TestStand Crashes on Startup After Reinstall or Upgrade

Updated Jul 31, 2023

Reported In

Software

  • TestStand 2019
  • TestStand 2020

Issue Details

I uninstalled and reinstalled TestStand, but my new installation of TestStand crashes on startup. What could be causing this issue?

Solution

When uninstalling TestStand 2019 and later, it is possible that certain packages will not uninstall correctly. If this happens, the remaining package may corrupt later installations, resulting in this crash. To avoid this, please ensure that all TestStand related packages are uninstalled.

Go through the following steps in order to find and remove the packages still installed:

1. Open NI Package Manager.
2. Go to the Installed tab.
3. Type TestStand in the search bar.
4. Look for the packages that correspond to each bitness. Only a few of them might be listed on your case, but below you find the complete list of packages:
 
  • For 32-bit check for the following packages:
 
  • TestStand Runtime GAC Assemblies
  • TestStand Tools Deployment Utility (32-bit)
  • TestStand ADE Support Shared (32-bit)
  • TestStand Documentation (32-bit)
  • TestStand Examples (32-bit)
  • TesStand Session Manager 
  • TestStand ADE Support (32-bit)
  • TestStand File Diff and Merge Utility Launcher
  • TestStand Licenses
  • TestStand Example Launcher
  • TestStand Graph Control 
  • TestStand Process Models Runtime (32-bit)
  • TestStand Process Models Source (32-bit)
  • TestStand Runtime (32-bits)
  • TestStand Sequence Editor (32-bits)
  • TestStand Tools (32-bit)
  • TestStand User Interfaces (32-bit)
 
  • For 64-bit check for the following packages:
 
  • TestStand Runtime GAC Assemblies
  • TestStand Tools Deployment Utility (64-bit)
  • TestStand ADE Support Shared (32-bit)
  • TestStand Documentation (64-bit)
  • TestStand Examples (64-bit)
  • TestStand Runtime (32-bits)
  • TesStand Session Manager 
  • TestStand ADE Support (32-bit)
  • TestStand File Diff and Merge Utility Launcher
  • TestStand Licenses
  • TestStand Example Launcher
  • TestStand Graph Control 
  • TestStand Process Models Runtime (64-bit)
  • TestStand Process Models Source (64-bit)
  • TestStand Runtime (64-bit)
  • TestStand Sequence Editor (64-bit)
  • TestStand Tools (64-bit)
  • TestStand User Interfaces (64-bit)
  • TestStand LabVIEW NXG API
  • TestStand LabVIEW NXG Controls

Note: You may find several versions of TestStand Runtime GAC Assemblies and TestStand LabVIEW NXG Controls. Consider all of them. 
 
5. After finding the packages that are still installed, select them and click the Remove button. 


Note: If both 32-bit and 64-bit are installed, you can uninstall the 64-bit packages leaving only TestStand 32-bit installed. However, since TestStand 64-bit depends on TestStand 32-bit dependencies, you cannot safely uninstall TestStand 32-bit while retaining TestStand 64-bit, as it can damage the installation of TestStand 64-bit.