CHITUBOX Basic FAQ

Issues with the Windows Operating System

Windows Explorer Keep Repeatedly Restarting

If your Windows Explorer keeps restarting, please follow these steps to fix it:

Press Ctrl + Shift + Esc to bring up your Windows Task Manager, right-click on Windows Explorer, and then click Restart.

In your Task Manager, click File > Run new task, input cmd, check Create this task with administrative privileges, and then click OK.

Enter:

regsvr32 /u "{CHITUBOX-Installation-Path}\CHITUBOX_Thumbnail.dll"

Note that you need to replace {CHITUBOX-Installation-Path} with your CHITUBOX's installation path, for example:

regsvr32 /u "C:\Program Files\ChiTubox\CHITUBOX_Thumbnail.dll"

Hit Enter to run the command.

Conflicts with Fusion 360 or OpenGL error "Failed to create OpenGL context for format QSurfaceFormat"

Please open System Settings> About> Advanced System Settings and remove the environment variable QT_OPENGL.

This application failed to start because no Qt platform plugin could be initialized

Please open System Settings> About> Advanced System Settings and remove the two environment variables QT_OPENGL and QT_PLUGIN_PATH.

The code execution cannot process because CbdXXXX.dll was not found

Installing failure due to a missing CbdXXXX.dll error could be caused by permission issues. Here's a quick fix:

1. Click on the Search bar on your taskbar or press the Windows key on your keyboard.
2. Type "UAC" in the search field.
3. Click on "Change User Account Control settings" in the search results.
4. Reset your User Account Control (UAC) settings to the option Notify me only when apps try to make changes to my computer (default).

After resetting, try installing the software again.

If the issue persists, try reinstalling the software on a non-C drive.

CHITUBOX is Not Responding

It is very likely a software conflict issue. Please exit all running software one by one and look for any software that conflicts with CHITUBOX. This should resolve the issue in most cases. The following software might cause conflicts:

• Anti-virus software

• Tabtip (In Windows Task Manager it is called Touch Keyboard and Handwriting Panel)

• PowerToys

• Google Drive

Authorization Code Issues

Error "SSL handshake failed"

Authorization code activation may be affected and result in an "SSL handshake failed" error message if the system time does not match the current actual date.

To resolve this issue, you can set the system time automatically (recommended) or manually. Then restart the software and activate the code.

Plugin Issues

Longer Error -1

1. Longer's control board process the resolution specially, we have confirmed the correct resolution to be x: 960, y: 1708. We have have carefully checked and confirmed this, so please don't change it.

2. Error code -1 is an internal error of the plug-in due to changing of the resolution.

Download Longer plugin here.

File Issues

Thumbnail Abnormalities

Hold down Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open the Task Manager, click File > Run new task, enter cmd, check Create this task with administrative privileges, then click OK.

Enter:

regsvr32 /u "{CHITUBOX-Installation-Path}\CHITUBOX_Thumbnail.dll"

Note you need to replace {CHITUBOX-Installation-Path} with your CHITUBOX's installation path, for example:

regsvr32 /u "C:\Program Files\ChiTubox\CHITUBOX_Thumbnail.dll"

Hit Enter to run it.

Enter:

regsvr32 "{CHITUBOX-Installation-Path}\CHITUBOX_Thumbnail.dll"

Hit Enter to run it.

Disk Cleanup

Find your system disk (usually C drive), right-click to select properties, and click "Disk Cleanup".

Check "Thumbnails", then click "Clean up system files", and then click "OK".

Select "Delete Files".

Restart Explorer

Open Task Manager by pressing Ctrl + Shift + Esc , right-click Windows Explorer, and then click Restart.

Rough Model Surface after Slicing

The displayed surface quality of a sliced model may appear rough. This is because each voxel of the model is rendered after slicing, similarly to zooming into each pixel after of an image in Photoshop.

As it is shown in the figure, the height of each voxel is the layer height set in the slice setting. The length of each voxel is the length of each pixel on the screen, while the width of each voxel is the width of each pixel on the screen. A voxel is the smallest unit that constitutes a print.

Why are STL files scaled when imported into CHITUBOX?

STL files do not contain specific unit information but use numerical records. Therefore, different software may use different units to read STL files. For example, 1 meter in Blender might equate to 1 millimeter in CHITUBOX. You need to test the scale relationship between your 3D modeling software and CHITUBOX before exporting files.

Other Issues

You may encounter other issues caused by data corruption between versions in certain cases. You can try the following ways to resolve the issue:

Clear Cache

1. Navigate to the following directory:

   • Windows:

   C:\Users\{user-name}\AppData\Local
   

   • Mac:

   Macintosh HD/Users/{user-name}/Library/Application Support
   

   • Ubuntu:

   ~/.local/share
   

   If you can't find the AppData or Library folder, they may be hidden. Follow steps below to show hidden files:
   Windows: Open File Explorer, go to the View tab, and tick the checkbox for Hidden items.
   Mac: In Finder, navigate to the desired location, and press Command + Shift + . (period key).

2. Close CHITUBOX Basic (make sure to close CHITUBOX Basic first).

3. Ensure that CHITUBOX Basic is closed, find and delete the 📂"chitubox2_0" and 📂"chituboxResource" folders.

1. Restart CHITUBOX Basic.

USB Drive Issues

Printers may fail to read certain USB drives sometimes. Usually this is because your printer's control board was designed to work with USB 2.0 with a capacity of 16GB or less. USB 3.0 uses a larger current, which can cause electrical interference with the control board. Your USB drive should meet the following requirements:

• FAT32 format

• USB 2.0

• ≤ 16GB

• Allocation unit size = 2048 bytes

  

Clear and Rebuild Thumbnails

If you need to clear and rebuild thumbnails, you can follow the steps below on your Windows system to clear and rebuild the thumbnail cache.

Disk Cleanup

Hold down Win + E to open File Explorer, right-click your system disk (usually C drive) and select Properties option, and then click Disk Cleanup.

Then check the Thumbnails option, click Clean up system files, click the OK button and finally click the Delete Files option.

Use Command Prompt

1. Open the Start menu.
2. Search for "Command Prompt", right-click on the result, and select "Run as administrator."
3. Type the following command and press Enter to stop File Explorer: taskkill /f /im explorer.exe
4. Type the following command and press Enter to delete all thumbnail database files without confirmation: del /f /s /q /a %LocalAppData%\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\thumbcache_*.db
5. Type the following command and press Enter to restart File Explorer, to restart File Explorer:start explorer.exe.

After completing these steps, you should be able to browse files and folders with thumbnail previews displaying correctly. If the thumbnails still do not appear after trying the above methods, please check the following settings:

1. Open File Explorer and click on the View tab.
2. Click the Options button to open Folder Options and click on the View tab.
3. Uncheck the option for Always show icons, never thumbnails and finally click Apply and then OK button.