So, resuming the discussion up to now, there seems to be NO compelling reason to upgrade at least from VS2010 to VS2012, or is there any?

Hi Mark, unfortunately, I've to leave immediately for a business trip until June, 22nd (I'm somewhat in a hurry to get the plane...). I'm going to try later what happens when dragging another window across the loop's form. So far thanks for your efforts, I get in touch with you as soon as I'm back. All the best Wolfgang

Hi Mark, meanwhile I tried your suggestion. Result: negative. With the .invalidate() and the .update() command the form doesn't redraw itself at all, not even before the screensaver has been invoked. And the documentation of the .refresh() method in principle promises exactly, what I'm looking for: "... Forces the control to invalidate its client area and immediately redraw itself and any child controls. (Inherited from Control.)" But it doesn't do so, unfortunately. Do you have any further idea, how I get my app paying attention to the WM_PAINT handling, after the screensaver has been removed (if this is the real problem)? Greetings from Berlin, Germany Wolfgang

... not to forget, Mark, that the problem doesn't occur as long as the screensaver isn't interfering. This, i.e. the win screensaver, seems to change the preferences in the GUI of my program. Wolfgang

Well, actually I'm calling both, the Me.refresh (which presumably corresponds to the this.refresh in C#) at the beginning, and the control.refresh method at the end of each loop circle, but this doesn't help. It seems that at runtime the screen upadate is being postponed behind the other programmatical tasks of the loop as a kind of secondary task. If so, what would you recommend to give the screen update back its demanded priority? Wolfgang

Hi Mark, I'm using VB.NET. Wolfgang

Hi, my program contains a rather time consuming loop to send newsletter emails (in no separate thread). Within this loop, the screen shall be updated after every loop circle, i.e. after every message being sent (simply updating the number of the sent messages and setting a hook in the addressees grid). So far no problem. Now, after some minutes running the procedure alone, the standard win logo screensaver absorbs the screen. And if I'm now returning to my program window by hitting any key, the screen gets frozen, although the program behind keeps running well. The screen will not be updated until the whole loop has been worked off. This happens although there is a .refresh command in every loop circle. Does anybody have a piece of advice how to fix this? Cheers, Wolfgang, Berlin/Germany

Well, if my hard disk conks out, I simply have to buy a new one and restore all project data from my backup hard disk. I think, a RAID system only has to guarantee an absoluteley uninterrupted service - normally required at web/file servers. But this doesn't supersede or even matches my backup necessities. So, I personally never used a RAID system and actually never missed it, too. ... Hope, I'm not on the wrong track! :-D

OK, many thanks so far. Wolfgang

OK, as a single developer I don't work with a RAID-System; I backup my projects daily on an external hard disk. So far, so good. Aditionally a question, which I already asked John: what do you think about working on a 64-bit OS? Does VS 2005 also work on a 64-bit base (output 32 bit, of course), or does it run with 32-bit, no matter what the OS is able to? Wolfgang

Hi Kallileo, well, I don't need much graphical power, that's right, and I don't care two figs about overclocking. So, how do you think about a 965p DS3 mobo / alternatively a DQ6? Or is there already something better on the market? Wolfgang

OK, thanks again, John. I'll think about. Wolfgang

Hi John, thanks a lot for your very precise hints! One more question: does it make sense to use a 64-bit-CPU and OS? Would VS 2005 be able to deal with this environment at all? Wolfgang Berlin/Germany

Hi Manuel, well, your code works, but on my side the player starts automatically. How do I switch off this feature? I just want to enable the user to start the player manually. Greetings from Germany, Wolfgang

Hi, I'm forced to buy a new workstation for our VS 2005 database application developments. The old one, a simple DELL with a 2.5 GHz single core processor, is too slowly. To which features I've to pay attention to get the fastest possible development / compiling / testing environment? Does a Dual Core processor make sense? What about a 64-Bit operating system? How much RAM is recommendable? (We don't work with multimedia-stuff: no video, no music, no 3D rendering and so on, just rather complex database and enterprise application developments). Is there anybody who could give me some pieces of advice? Thanks in advance! Wolfgang

Seems a bit crazy, but when I'm trying exactly your example: it keeps autoplaying / autostarting as ever! :confused: Did you try it also with a mp3 file? Thanks for your efforts... Wolfgang

Hmm, doesn't work on my side. No matter which values I'm assigning to the autostart and autoplay parameter, the player always starts automatically. Doesn't it do so on your side? Wolfgang

Hi, when I embed the Windows Media Player in the following way (sorry for the wrapped lines...), the indicated file always starts automatically, although the default value of the parameter autostart is false. It doesn't help neither, when I'm setting the autostart parameter explicitlay to false: Does anybody know how to disable the autostart function here? Wolfgang (Berlin, Germany)