Yeah the mesh is most likely corrupted, Its best to try and model with clean topology meaning everything should be made up of edge loops, avoid polygons with more than 4 sides etc... If you can use an stl check modifier without crashing you might be able to get some clue to the problem areas. or if you can export it to something like .obj then re-import it into a new scene you may be able to salvage your work, sometimes crashes like this are nearly impossible to diagnose and its usually because an object is corrupted. you would usually isolate the bad mesh by merging in one object at a time until the crash occurs. But in this case its just the one object, as a first step try merging the object into a new scene.

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I was working with it as an editable poly.. should I use editable mesh instead? Because converting it to an editable mesh fixed all the errors and it doesn't crash anymore. Also after converting back to editable poly again it's still fixed. I actually attempted splicing the face a few times and tried to get it as clean as possible, would you have done it a better way? I never really learned any good way to model I kinda just jumped in and started experimenting

Thanks for the help

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[Link to mediadesign.deviantart.com]
[Link to www.youtube.com]

Usually editable poly is perfectly stable. Editable poly is a newer type of polygon object in max. I think it came in around version 5 or 6. can't be sure. But yeah thats cool. sometimes there is just weird anomalous shit that happens in all that code. sometimes it just takes a convertion or a merging or an export to get it working again. generally some advice on modeling cleaning might be.

1. Always collapse any extra verts you create with the cut tool using ctrl+alt+c

2. Work with clean edge loops as much as possible, try to think about the best topology for the form you are creating. try not to go against the grain so to speak.

3. routinely do a weld threshold on all your verts if you think you may have coincident vertices and coplanar faces.

4. be carefull when you extrude edges and polygons to avoid double edges and coplanar faces.

5. Use a turbosmooth mod to help you find any weird glitches. even if the model isnt going to be smoothed.

Glad you figured it out and didnt lose the whole model

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Thanks man, I'll be sure to follow those tips This is probably a stupid question but what exactly do you mean by clean edge loops?

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[Link to mediadesign.deviantart.com]
[Link to www.youtube.com]

Basically you want your edges to have a nice smooth flow that follow the lines of the object you are trying to create as much as possible. This is especially important when modelling an mesh that will be deformed such as an animated character, but is something you should get into the practice of doing for all models as it will help with efficiency and accuracy.

Here are a few links:
[Link to cube.phlatt.net]
[Link to maxrovat.sns.hu]

This thread has loads of info on topology (warning, link to rival forum. Click if you dare...)
[Link to forums.cgsociety.org]

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[Link to www.3dprevis.com]

Ah, I figured it had something to do with keeping it all quads Now I know. Thanks mate

Don't worry I didn't click that third link

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[Link to mediadesign.deviantart.com]
[Link to www.youtube.com]

Thanks guys for your help, I finished the model if you're interested:
[Link to mediadesign.deviantart.com]

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[Link to mediadesign.deviantart.com]
[Link to www.youtube.com]

That's a pretty cool design. I'd buy it if I was an uber nerd.

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[Link to www.3dprevis.com]

Great work man! Nice case design. Call antec and get them to make it.

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--Matt