Hello All:

We presently are deploying DisplayFusion to my entire company of over 2000 users. It is pushed out through Group Policy and we are configuring some default settings and UI restrictions via Group Policy registry preferences.

During our recent testing of Windows 10, we experienced a rash of Excel and PowerPoint crashes. We could not figure out what was causing it until just recently. After 12 days of troubleshooting and engaging with Microsoft and our Anti-Virus vendor's engineering team, we finally discovered that DisplayFusion 8.1.2 was the cause.

Upon terminating the DisplayFusion process, the Excel problems went away instantly and we no longer had crashing issues. As soon as we started the software back up, Excel and Powerpoint crashed constantly.

So we cleared out our configuration changes and to our dismay, the problem remained. In digging through the registry, I deleted the HKCU\Software\Binary Fortress Software\DisplayFusion\Session keys and Excel instantly started functioning properly.

After the computer (or DisplayFusion) restarts, the keys are recreated and the crashing issues resume. This is a critical issue as we are up against a very tight deadline to prepare systems for Windows 10. Our plan at the moment is to disable DisplayFusion on all Windows 10 systems, however, many users will riot if we keep it away for too long.

(Also, we are presently evaluating DisplayFusion v9 for installation, but didn't want to add more pieces to this puzzle.)

Thanks for any responses that I get. For reference I have attached a screenshot of the keys that appear to be the culprit.

Thanks again.
--Robert

It does indeed seem to be the application hooks that are causing the issues. After adding the compatibility option, everything seems to work without issue.

Couple of questions: Is there an easy way to push out this configuration on massive scale without having to copy and deploy 15-20 registry keys to the entire firm? I could not see anything that stood out to me in the ADMX template (v4.1).

Also, what does disabling the application hooks break in terms of functionality?

We are hoping that an upgrade to v9.0 will alleviate our issues without having to worry about added compatibility concerns.

Thanks.

Keith,

I have verified that the problem continues with version 9.0 of DisplayFusion. I have also confirmed that the Excel and PowerPoint crash issue occurs with all addins disabled and also when running the programs in safe mode.

Thank you for the shortcut on the compatibility keys. My supervisors are not at all thrilled with having to apply compatibility settings to two of the most commonly used applications in Windows, but it will hopefully hold us over until we can figure out a permanent solution.

Please let me know if you would like any additional information.

Thanks.