Shut Down a Frozen Windows Movie Maker Project

Ah, Windows Movie Maker (WMM). That handy little device that comes with a computer carrying Windows XP. When it freezes in the middle of your project, however, you may curse yourself for ever believing that it was ever useful. When this frustrating but common occurrence happens, it's important to make the best of the situation and take the proper steps. Detailed instructions after the jump.

Steps

  1. If your program has been prone to freezing before, keep a watchful eye on it and save often. Know when it's freezing and when it's simply taking its time. If WMM doesn't respond to a command, wait a minute to see if it's 'getting there' or has decided to ignore you and freeze. Once you're sure, proceed.
  2. Don't Panic! One of Windows Movie Maker's saving graces is that it has an auto-save feature. In case you didn't recently save, wait patiently for at least thirty seconds so this feature saves your project.
  3. Hit control-alt-delete. Don't be fooled if it tells you WMM is "running". Hit End Task and wait for the pop-up 'this program is not responding'.
  4. Click 'end task now'. Don't worry about its notice on how 'all unsaved data will be lost'. You just activated auto-save, remember?
  5. Wait patiently until Windows shuts down the program, then abut five-ten minutes later open WMM again. In most cases, it will have saved your project. Click 'upload files now' and wait.
  6. Your project will now be called 'Untitled'. Go to the File menu, click Save As, and enter your former project name. This is to prevent you from working on four different 'Untitled' projects at the same time.
  7. Keep working on your project! Unfortunately, this will most likely not be the last time WMM freezes. However, if you wish to keep using it, you have to make do with it!

Tips

  • The best advice for movie maker freezing is to close it's process in task manager as opposed to it's task. this saves having to wait for ages for the program to shut. Be sure which process you are ending before doing so, it should be called moviemk.exe . You can check by finding it as a task in task manager then right clicking and selecting "go to process".
  • Alternatively, to end the program immediately you can first press control-alt-delete, and then right click on the Windows Movie Maker task in the task list, click on "Go to process", and finally click on the "End process" button. Window Movie Maker's auto-save feature will still work even if ended this way.
  • Also for next time go to Options and make sure you select auto-save every 1 minute. This way if WMM freezes you are more likely to retain all your work
  • To prevent freezing consider closing down other applications or upgrading your computer's memory.

Warnings

  • Having WMM Freeze on You Can be Really Stressful, but don't overreact, when you get your project done, you will feel great!
  • "Bigger projects may freeze more often than smaller ones"*

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