Evernote (Not Responding)

[southernforge 69]

In version 6.0.6 and Windows 7, this is frequently what I see in the Evernote window title - because Evernote frequently is unresponsive, and thus unusable. 

This behavior seems to be a more frequent occurrence now than in earlier versions - has anyone else encountered this?  Thanks.

[Austin G 527]

Hi. If you haven't already please try reinstalling Evernote. If the issue continues after reinstalling, can you tell what action(s) trigger the freeze. E.G. search, new note, adding a tag etc. 
 

[southernforge 69]

22 hours ago, Austin G said:

Hi. If you haven't already please try reinstalling Evernote. If the issue continues after reinstalling, can you tell what action(s) trigger the freeze. E.G. search, new note, adding a tag etc. 
 

Hey @Austin G, thanks for the advice and questions.  I had removed and reinstalled Evernote - and regret not mentioning that in my original post.  The issue continued - and most often, what triggers the freeze is creating a new note to begin typing in it - and try (to type) but the application freezes, and I have to wait several seconds at least before I can begin using the application again.  The PC runs Windows 7, and has 8GB of RAM.

[ClutterBGone 152]

19 hours ago, southernforge said:

Hey @Austin G, thanks for the advice and questions.  I had removed and reinstalled Evernote - and regret not mentioning that in my original post.  The issue continued - and most often, what triggers the freeze is creating a new note to begin typing in it - and try (to type) but the application freezes, and I have to wait several seconds at least before I can begin using the application again.  The PC runs Windows 7, and has 8GB of RAM.

Welcome to the club!  This has been an issue for the last several years, use the search function in the Evernote database and you will find thousands of comments about this problem. The only way that I was able to solve this issue was to instal a solid state drive. WOW, what fast start-ups and since the SSD was installed not one time have I seen the dreaded (Not Responding)
Regards,
David in Wichita

[Austin G 527]

On 5/7/2016 at 1:29 PM, southernforge said:

Hey @Austin G, thanks for the advice and questions.  I had removed and reinstalled Evernote - and regret not mentioning that in my original post.  The issue continued - and most often, what triggers the freeze is creating a new note to begin typing in it - and try (to type) but the application freezes, and I have to wait several seconds at least before I can begin using the application again.  The PC runs Windows 7, and has 8GB of RAM.

Thanks for the update. Try these steps to help fix this. 

1. Open Evernote for Windows
2. Once open click on **Tools** in the menu bar of the application.
3. From there hold down the CTRL key and hover over to **Help** and you will see the Help menu has been expanded.
4. Choose **Fix All Notes** and then go back and choose **Optimize Database**.
5. Restart your computer and then go back into Evernote 

Let us know if that helps. 

[southernforge 69]

On 5/9/2016 at 11:48 AM, Austin G said:

Thanks for the update. Try these steps to help fix this. 

1. Open Evernote for Windows
2. Once open click on **Tools** in the menu bar of the application.
3. From there hold down the CTRL key and hover over to **Help** and you will see the Help menu has been expanded.
4. Choose **Fix All Notes** and then go back and choose **Optimize Database**.
5. Restart your computer and then go back into Evernote 

Let us know if that helps. 

@Austin G, this was one hell of a lengthy process - optimizing the database - I had no idea it would be over an hour of "optimizing" but yet, the application has not stumbled once since...  Thank you for the information.

[jbenson2 2,147]

Back in 2009, I asked: How frequently should I optimize my database?  Seven years later, the response from Evernote Engineer Dave Engberg still resonates with me, especially because I regularly move quantities of notes from my primary Evernote account to my secondary Evernote account. (I want to keep my note count below 30,000 in each account.)

 

New post by engberg on Sun Aug 02, 2009 7:02 pm

The "Optimize" function is mostly used to reclaim the "holes" in your database file where deleted data used to sit. So if you add big notes (e.g. big PDF files) and delete them a lot, your file may end up with a lot of holes in it that make it larger and more inefficient. This shouldn't, however, have any greater likelihood of causing corruption.

If you're using normal (synchronized) notebooks, then you'll have a full copy of your data on the service in case something happens on your local database. But you may also want to back up the Database directory on your own local computer. This can lead to faster recovery times after a crash, and potentially give you access to something that you yourself deleted, but want to recover later. (When you delete a note and sync to Evernote, we permanently remove the corresponding data from the service to protect your privacy.)
 

