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In my Visual Studio 2008 project, the active configuration is Release, and there are no debug symbols enabled in the Compiler and Linker settings. I'm building an exe file from command prompt:

devenv standalone_cpp.sln /build "RELEASE|WIN32"

There is no reason why a debug dll MSVCR90d.dll should get used at runtime, but it does and crashes. I don't have the slightest clue why only the debug dll gets picked up not the release dll MSVCR90.dll. Can someone please help?

I even tried building my .exe in debug mode hoping that it would not crash, but still it crashes with the same assertion failure _BLOCK_TYPE_IS_VALID(pHead->nBlockUse). Please help before I shoot myself.

Walking Corpse
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2 Answers2

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Re-install the MSVS2008 Service Pack 1. Your install seems to have gotten corrupted.

I've had this happen -- it manifests with mysterious behavior like this, although I've also seen it manifest with strange "internal errors" when linking large DLLs/EXEs, and sometimes compiling very large projects, or very large translation units. For some reason, re-installing the service pack worked.

Here's a quick link: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyId=FBEE1648-7106-44A7-9649-6D9F6D58056E&displaylang=en

Another thought might be that you did link debug into your release executable. Even though you built the solution for "RELEASE|WIN32", if any prerequisites (linked libs) were the debug version (either the *.lib was referenced directly, or you referenced the debug path instead of the release path), you'd end up with that mix and the "debug" version of that DLL would attempt to load.

Then, the reason it crashed, is probably that you allocated in a "release" module and deleted in a "debug" module (or vice versa). That won't work, because the allocators are different (since the "debug" versions allocate extra state for sentinels and other "debug checks").

Remember that MSVS2008 will "override" any project/solution settings with those found in Tools==>Options, even if you build from the command line. Check that no debug paths are set there for linking in your release targets. (That was a bad decision by Microsoft because it leads to project/solution files that do not describe what's actually happening, they removed that "feature" in MSVS2010.)

You might also have a look at:

Community
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charley
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I think @Charley is on the money.

Download Dependency Walker and see what is actually causing the debug DLL to be loaded. If what you say in your question is correct, then it'll probably be another library that you exe is depending on.

Seb Rose
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