Windows Explorer becoming unstable

[Guest]

Hi,
I've noticed this behavior on a couple of the PCs at our company. It's also
happened on my wife's laptop at home. All are XP Pro. . . .

What happens is that Explorer, not IE, basic Explorer, starts to become
flaky. The most evident symptom is the inability to use the right-click
functionality of the mouse. When I right-click on any icon, Windows goes into
a loop. The egg-timer shows and shows and shows. Eventually, I have to go to
Task Manager, kill Explorer under Processes, then instantiate it again in
Task Manager Applications.

This is very, very frustrating and it makes me want to run to get a Mac. (-:

Thanks,
Peter

 

[R. McCarty]

Explorer issues can sometimes be directly related to context
menu add-ons that 3rd-party applications apply. Things like a
"Scan with...." . Two excellent tools for determining this is a
program from SysInternals called AutoRuns and Shell Ext
Viewer.

Moderately complicated to determine what is valid and what
is unnecessary or broken. Helps to read the help files on each
program's website.

AutoRuns:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/ProcessesAndThreads/Autoruns.mspx

Shell Extension Viewer:
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/shexview.html

 

[Gerry]

Peter

Something to consider but tread carefully:
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/rcdelay.htm

http://windowsxp.mvps.org/slowrightclick.htm

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Hope this helps.

Gerry
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Stourport, England
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