Version, Illegal Operation Error at launch

[Guest_imported]

I've been using Illustrator 9, Photoshop 6 and Acrobat 5 for a long time now, without incident. Just last night, I tried to open Illustrator for the first time in about a week or two. Every time I launch the application, I receive the tyical Windows error message, "This program has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down."

I've exhausted every possibility I know of on my own; I'm hoping one of you folks can help me. Here's what I tried so far:
- Uninstall and Reinstall, numerous times
- Uninstall and manually delete all residual files before Reinstall
- Deleted Windows Registry entries pertaining to Illustrator prior to reinstall
- Reinstalled display driver
- Uninstalled a few applications that were recent installations that I can do without

Illustrator seems to be the only application doing this. I haven't opened everything, but the other Adobe products work, as do the few other applications I've been working in. There is only one other thing that, in good conscience, I have to bring up: I recently installed Microsoft Visio to do work for a course I'm in. I cannot remember if I've used Illustrator since that installation, but I cannot remove Visio just yet, especially if Illustrator isn't working. (If someone KNOWS of a compatibility issue with the pair, I'll try uninstalling Visio.)

Any suggestions? I'd really appreciate some help here.

 

[Guest_imported]

Just an update: I uninstalled again. I also uninstalled Streamline and Photoshop, along with Visio. I rebooted, and then I reinstalled Illustrator first, followed by Photoshop - no Streamline or Visio. Didn't work. Help. Please. Thanks.

 

[Guest_imported]

Hi all,

This is my last message related to this problem, promise. I stopped in again to tell you I figured out what the problem was. Reading the Illustrator troubleshooting guide at adobe.com for the 10th time, I noticed the printer driver compatibility issue. I never had a problem with my printer before, but then I remembered that I had Adobe Acrobat Distiller set as my default printer for the moment, due to a project I'm working on. I tried setting my real printer as the default again, and Illustrator opened. When I set Acrobat Distiller as the default again, Illustrator wouldn't open. How's that for a kick in the teeth, eh? Adobe Acrobat cannot be the default printer if you're going to work in Adobe Illustrator. Thought I'd post the resolution here for anyone else who works with both applications. Take care, see you soon.

 

[askIllustrator]

Thanks for the info but to make matters worse thats not the case on all machines. Thanks to the wonderful world 3rd party products and windows simulated technology, one can never really determine what overall configuration conflicts. All I know is that I've worked in AI since version 5 (thats 1995) and the really weird, mind boggelingly stupid stuff didnt start to happen until Adobe started moving its product line over to PC's. Adobe is the second largest software developer in the world, next to microsoft so if Adobe software always worked perfect until the windows versions came out I can only think that windows just plain is bad and Adobe did the best they could to make their stuff more "Mac-Like". I compare the two OS's like this: The PC is like a bed of nails and the Mac is a bean bag chair. You can recline on either one but only one is painless.

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