Corel Paint Shop Pro customers of any version got a big surprise when they upgraded to Windows Vista. Paint Shop Pro and Vista are not compatible. Some see Paint Shop Pro crash on startup, or after it’s been running a while.

For some the solution is as simple as disabling Windows Aero theme. To disable right click your desktop –> Personalize –> Window Color and Appearance –> Open classic appearance properties for more color options, then change Windows Aero to Windows Vista Basic, or some other lower quality theme, and click okay.

For everyone else the solution is running Paint Shop Pro in the Windows XP SP2 virtual PC mode. Locate your Paint Shop Pro icon either on your desktop, in your Quick Launch menu, or your start menu, then right click the icon, and choose properties.

Click the Compatibility tab, check the box for Run this program in compatibility mode for:, then select Windows XP (Service Pack 2), and click OK. You probably won’t need to check any other boxes, unless you find you have additional needs.

You can also enable Paint Shop Pro to run in Windows XP compatibility mode the long way. Click the windows button in the left lower corner of the screen –> Control Panel –> Programs. Under the Programs and Features click Use an older program with this version of Windows. Now use the Windows Compatibility Wizard to accomplish the same thing as above.

For most that will allow Paint Shop Pro to start without running into conflicts with Windows Vista. However, Dell customers who have upgraded to the latest version of Dell Support Center will still see Paint Shop Pro crash on startup. There is a fix.

The Dell Support Center runs a process called sprtcmd.exe, which is located in the C:\Program Files\Dell Support Center\bin folder. sprtcmd.exe is part of the Dell Support Center software that runs to assist in monitoring and fixing problems on Dell computers. The program was created by a company called SupportSoft. sprtcmd.exe is not necessary for your computer to operate properly, nor is it adware or spyware.

If you own a Dell with the latest Support Center software installed you will need to kill the sprtcmd.exe process. Right click on the taskbar, then choose Task Manager.

Go to the Processes tab, locate sprtcmd.exe in the list, and select it.

Now click End Process in the bottom right corner.

That’s it. Now Paint Shop Pro will run on your Windows Vista machine. If you still have trouble after setting Paint Shop Pro to run in Windows XP VPC mode, try killing a process, which isn’t necessary to run Vista, until you find the one conflicting with Paint Shop Pro. Leave a comment if you find another process that stops Paint Shop Pro from running besides sprtcmd.exe. There is still a crash when some image files are saved I haven’t solved yet, but I’m looking for a solution. The best solution I’ve found was to simply switch to Adobe Photoshop

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