Buffer tool not finishing on large feature class

[MarcCusumano]

I am trying to create a new "Cartway" feature class using the buffer tool on a centerline feature class with ~750,000 features in ArcGIS 10.1 SP1. The tool has basic parameters as inputs, such as "FULL", "ROUND", and "ALL", and background geoprocessing is disabled.

The problem I am having is the tool is stuck at 100% completion and does not finish. However the ArcCatalog.exe process is still working (13% CPU, or 100% / 8 cores). I even let it run over the weekend and it is still not done.

The data and scratch workspace are all on solid state drives (SSD's). There are no "spinners" in this workstation to slow things down, so there should be no bottleneck there. The workstation is a Dell T5500 Precision workstation. The specifications are:

2 x Intel Xeon X5677 (2 physical quad-core CPUs, 8 physical cores total, HT disabled).

20GB RAM

2 x NVIDIA Quadro 600 GPUs

120GB Corsair V12 SSD

120GB Corsair Force GT SSD

Any ideas as to how I can get this to finish?

[DaleHoneycutt]

This issue is definitely in dissolving the buffers as you've discovered (running buffer w/o dissolve option works).  If your input is 750,000 centerlines, that means there are 750,000 polygons, many of them with multiple overlaps.  These overlaps count as additional polygons during the dissolve process.

I suggest you first run the Unsplit Line tool on the street centerlines.This should create a centerline feature class with significantly fewer features than the 750,000.  Use these unsplit centerlines as input to Buffer.

If you have a 64-bit operating system, install and use 64-bit background processing.

PS: Here's a picture of unsplitting street centerlines on a street-name attribute.  This shows the potential reduction in features: