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Capture One Crashes on macOS and Windows: Troubleshooting

Karolina
  • Updated

If Capture One is crashing on your computer, follow the steps below to troubleshoot and resolve the issue. This guide includes specific instructions for both macOS and Windows platforms.

Contents

Check the Setup

Make sure your setup meets the minimum system requirements for Capture One:

  • Ensure your macOS or Windows version is compatible with your version of Capture One.
  • You need significantly more than 10 GB of free space on your internal drive, especially when storing sessions or catalogs externally.
  • Quit any background applications and disconnect hubs or external monitors while troubleshooting.

Crashing on startup

If Capture One crashes at startup and you can't access Settings, follow the startup crash instructions in this guide.

Test with a New Session or Catalog

Crashes may be caused by a specific session or catalog file. To test this:

  1. Launch Capture One.
  2. Hold down Option (Mac) or Alt (Windows) while the app is initializing.
  3. Create a new catalog or session and save it to your internal hard drive.
  4. Use test images saved locally and see if Capture One runs smoothly.

If this resolves the issue, verify and repair the original file:

Disable Hardware Acceleration

Problems with the OpenCL pipeline might be causing crashes. To disable hardware acceleration:

  1. Open Capture One and go to Settings.
  2. Under the General tab, scroll to Hardware Acceleration.
  3. Set both Display and Processing to Never.
  4. Restart Capture One and check if the crash persists.

Reset Preferences

Please follow this guide for macOS and Windows. 

Try a New Admin User

Creating a new admin user profile can help isolate user-specific issues.

macOS

  1. Open System Preferences Users & Groups.
  2. Add a new admin user.
  3. Log in to this user profile.
  4. Install and run Capture One. Create a new session or catalog inside the Pictures folder.

Windows

  1. Click Start and type Add User.
  2. Select Add, edit, or remove other users.
  3. Click Add someone else to this PC and follow the prompts.
  4. Once added, select the new user and click Change account type.
  5. Set the account type to Administrator and click OK.
  6. Restart your PC and install Capture One in the new user account.

Clean Install

If Capture One doesn’t crash on the new user profile, it likely means your original profile needs a clean reinstall of the software. Follow the instructions here:

How to uninstall Capture One?



Still Need Help? Contact Support

If the issue continues after following the troubleshooting steps above, please reach out to our Support team for further assistance.

Helpful materials to include in your request:

  • A screen recording showing the crash as it happens. Learn how to make one here: How do I make a screen recording?
  • Log files from your system. These help our development team understand what's happening behind the scenes. Find out how to collect them here: How to retrieve logs?
  • Crash logs, which are generated automatically by your system:
    • macOS: Open the Console app, go to User/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports, and locate recent crash logs for Capture One. 
    • Windows: Look for crash reports in the Windows Event Viewer under Windows Logs Application.

Including these files can significantly speed up the resolution process.

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