perfh.dat is considered a type of Dynamic Link Library (DLL) file. Dynamic Link Library files, like perfh.dat, are essentially a "guide book" that stores information and instructions for executable (EXE) files - like 3DViewer.ResourceResolver.exe - to follow. These files were created so that multiple programs (eg. Windows) could share the same perfh.dat file, saving valuable memory allocation, therefore making your computer run more efficiently.
Unfortunately, what makes DLL files so convenient and efficient, also makes them extremely vulnerable to problems. If something happens to a shared DAT file, either it goes missing or gets corrupted in some way, it can generate a "runtime" error message. Runtime is pretty self-explanatory; it means that these errors are triggered when perfh.dat is attempted to be loaded either when Windows is starting up, or in some cases already running. Some of the most common perfh.dat errors include:
- Access Violation at address - perfh.dat.
- perfh.dat could not be found.
- Cannot find C:\Windows\inf\PERFLIB\0000\perfh.dat.
- Cannot register perfh.dat.
- Cannot start Windows. A required component is missing: perfh.dat. Please install Windows again.
- Failed to load perfh.dat.
- The application has failed to start because perfh.dat was not found.
- The file perfh.dat is missing or corrupt.
- This application failed to start because perfh.dat was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem.
Your perfh.dat file could be missing due to accidental deletion, uninstalled as a shared file of another program (shared with Windows), or deleted by a malware infection. Furthermore, perfh.dat file corruption could be caused from a power outage when loading Windows, system crash while loading perfh.dat, bad sectors on your storage media (usually your primary hard drive), or quite commonly, a malware infection. Thus, it's critical to make sure your anti-virus is kept up-to-date and scanning regularly.