is the case here. I'm just speculating that the high performance of a GPU can become a problem when a software requires the card to perform at its best, perhaps in a not very adequate way.
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Miguel: I think you may very well have hit on it. The GPU in the laptop (that upgraded OK) is not as heavy duty. I also cannot find any other significant differences in the software configurations of the two machines. At this point, I decided to run ver 4.2, and wait and see if Skylum can clean up their act. Thanks for the help.
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It was this which finally fixed it for me. Can't think why, as I'm running Windows 10. I also increased the page size, so I don't really know which was the critical part:
- Right-click on the Luminar icon.
- Go to Properties > Compatibility.
- Enable 'Run this program in compatibility mode for: Windows 8' checkbox.
- Press 'Ok'.
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After doing the following -
- Right-click on the Luminar icon.
- Go to Properties > Compatibility.
- Enable 'Run this program in compatibility mode for: Windows 8' checkbox.
- Press 'Ok'.
The program now runs.. However, it is externally slow to launch. I timed it - and from within photoshop clicking on Filter->Luminar 4 takes 30secs to launch. I can render out 4K videos in less time.
Is there anything that can be done to speed up the launching of the program? I am running it from an SSD drive, on a 12core machine, with 64GBs of Ram. It is not a hardware problem.
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In my case, I've solved this problem running the program as administrator, changing the properties in the Luminar 4 direct access. Once this properties were set in this way, in the following run of the program, showed me a little window with the message "Data base migration needed". When this happened, I pushed the button accept and the program opened well. I've tried to run Luminar as normal user after this, and opens normally too.
I hope this would be useful ... for me, with the other methods I had no results.
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Hi everyone,
is there a solution visible at horizon?
Someone stated here to have found the "database migration needed" Box behind the splash screen, and so luminar hangs while waiting for the click. How difficult could it be for the skylum programmers to bring it to front?
Is skylum really working on a solution?
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Hi guys,
I'm grateful that you keep sharing what helped in your case.
I've already updated the top post and added compatibility mode as one of the possible solutions.
We're actively looking for the permanent fix right now and will be sure to make it available ASAP.
More artists have reported in tickets today that on their end the issue was resolved by disabling the security software or allowing the app through it. A lot of Luminar copies were affected, in particular, by Avast.
Thus, if you have the Avast antivirus/ firewall, try switching it to private mode additionally.
Besides, please download Process Explorer via the link below and with its help kill all processes related to your antivirus / security software:
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorerIt would also help us a lot if, apart from the data requested in the top post, you could provide the screenshot from the Process Explorer.
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OK Kate,
Tried the following:
Installed Luminar 4.3 on a machine running only an updated version of Windows 10 (including Windows Defender). Installed and ran perfectly. No issues, none what's so ever.
Upgraded Luminar 4.2 to Luminar 4.3 on a machine running Windows 10 plus the usual software (Affinity Photo, Office, etc., etc) but without replacing Widows Defender with another Antivirus (i.e. just Windows Defender). It installed and ran perfectly (tried it our several times with several different files). No issues, none what's ever. Then installed Avast and then tried to run Luminar 4.3 again but it hung on the splash screen. Funnily enough Task Manager could not find an instance of Luminar running but Process Explorer could and I was able to terminate the process.
Repeated the previous procedure but using BitDefender rather than Avast as the replacement for Windows Defender and encountered no problems. Luminar ran without issue. Unfortunately for me BitDefender and my system just don't get on well.
So it looks like I have a choice of either Windows Defender and Luminar 4.3 or Avast and Luminar 4.2. Suppose I could try AVG but is it worth it.
So in summary it appears that as I said a couple of days ago - Avast and Luminar 4.3 just don't like each other.
Oh well, time for a beer. Good Evening from a sunny South Wales.
PS: Following on from John Hummel's post I tried running Luminar 4.3 (as Administrator) with Avast as the antivirus. Did not have Hardware accelerated GPU scheduling enabled. Alas no luck still hung on the Splash screen.
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Hi all,
Every software must run on standard win 10 installations! (With internal protection) there should be no need to install 3rd party security solutions. All (!) other photo- graphic- music- cad- Software runs without modifications on my system. Luminar should also!!!
I know, it could be difficult to figure out, what the problem is. Support: please don‘t tell your customers to terminate security tasks with process explorer - that’s very dangerous! -
Agree with Michael Eicher. Customers should not be terminating security tasks, turning off firewalls, messing with C++ and the registry... That is NOT best practice. Fix the Code! What incensing me most of all is that after days of back and forth with Support, I finally came onto this forum and saw that the issue is wide-spread... all the while they were giving me directions to troubleshoot my own machine that worked perfectly until I pressed the button to update Luminar.
The root cause is not with personal computers, it is the Luminar software update. Fix that, and stop wasting time trying to fix thousands of customer computers, especially dangerous recommendations.
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I had too the GPU acceleration on Windows, but to be honest I don't remember if I activated it before or not the Luminar Upgrade.
Now I removed it. Also I removed the start as Administrator from the App...and.. it works!
Now I'll do a reboot to see if it last a bit ;)
BTW, yesterday I edited some pics... maybe working on the catalog could fix the problem? -
Totally unacceptable to be forced to do a damn thing just to make some software that never passed quality control work.
Not going to happen here.
I use multiple progs from Paint shop pro to Alien skin to DX0 etc etc. They ALL work.
I need to transfer or migrate many photographs to many different applications and using Luminar 4 is most certainly now never going to be one of them..I for one am out.
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Well ... I have to admit that Chelle Harper is right. I went through two similar situations, with two serious developers, one in Alabama, the other in Moscow. Both produce really unique plugins. And both avoided asking me to modify settings on my system as much as possible. On the contrary, they just asked me for a detailed report of the failure conditions and quickly delivered their products to me in perfect conditions of use. They are not stars in the software world, but someone like Chelle Harper would have nothing to complain about their professionalism towards their customers.
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Hi, I can´t confirm that the "L4 4.3 not loading error" depends on the antivirus (Avast):
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"More artists have reported in tickets today that on their end the issue was resolved by disabling the security software or allowing the app through it. A lot of Luminar copies were affected, in particular, by Avast.
Thus, if you have the Avast antivirus/ firewall, try switching it to private mode additionally."
I have two machines, both with avast running, on one the Luminar 4 4.3 does not work (hangs on startup-screen), on the other Luminar 4 4.3 is working fine. Changing anything with avast does not help at all for me.
On the machine L 4 4.3 not regulary working this helps for me:
- use compatbility mode Win 8
- and sometimes (!?!?) it also needs run as admin
Erwin
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"More artists have reported in tickets today that on their end the issue was resolved by disabling the security software or allowing the app through it. A lot of Luminar copies were affected, in particular, by Avast.
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Hi Erwin,
Could you please install Process Explorer on the PC where the splash screen issue appears? Run the app and try closing all processes related to Avast.
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorerMany artists have recently reported that this helped.
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