Unity 5.2 had been working perfectly on a development machine.
A total uninstall and upgrade to 5.3 and later 5.4 created the following issues:
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On 5.4, a new project can’t be created. As soon as I click “New Project”, it creates a new project folder, some files, then crashes. Crash logs weren’t informative.
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Uninstalled 5.4, then installed 5.3 and tried again: This time, a new project can be created…however, upon opening this new project the Editor area turns completely white and freezes. The Console gives the error: “Failed to get socket connection from UnityShaderCompiler.exe shader compiler…” After a minute, Unity then crashes.
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Uninstalled 5.3 and re-installed 5.2 again. Everything works perfectly as before.
I checked online regarding the “ShaderCompiler.exe” error and most solutions were to disable ZoneAlarm, antivirus/malware, firewalls, etc… Well, this computer does not have ZoneAlarm or any anti-virus (this development machine is completely off-the-grid, never online) that might affect Unity.
This same machine has installed and can successfully run: Unity 5.2, Unreal Engine, CryEngine, and Amazon Lumberyard. On Windows 8.
The only thing I haven’t done is upgrade any graphics drivers…but I didn’t think this was necessary - are there significant changes from 5.2 to 5.3 that would warrant upgrading drivers? What is the issue here? Currently, I cannot upgrade my Asset Store products to 5.4 without moving everything over to another machine.