I'm experiencing intermittent hangs and crashes in both Firestorm and the official Second Life Viewer on Windows 11. Firestorm has generally been more troublesome, but switching to the official Viewer has not eliminated the problem.

The issues are not limited to busy regions, logging in, or teleporting. Even after adjusting the official Second Life Viewer's preferences conservatively, problems have also occurred at home and during ordinary activities, including unpacking and managing inventory, viewing images, changing outfits, and changing group tags. Busy shopping regions can also become extremely laggy.

I've seen mixed results when changing group tags: some changes completed without a problem, while another caused the Viewer to freeze and crash. I also had one Windows Reliability Monitor incident report that SLPlugin.exe had stopped working, although I don't know whether it is related to the wider issue.

The problems became worse around the September 2026 Windows update, but I cannot confirm that the update caused them. Lowering the Viewer's graphics settings and trying other troubleshooting steps have helped reduce the problems, but they have not eliminated them. I cannot reliably reproduce the crashes on demand.

I've experienced Bugsplats, freezes, an avatar continuing to walk while the Viewer is unresponsive, gray screens, and most times I'm offered the chance to look at my IMs before crashing.

System information

Laptop: MSI Raider GE68 HX 14V

CPU: Intel Core i9-14900HX

RAM: 32 GB

GPU: NVIDIA RTX 4070 Laptop GPU

Operating system: Windows 11

I previously contacted Linden Lab Support about Viewer performance and provided diagnostic logs privately when requested. I was subsequently directed to use this feedback portal.

I'm reporting this because the intermittent hangs and crashes affect everyday use across both Viewers, not just performance in busy regions. I don't know whether the incidents share a common cause.

Related report: Crash Problem — reports crashes in both Viewers on busy regions.