Still hunting.. the latest version DID load on a different workstation, after alerting me when loading the project that a few BCC plug-ins weren't installed on that machine (BCC Chroma Key Studio). After it loaded on that machine I saved under a different name and went back to my main editing workstation.

The project loads! (and the BCC Chroma Key Studio effect is not on the two events I had it on, which is fine).

BUT before getting into it too far.. I saved the project on that main editing workstation and tried to re-load it.. Crash. No-go.

If it's plug-in related, what can be done to diagnose that? I've forced the BCC plug-ins not to load by rename the folders (and Vegas reported it couldn't load them when it launched) -- but still the same crash when I open the project. So maybe it's not plug-in related afterall.. but then what is happening that when I load it, then save it, the newly saved file crashes?

Tried an old technique ..

1. opened the version which loads, deleted all media (left markers, track motion, etc) from timeline, saved as "shell"
2. opened the "shell" and the version which loads
3. copied all media from the working prj and pasted into new ("shell") timeline. saved that as "shell_filled"

When I open shell_filled, it prompts for a missing PSD file used in the project (drive mapping was different on that other workstation which created/salvaged it). No prob... if I locate the file, it loads OK. If I say "IGNORE" missing files, Vegas crashes and won't load it?! And like before, locating the file and saving it -- results in a crash when I load that newly created file.

I'm really stumped here.. going to keep deleting media til something helps..? Yeah.. I'm rambling.. long night. Sorry for this folks.

I originally came to Vegas many years ago because of instability in consumer NLEs.. so sad to still be dealing with pesky issues like this after all these years.

Firstly, update from VP14 build 252 to the final build 270.

Disabling stuff to get Vegas to start is covered in this post. It should also apply to getting a project to open. https://www.vegascreativesoftware.info/us/forum/faq-vegas-pro-won-t-start-what-can-i-do--104784/

Thanks Nick -- not my first time at the rodeo here, as you know.

I updated to build 270, and now none of my built-in audio plug-ins (track compressor, etc) show up. Lovely.

Uninstalled Vegas and re-installed and now they're back.. *whew*.. now.. back to the drawing board on this pesky project <sarcasm> (fun way to spend the night!) </sarcasm>

What I did in this situation was to rename the folder the where the media is and when the program loads and ask for the media bring in things one at a time to find any corrupted files, tedious but worked for me.

I've got *most* of the project reassembled and loading.. but whenever I drop any number of individual clips into the timeline now, and save, it crashes on re-load.

As you suggested might be helpful, I moved the remaining .MP4 clips into an "orig" subdirectory, and re-encoded them all using FFMPEG into a "new" subdirectory, which is what I pointed Vegas to when loading.

Sadly, no difference.
- reinstalled Vegas
- tried running as Administrator
- renamed plug-in folders, and eliminated the use of 3rd party plug-ins
- disabled video card use
- created a new project by deleting all events, cleaning project media, then doing save-as (to keep tracks and keyframes), then have been copy/pasting events incrementally in.

Unfortunately it's now at a point where putting any media in will present this problem. And actually, I just deleted an animated .GIF from the project (still trying to find the culprit) and event doing that caused the newly saved file not to load?!

Could you share your Vegas Pro project file for download (without source media)?

Hardware fault perhaps? HDD? RAM? Perhaps run diagnostic checks on them. HDD manufacturers usually have their own application for that.

Check this out --

1. I created a brand new project.
2. Manually inserted the 18 tracks (didn't bother with nesting, keyframes, etc. at this time)
3. Pasted the audio events, BGM (music) events, and video events from loading project.
4. Saved
5. Loaded -- crash
6. Renamed .MP4 folder to NEWER
7. Loaded -- one-by-one choosing the new MP4 from the "NEWER" folder. The entire project loaded. Closed project.
8. Loaded -- answered "yes" this time when it said it found the other media in that folder -- crash
9. Loaded -- told to "ignore" all missing media -- loaded.

Manually choosing each file caused a successful load -- telling it to automatically choose the files in that folder that it found -- and it crashes.

?!

Nick -- I'll copy to a local/internal HDD and see if there's a difference. Probably not the drive though, since moving the drive to the eSATA dock on a different computer and it behaved better). Yeah.. I probably at this point should just finish this project on that other computer -- but rendering is so much slower there and it doesn't really tell me what the root cause is here.

Marco -- I can upload the project. Which version LOL.. Without any media all versions do load OK.

Ran Windows memory diagnostics -- (MDSCHED.EXE).. no errors detected of the 32 GB RAM I've got. S.M.A.R.T. looks OK on the drive.

"Without any media all versions do load OK."

It does not mean there should be no Events in the timeline or project media but only there's no need to also upload the source media. The source media itself wouldn't matter for a first overall project check.

Marco and Nick -- thanks for hanging in here with me once the sun rose.. I really really really appreciate not feeling completely on an island here.

*pant pant pant*

Update: After I converted the .MP4's in my project (originally generated from a BMD H.264 encoder, subsequently converted via FFMPEG in an attempt to resolve this project-load issue) to high bitrate MPEG2s, things seem to stabilize. Don't know why Vegas on this machine suddenly doesn't like those MP4 files, but things are moving along now.. after an entire night of arrggggghhhh...

*yawn* OK.. let's see how far I can get before crashing...

Thank you again... thank you thank you thank you!

Check RAM as well as your HDDs: https://www.lifewire.com/free-memory-test-programs-2626178

My VP12 crashes in render if I use Cuda