Expert: Amy - 1/21/2009

Question
Hi Amy,
I'm using Illustrator on vista.
Some weeks ago, Illustrator began to crash each time I navigate to the menu >Type >Font where the fonts (including samples) should appear. There are no problems choosing a font from any other control panel (without samples).
Thanks in advance for your advice.

Answer
Sam,

That's a problem I've heard of before.

First, delete your preferences. Instructions for doing that are located here: http://www.adobeforums.com/webx/.eed5198.2cd0b46e
But those instructions are a little old.

Current trend is to delete the entire Illustrator CS2/3/4 Settings folder from the c:\Documents and Settings\~username\Application Data\Adobe folder.

I think it is still the same path for Vista. Sorry, I am not familiar with file locations on Vista.

Next, you can try rebuilding all of Adobe's font lists.

Quit all Adobe apps.

Search the machine for all instances of adobefnt*.lst where * is a number. Delete any files that you find. Please make sure they are .lst files that fit this pattern before deleting them - have no fear, these are reference files that Adobe applications will re-create upon launching.

Restart Illustrator. If the problem persists, you probably have a bad font in there. I believe you can turn those font previews off in preferences. If you really want to use them, I'm afraid you will have to find the bad font and delete it from your system. That's not easy, and it's pretty much trial and error. When you have a free hour, You have to move all non-required fonts out of the fonts folder, move them back in a  handful at a time, and restart Illustrator and try to recreate the problem. When you find the handful that causes the crash, you can move them out again and put them back in, one by one, until you find the offender.

God luck!
Amy