[IncrediMetaBeta 22]

On 5/8/2016 at 7:29 AM, ClutterBGone said:

The only way that I was able to solve this issue was to instal a solid state drive. WOW, what fast start-ups and since the SSD was installed not one time have I seen the dreaded (Not Responding)
Regards,
David in Wichita

 

I have an SSD drive and I get the problem all the time.  Why?

[CalS 5,280]

Probably need a little more information on your environment prior to making any suggestions.

[IncrediMetaBeta 22]

Hi csihilling, thanks for your response.  I'm using a new (8 month old) ASUS laptop PC that has an i7 Intel CPU and 16 GB of RAM.  It has a 512 GB solid state "HD" and no disk drive.  (Please note that I am not a particularly fast typist.  )

Also, please be aware: I have virtually no other speed issues with any other apps besides EN for Windows. This behavior in EN for Windows can occur EVEN when the only apps open are EN for PC and a few chrome browser tabs.  In other words, it seems to happen even when system resources should be amply capable of handling text entry.  

The "not responding" problem occurs in much the way I have seen it described in the forum:  You start to type a note in EN for PC, and by the time you get to about the 5th word, you get the message, which lasts for about 10 to 20 seconds.  Once the message clears, it will come up again soon though intermittently.  This seems to occur particularly when first entering text in a blank or existing note.  In other words, it seems to occur with a bit less frequency with a note that has already had these "hicckups," these interruptions during the same editing session.  

I have wondered whether the "not responding" errror results from some background activity, such as EN for PC trying to contact the EN server to begin to sync the note, despite the fact that hardly anything has been entered and there should be no urgency for this to be performed right when an EN user has some fertile idea on their mind that they want to immediately capture.  

Could something background activity like this be the explanation?  

It is beyond merely "annoying".  It renders EN for Windows useless for anything but data capture.  That is, the much vaunted ability of Evernote to serve as your writing app is completely undercut by these interruptions.  (Remember Phil's interview with some guy who said he had written a book entirely within Evernote?)  The problem has been very discouraging and made me wonder whether I should stick with the product.  I've been a user for about 3 years.

There is a broader point I want to make here.  Considering that this problem has been pointed out in the forum for quite a long time, yet there appears not to be a resolution, I strongly suspect that the company is not aware of its huge significance.  

Why?  If one is a software engineer, your professional performance rests on having solid neurocognitive abilities of being able to acquire and retain a lot in your short term memory. My impression is that software engineers excel at this "metaskill."  In other words, it's easy for them to deal with "interruptions."  

As they and management and support and web page folks engage with each other to consider the company's top priorities, I can see this problem slipping down to a lower priority.  As though someone asked, "So, what's the big deal?  What's the problem?  It's just a few interruptions~!"

Well, perhaps it has escaped their attention (which would be only human) that not everyone has the cognitive strengths of software engineers. IMO, many so-called "creative" people may not possess such cognitive strengths to nearly the same degree.

Thanks for your quick response.  I look forward to you insight and suggestions.

[CalS 5,280]

15 hours ago, IncrediMetaBeta said:

I look forward to you insight and suggestions.

Well, you certainly would seem to have enough horsepower.  I have a 4 year old lap top, a 256 GB SSD, 32,600 notes, a 17GB data base, and no response time issues, so it can be done.  A few suggestions:

1. Hold the Ctrl key and press help in the EN menu.  Then press optimize data base.
2. If you have Context turned on, turn it off, Tools - Options - Note - show Context.is at the bottom
3. Some say Instant sync causes issues (it doesn't seem to for me), so if you like turn it off, Tools - Options - Sync.  If you leave instant sync on, set the synhcronize automatically window to every 30 minutes.  But do remember to force a sync if you make a change on a mobile device and you return to your PC.

Advise if any of the above helps or not.

[IncrediMetaBeta 22]

2 hours ago, csihilling said:

Well, you certainly would seem to have enough horsepower.  I have a 4 year old lap top, a 256 GB SSD, 32,600 notes, a 17GB data base, and no response time issues, so it can be done.  A few suggestions:

1. Hold the Ctrl key and press help in the EN menu.  Then press optimize data base.
2. If you have Context turned on, turn it off, Tools - Options - Note - show Context.is at the bottom
3. Some say Instant sync causes issues (it doesn't seem to for me), so if you like turn it off, Tools - Options - Sync.  If you leave instant sync on, set the synhcronize automatically window to every 30 minutes.  But do remember to force a sync if you make a change on a mobile device and you return to your PC.

