Warning – A Journal File Could not Be Created. Another SOLIDWORKS Session Running

Do you receive a warning message every time you open SOLIDWORKS? The warning states there is another SOLIDWORKS session running. You probably have made sure that there is no other session running on your machine; or have performed a Windows reboot. To check that, we need to go to the Windows Task Manager and select End Task to any SOLIDWORKS sessions that might be running. Learn how to open the Windows Task Manager.

Warning – Another SOLIDWORKS session running

How to solve the issue

However, if you have checked the task manager and there is no other session of SOLIDWORKS running, you can solve this issue by going to the windows registry and make a simple change:

1. Open up the Registry Editor window by clicking on WIndows Start button and typing “regedit”
2. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER > software > SolidWorks > SolidWorks 20xx > ExtReferences
3. Rename the “ExtReferences” folder by adding a suffix to the end of it such as “ExtReferences_old”
4. Close Registry Editor and run SolidWorks

You will notice that the error message will no longer show. Note in the Registry Editor window there is a new folder created for “ExtReferences”. If the error message does not show and the problem is solved, you can delete the old “ExtReferences” folder that was renamed.