AutoCAD 2010/2011/2012 DWG Format

[#1]

I have AutoCAD Mechanical (but only use ACAD), and now every time that I try to change the color of something (line, circle, text...) my AutoCAD crashes!  {This is very frustrating}

Currently the only way of changing colors is through Layers.

-Norm

[#2]

did this just start happening? or did something change right before it started?

win7? turn off it"s aero theme.
also change the hardware acceleration in autocad and see if that helps.

Autodesk Supported Graphics Cards List and drivers:
http://www.autodesk.com/autocad-graphicscard

[#3]

  As far as I'm aware nothing has changed, and I'm not running Win7 (yet - soon to be upgraded).  My Acad has been working fine since I got it back in 2011 - with the exception of when you flip between programs, and then press the negative key ("-") that it opens the drop down menu as if I've hit "Alt" + "-" ("alt" stays active after switching programs).  I've been using Cad since version 13 and this is the first one that I've had an on-going issues with.

Unfortunately my company isn't planning on upgrading to a newer version for a year or two (due to the size of the company), so I don't know how to get rid of these issues.

-Norm

[#4]

Other than Win7, did you try the other two suggestions I posted?

[#5]

I only saw two options - Win7, and the graphics acceleration.  I tried turning on the hardware acceleration, and then changing the color of a polyline - and it crashed, so no difference.  Is there something I should do differently?  as a note - I don't have admin access.

The graphics card is a ATI Radeon HD 3450 (and the 'Optiplex 780' PC is running XP Pro).  I've had this computer for well over a year.

-Norm

[#6]

It might be worth trying a system restore in Windows back to a month when everything worked.