Advise if any of the above helps or not.

 

 

Hi, per your suggestions, I have started with step 1.  (I meant to ask you first, should I back it up before optimizing?)  I proceeded anyway, and the optimization pop-up progress bar completed.  However, after that and placing my cursor in the application, I now get the "not responding"  error message.  Of course, I can just "kill" the app and relaunch, though I have not yet done this.  I wonder, is there a possibility that the Enex database on my PC has become corrupted in some way?  

[CalS 5,280]

3 minutes ago, IncrediMetaBeta said:

Hi, per your suggestions, I have started with step 1.  (I meant to ask you first, should I back it up before optimizing?)  I proceeded anyway, and the optimization pop-up progress bar completed.  However, after that and placing my cursor in the application, I now get the "not responding"  error message.  Of course, I can just "kill" the app and relaunch, though I have not yet done this.  I wonder, is there a possibility that the Enex database on my PC has become corrupted in some way?  

I think you mean the EXB data base, ENEX represents the format of notes exported from EN.  

Your DB may be corrupted, not sure.  If you don't have any local notebooks it is fairly simple to rebuild your data base from the EN servers.  If you have local notebooks you MUST export them to the ENEX format and then import them after the note download is completed.

1. Get the location of your EXB file, Tools - Options - General.
2. Log out of EN and close the window.
3. Drag the EXB file to the desktop.
4. Start EN and log in.
5. Your notes should begin to download at this point
6. If you had any local notebooks, import them after the download is complete.

PM if you have any questions.

[krestor2 7]

On 5/9/2016 at 11:48 AM, Austin G said:

Thanks for the update. Try these steps to help fix this. 

1. Open Evernote for Windows
2. Once open click on **Tools** in the menu bar of the application.
3. From there hold down the CTRL key and hover over to **Help** and you will see the Help menu has been expanded.
4. Choose **Fix All Notes** and then go back and choose **Optimize Database**.
5. Restart your computer and then go back into Evernote 

Let us know if that helps. 

I had the same problem, and this solved it. Thanks!

[Aaron Force 0]

I started having problems yesterday with not responding. I could type about a sentence then it would crash every time. I logged out, restarted, didn't matter. I just reinstalled the desktop app this afternoon and it did it again. Only now after several times doing this it won't even load notebooks or notes. It is completely non-functional now. This is absolutely ridiculous—there must be a solution. What do people do to fix it?

[IncrediMetaBeta 22]

21 hours ago, Aaron Force said:

I started having problems yesterday with not responding. I could type about a sentence then it would crash every time. I logged out, restarted, didn't matter. I just reinstalled the desktop app this afternoon and it did it again. Only now after several times doing this it won't even load notebooks or notes. It is completely non-functional now. This is absolutely ridiculous—there must be a solution. What do people do to fix it?

Optimizing the database has not worked for me.  Aaron, I do not say this lightly.  Neither do I wish to be sarcastic. Rather, I say it sadly since I commiserate with you:  "Welcome to Hell."  Evernote is the most horrible of the greatest products on which I strongly depend.  It has such promise, were it to really work, and were the company to be responsive to customer concerns.  Alas, Evernote (the company), whether intentionally or not, is simply "busting pans, across the peasants' hands."   You are now on the frontier.  Welcome to the Wild West.  The company seems to have neither effective help, nor candor, nor product map, nor shame.  There are some very kind and good people on these forums. Be patient. There may be some answer to the problem, but continue breathing, since there is no assurance it will happen anytime soon.

[Stanislav Vitebskiy 0]

If Evernote has just updated to a newer version, and your are launching it form a pinned icon on the Window 7/10 taskbar, try un-pinning the icon, and launching Evernote from the Start menu. I have seen cases where Evernote would try to launch a defunct old version after an upgrade if an old taskbar shortcut is clicked.

[Duane 21]

I've

1. reinstalled my then current version
2. searched activity logs for "errors" and "failures" (there were none. Not one, through over 140 pages of activity logs)
3. upgraded to the latest version
4. rebuilt the database (took nine hours. Yeah, nine of them).

