Intermittent file creation error

[ScottHorn]

On a few occasions recently I've received an error at the end of an analysis on one of my instruments. It occurs with both single analyses as well as at the end of steps in a sequence. The error message says (roughly) "Cannot create raw file C:\Clarity\tmp\$ch3temp.raw". I'm not sure if it is always the case, but most of the time I've observed this error there have been two or three instruments running simultaneously. I cannot reliably reproduce the error. In the most recent instance the error occurred on one instrument at the end of a short (20 min) analysis, while the other instrument was running a long (1000 min, overnight) analysis. The sequence on the first instrument halted waiting for me to hit ok. In the morning when I discovered the error, and hit ok, the sequence continued, but the second instrument's status read "stopping" and remained that way until I hit "abort". Both the chromatograms for the first and second instruments were incorrect (ie the 1000 min chromatogram appeared be truncated at the time the error occurred, 85 min instead of 1000 min). Any ideas as to what's happening and how I can prevent this in the future? Might I need to increase the available number of file handles?

Scott Horn

[Daniel Mentlik]

Dear Scott,
after a brief discussion, the problem seems to be more complex. Some described symptoms seem familiar, but it does not ring a bell as a whole, so we will definitely need more informations.
Do you have the diagnostic files for the problem available? Standard diagnostic files are needed (look here which ones they are), as well as sequence files from both instruments in question and also the created chromatograms. If you do not have the files available, please, if the issue happens next, send us the diagnostic files from the station to support@dataapex.com .

Best Regards,
Daniel

[ScottHorn]

Thanks for looking into the problem for me. I've put together the files requested, and will send them to you shortly. I've included two chromatograms. The shorter of the two is from the instrument I believe to be causing the trouble, and the longer is from another instrument and was truncated at the time the error occurred. Luckily, this problem seems to have been resolved. I'm still not sure what caused it, but I believe it may have had something to do with the antivirus software my company uses. I instructed the antivirus software to completely ignore anything in the Clarity directory and rebooted. Since then I have not seen the error. It could just be pure coincidence though. I will still send the files however, as you may be able to learn something from them.

Thanks

Scott Horn

[Daniel Mentlik]

Dear Scott,
we have received your diagnostic files and passed them to programmers for inspection. Basically, there might be problems with the antivirus, we generally advise people to disable the scanning of files at each change for Clarity directory, as the files are modified quite often during the whole period Clarity is running.

However, as of late, we have discovered more reports resulting in the station switched to "Stopping" state, which we now explore and which will hopefully be repaired in the next version of the software. It is thus possible that your case might be somehow connected to one of these too.

I will let you know as soon as we insect the files.

Best Regards,
Danile