Flexi Crashing

[stickygraphics12]

I have NEVER had problems with my flexi 7.6 until this week? I am not bashing the software b/c it has been great for me, but here is my problem and it is really pi**in me off!

I am using Adobe illustrator to do some inner glows and things like that on a vehicle graphic design, saving it as an .eps, then importing it into flexi. I can work for a little while and start getting the design ready to go, then out of nowhere flexi just shuts down? The logo i am incorporating into the design was designed in illustrator also, and it pretty much freezes the program when i make too many of them. The customer wants different fills inside the background so i have to make about 20 different fills for the logo background......it takes about 10 minutes just to get a contour cut on 1 logo!

Someone please tell me if there is a solution to making this run properly and/or stop the program from crashing, I've wasted 2 days now and got nothing done b/c of this, and we all know time is money!

Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

[CS-SignSupply]

Could it possibly be a memory issue? RAM, HDD, Processor Type/size ?

Sure sounds to me that the computer/program is struggling.

Give us some more detail.

 

[Mike Paul]

20 fills in one file is most likely your problem. High res low res? computer specs? what happens when you work on them independently as separate files?... need more info.

Keep in mind not all filters and plug-ins play nice w/ Flexi.

 

[stickygraphics12]

Intel Duo Core 2 Processor 3.0Mghz, 2Gigs RAM, 528 Graphics Card, I upgraded all this stuff about 3 months ago to get the computer running faster and better. Maybe it info on the wasn't enough.....

The fills are the BD Custom Fills - diamond plate, lightning, brick, etc.

Like i said though i never had this problem before, I just started using Illustrator files in Flexi and thats when these problems started for me? The logo has so many paths that it takes flexi forever to read all of them.

Hopefully this helps

 

[Replicator]

Your RAM and your Graphics Card are quite small . . .

That being said, there are many effects that do not import correctly and with any amount of stability in Flexi.

Do you have any other programs that you can print from ?

 

[stickygraphics12]

I have Illustrator & Corel Draw X4 to design in, but no RIP for them......I guess that is something i need to work on getting.......

 

[Mike Paul]

20 high resolution Bergen fill in one file...
Ram and video card issues for sure with those specs...

 

[stickygraphics12]

Thanks mike.....so if i up the RAM and video card it will help improve the speed issues?

 

[Replicator]

4GB RAM and 2GB Graphics Card should help . . . !

 

[Charlie J]

If you uncheck preview bitmaps, wouldn't that help?

 

[iSign]

it boggles my mind sometimes what people expect to work...

I went to South America & I knew just enough Spanish to know how to order beer, coffee or water, & I knew how to check prices, count change & ask for a bathroom... but when someone heard my gringo accent struggle to make out a por favor or gracious... god forbid if they just launch into a non stop diatribe of fluent Spanish & expect me to have half a clue...

Anyway, Illustrator used to pretty much only create pure vectors... and if you expand your strokes, convert your fonts & save down to an older version .eps file... lo & behold, the amazing world of graphics software would bless us with the awesome good fortune of allowing us to import our vectors into an entirely different program, speaking a different language... yet somehow recognizing the relatively simple, basic stuff we are throwing at it...

Anyway, these days illustrator is quite fluent in it's own unique foriegn language of file creation, incorporating rastor effects, plug-ins, layers, editable effects or "expanded" ones...

You really expect Flexi to deal with that?

Why don't you just export as a .tif file to flatten everything you've created into one simple layer of print-ready pixels?? That is what I do on virtually 95% of all the prints I've done out of Flexi for 4 years. I never have a problem in Flexi this way.

If I had to build some complex collection of multiple fills... I'd do it in Photoshop, and flatten it when it's done. Save one as a .psd file still in layers if you anticipate revisions, or new creations using some of the work in those layers... but if you have fills overlapping each other (if... just guessing here) ...then the file size will be huge to memorize that hidden detail... flatten everything into one layer & you will see a smaller file size. Also, Photoshop is made for this specific type of complex rastor editing... Flexi has design capabilities, but if you can do stuff in Photoshop, and just open in Flexi when it's all done... then you won't be choking the program so bad & getting yourself all tweaked out over the alleged weakness in the program, when you never needed to place so many demands on it in the first place...

well, that's assuming you have Photoshop... if you don't, I'd suggest that as a next investment instead of more ram!