Yet still, after all of this, every time I touch Evernote for Windows, I'm banished to not responding hell. WTF? This thing is pretty much useless. WHY?

Evernote for Android, no problems.

Evernote web version in a browser, no problems.

I would love to just stick with my phone app and the web version, while ripping Evernote for Windows off my machine and never, ever, trying to run it again. Ever.

But there are tasks that can ONLY be done in a desktop app, like exporting notes/notebooks, encryption (such as it is), etc...and that is what is most frustrating. I'm beholden to using this piece of *****, but it just refuses to work for me.

This is about the point when I should cue all the people who're going to say "works fine on my machine." And that's terrific, except I don't use your machine.

This entire, ongoing lack of functionality is utterly depressing. What ELSE can I try to rectify this? Is there ANYTHING I can do?

[PinkElephant 8,115]

What sort of disk drive are you using ? Is it a classical HDD with turning disks, or is EN running from a flash drive / SSD ?

Reports in the forum are that performance from an SSD is much better. My installation runs since the beginning on a SSD, so I can’t compare.

Can you specify on the rebuild time of 9hrs. Is this the time to download the whole content from the EN server ? If yes: About what amount of data do we talk here (in GB) ? How fast is your internet connection ?

[Duane 21]

Re: disk, I've got a HDD, not SSD on an Asus laptop with 12GB RAM.

I'm using v6.22.3.8816 (08816) Public (CE Build ce-62.6.10954). My EXB file is 6.13GB

Re: rebuild time, after a quick "fix all notes", I clicked on "Optimize database", a progress bar appeared, and it took all day (from some time in the morning through till some time in the evening) to complete. Then Evernote was in not responding mode indefinitely...at some point after at least a half hour, I shut down the machine, rebooted, restarted Evernote, "not responding" was back like Jason Voorhees...shut it down again, restarted again...and now, it appears to be running crisply. Started faster than I've ever seen it start before.

Now I'm trying to do a search. I start typing into the search field...not responding. I force close the app, try to start it again, now it won't even start. Previously, I would have to restart machine in order to restart Evernote, but I've since realized I can invoke the Task Manager and close the Evernote processes that were still running even though the app had been shut down - this allowed me to resart Evernote.

One thing I'm now trying that appears to be helping (as in the last 20 minutes) ...I've turned off both Snippet View as well as Note Panel - there are no longer any images being served in my main list. Sucks that I'm paying for a service and can't enjoy its full functionality, but I need the stability.

 

 

[Dave-in-Decatur 3,959]

Sounds really frustrating. If it continues, since you're on a Plus subscription, I believe you have access to support, and this might be a case for them.

[CalS 5,280]

14 hours ago, Duane said:

What ELSE can I try to rectify this? Is there ANYTHING I can do?

A few things to try

1. Turn off context if it is on, uncheck Show context at Tools - Options - Note.
2. Change Automatically save edited notes every to something like 300, same panel as 1.
3. Change Search as you type delay to 50 at Tools - Options - Search.
4. Some folks say using On Demand Sync improves performance.  Not something I would do, but if at wits end go to Tools - Options - Synchronization and check Enable on demand sync.  Others may have a different view as to ODS benefits.
5. Turn off any less used Windows or other processes.  My personal view is that things like the Windows index feature don't do much other than consume resources.  Particularly if your main drive is a HDD which they all compete to use.

An SSD is a hardware solution to the problem, but it does work well in my experience (45 k notes, 22.5 GB data base and no response issues),   You can get a replacement internal 500 GB one for less than $100 anymore.  FWIW.

[Duane 21]

1 hour ago, Dave-in-Decatur said:

Sounds really frustrating. If it continues, since you're on a Plus subscription, I believe you have access to support, and this might be a case for them.

I appreciate your understanding. I hoped I could do some things on my end without having to bug Support, they're busy enough as it is. But yeah, I may go that route if my current set up doesn't improve performance.

Cheers.

[Duane 21]

1 hour ago, CalS said:

A few things to try

1. Turn off context if it is on, uncheck Show context at Tools - Options - Note.
2. Change Automatically save edited notes every to something like 300, same panel as 1.
3. Change Search as you type delay to 50 at Tools - Options - Search.
4. Some folks say using On Demand Sync improves performance.  Not something I would do, but if at wits end go to Tools - Options - Synchronization and check Enable on demand sync.  Others may have a different view as to ODS benefits.
5. Turn off any less used Windows or other processes.  My personal view is that things like the Windows index feature don't do much other than consume resources.  Particularly if your main drive is a HDD which they all compete to use.

An SSD is a hardware solution to the problem, but it does work well in my experience (45 k notes, 22.5 GB data base and no response issues),   You can get a replacement internal 500 GB one for less than $100 anymore.  FWIW.

I've got ~10K notes, so you're managing 45K without issues gives me hope. 

Thank you for the tweak suggestions - I will try them and see how it goes. Beyond that, I may add an SSD to the list of upgrades my machine needs (I like this machine's screen size and Bang & Olafsen speakers, and since I'm on Windows 8, hopefully Microsoft won't force me into Windows 10 for a while yet).

Cheers.

[PinkElephant 8,115]

Just to throw some more into the options box:

Which security / antivirus are you running ? This may interfere heavily with performance. I had very negative experience with Norton some years ago, then switched to Kaspersky, which proved to lean less on hardware resources. Now I am considering to move on to Windows own Defender solution, that is moving up in the ranks of tests year by year.

You can check on this and other background processes using the process manager integrated into the task manager. Sort for CPU usage, and look for apps that jump a lot up and down the list. These tend to interrupt other programs.

How much disk space is available ? A rule of thumb says there should be at least 10% of the capacity unused, better 20%. On a 500GB disk this means leaving 100GB unused. This sounds ridiculous, but it helps.

About the SSD, I would make myself a Christmas present and switch. The computer will feel as new, not only when running EN. Prices are pretty much down, so I would go for a big one. Depends on what your Asus will take as a disk replacement. You can get a decent 1TB-SATA-2,5“ for about 100€/$.

When you are changing things anyhow, think about installing the new SSD and make a fresh install of Windows right away. I understand you are used to and like Win 8 - I think Win 10 is far better and develops further, whereas Win 8 is sitting around, waiting for being declared obsolete one day. Especially when security oriented, Win 10 is sort of a must, because the OS is much better hardened against attacks.

[s2sailor 2,200]

24 minutes ago, Duane said:

Beyond that, I may add an SSD to the list of upgrades my machine needs (I like this machine's screen size and Bang & Olafsen speakers, and since I'm on Windows 8, hopefully Microsoft won't force me into Windows 10 for a while yet).

The SSD upgrade several years ago was the magic bullet fix for me but others have reported that it didn't help, but even if it doesn't help Evernote specifically (and here's hoping it does) Windows overall will be a lot snappier and more responsive.  It is IMO a very worthwhile hardware upgrade, and if you go through that effort I would suggest you bite the bullet and do a new clean install with W10 instead of trying to migrate over your W8 image.  There are some SSD settings that Windows takes advantage of when doing a new installation on an SSD that will not get set if you migrate over an image created on an HDD.

[Duane 21]

But...but...isn't W10 spyware...??

[CalS 5,280]

6 hours ago, Duane said:

Thank you for the tweak suggestions - I will try them and see how it goes.

You are welcome.  Let us know how it goes.

[PinkElephant 8,115]

All Windows versions talk „home“. In Win10 it is probably more layered, and this makes it more visible.

At the beginning it was hard to stop, but MS obviously listened to their customers, or reacted to law restrictions (for example the European legislation, that is much stricter than the US laws and carries high fines for violations).

The last updates (I am running the latest update 1909) asks in the setup process what to allow, and what to block. I am pretty strict on data safety, and I could configure things pretty much to my preferences (like not sharing geodata, cutting off Cortana etc).

On the other side a system is only as secure as the weakest element. And for this Win10 did a lot to harden the whole system against threats. I think MacOS is still better, but MS invested into preventing harm. Win 10 it is developing further, whereas older Windows-versions may still get „plugs“ for what they have, but no new features needed to counter new attack vectors. Software developers will orient their releases at Win 10, not the older versions.

I am running Win 10 on a standard „Minitower“ desktop from 2012, core i7, 16 GB, and the only thing I changed in the setup was to install a 512GB SSD as primary disk drive. Even the latest versions run fine and with good performance.