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Crash / Critical

GPU / Graphics Driver issue (black screen)

The error

"After Effects can't continue: encountered a GPU or Graphics Driver issue" — the Composition panel goes black mid-session, reportedly more common on NVIDIA 16-/20-series cards.

Why this happens

A buggy GPU driver / CUDA errors logged by AE.

How to fix it

1. Clean-remove drivers with DDU and install NVIDIA Studio Driver 537.58 (Oct 10 2023) — the version most cited as fixing the GTX16/RTX20 black-screen crash.
2. Preferences > Display: disable "Hardware Accelerate Composition, Layer, and Footage Panels".
3. Preferences > Import: disable "Hardware Accelerated Decoding".

Source: Compass research report · "GPU/Graphics Driver issue" · id 8

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