GUI window flickering on startup, unusable (Windows v1.37.4 and previous)

[tud69]

ImHex 1.37.4 and 1.35.4, tested both, "normal" and "NoGPU" versions.

When starting imhex-gui.exe or imhex.exe, the main window appears but is flickering very fast, something like 20-30 Hz maybe. Nothing seems click-able, so I need to kill the task from the taskmanager. I am running it on my Dev system under Windows 7.

What could be the reason? What can I do to make this great software working on my Win7 ?

[WerWolv]

Hey! Give the nightly build a try perhaps. Otherwise if you manage to get into the settings, maybe you can enable the "Use Native window decoration" option which might improve things.

I haven't tried using Win 7 in a long time though so I'm unsure what could be causing it.

[tud69]

I have already tried the nightly built, but same thing.
I am not even able to locate the menu as the window always appears only for a fraction of a second. I wish I could send you screenshots, but even this is very difficult. Attached my best attempt to capture this. The window appears only for approx 5 to 30x per second.
Isn't there a command line switch to use "Native window decoration" ?

[WerWolv]

You can modify the config file directly. It's under %localappdata%/imhex/config/settings.json

[tud69]

I am using the portable version and found it under /config/settings.json

I changed:
"hex.builtin.setting.interface.native_window_decorations": false => true
"hex.builtin.setting.interface.multi_windows": true => false
"hex.builtin.setting.interface.fps": 60 => 10

Nothing helped :(

[tud69]

I have tried a few older versions from 2020-2021 just now, including v1.0.0. All of them are crashing.

[tud69]

I am running all kind of software here, incl. graphics software, development tool chains, latest notepad++, STM32 Cube IDE etc. without any problems. So it's not a general problem with my computer.

[WerWolv]

Compared to those applications, ImHex makes very heavy use of the GPU though. One thing I could think of that might cause issues would be if you have Aero turned off.
Otherwise I'll need to investigate but I'm unable to do it right now

[tud69]

YES! That did the trick! I changed back to the default Windows 7 Aero theme and the software works. I used this as a base where I just modified a few settings, not sure what I did at that time. I tried to enable/disable transparency, but that was not the reason. Anyway, it works and I am finally able to test this great piece of software.

Thanks a lot for your help and all your development effort, Nik !!

[WerWolv]

Great to hear! You're welcome :)

[tud69]

Update: Confirmed!
My windows theme was "Windows 7 Basic" (with modified settings) which is not an Aero theme.
The Aero theme is just called "Windows 7" and this is the one which works for me, running imHex 1.37.4. (the portable NoGPU version).