I’m having an issue with a .jv2 file on a Windows PC. It’s been used for a couple years but just last week they started getting a dialog box with the message “Byron.exe has stopped working” and the only option is “Close Program.” I tried the same file on my Mac laptop running V3 and it crashed there as well (once it froze while trying to open the file, another time it completely quit the app). Is there anything I can do to look at this file to see if it’s recoverable? As far as I can tell there’s no backup. 
I called Chroma-Q to see if someone could talk me through this but I had to leave a message so I thought I’d check here, too.
I would recommend two things:
First run the Clean Up Show tool in the Tools menu on the show file. This will fix some errors if you are able to open the show
Next, start a new Vista 3 show and use the new Merge function (File/Merge) to bring the data over from the old show. This clears out any corruptions in the show file.
This could be caused by a very large show file. We recommend deleting any old cuelists and such as they will increase the load time of the file and possibly lead to what you are seeing.
Unfortunately I can’t even open the file. On both the Windows & Mac it either crashes or tells me it can’t open the file. Any other way to get into the file to edit the contents outside of the Vista app?
No, it sounds like the show file has been corrupted and won’t be salvageable. Check the backups folder to see if any copies were made. Other than that I’m afraid it will have to be rebuilt.
In Vista 3 it is a good idea to use the new Save Copy As option to spit out backups. There is also a new Autosave process that can generate backups. The one thing to remember with either of these is that should the show start to become corrupted, these corruptions can start to save in the backup copies so that is why it is advisable to backup often so you always have a clean version to go back to.