diff --git a/src/LSPHackTypeChecker.ts b/src/LSPHackTypeChecker.ts
index e9701eb..c6f6a57 100644
--- a/src/LSPHackTypeChecker.ts
+++ b/src/LSPHackTypeChecker.ts
@@ -46,6 +46,8 @@ export class LSPHackTypeChecker {
       }),
     );
 
+    // `hh_client --lsp` fails to spawn `hh_server` if not already running,
+    // so do an initial `hh_client` call to start the server if needed.
     await vscode.window.withProgress(
       {
         location: vscode.ProgressLocation.Window,
diff --git a/src/proxy.ts b/src/proxy.ts
index 6bfdcbd..469b465 100755
--- a/src/proxy.ts
+++ b/src/proxy.ts
@@ -19,11 +19,14 @@ export async function version(
   }
 }
 
+/** Run `hh_client` to start `hh_server` if needed. */
 export async function start(
   config: HackConfig,
   log: vscode.LogOutputChannel,
 ): Promise<string> {
-  return run(config, log, []);
+  // Ignore errors to avoid exceeding `maxBuffer` in case of many preexisting errors.
+  // We only run this command to ensure `hh_server` starts and don't care about the output.
+  return run(config, log, ["--max-errors", "0"]);
 }
 
 async function run(