J
JCB
When I try to type into the address bar of Windows Explorer, I find
that I can type a few characters, then the whole address bar resets to
the folder I am currently viewing, as if I had Alt-Tabbed to another
window and back again. So the next character I type starts the address
again.
For instance, If I am currently viewing My Documents, and I want to go
to C:\Windows, I may get as far as typing C:\Wi. At that point the
address bar reverts to saying My Documents (highlighted). I continue
typing and end up with "ndows" in the address bar.
*** If you don't want to read the details, point 7 below identifies the
culprit ***
There have been a number of discussions about this problem, none of
which seem to have reached any conclusions, but I've done a bit of
investigation, and hope we can take it a bit further.
1 - it has nothing to do with AutoComplete, AutoSuggest, etc.
2 - this behaviour also occurs in Internet Explorer - but only after I
have visited a local html page (eg C:\Documents and Settings\John\My
Documents\My Websites\myhome.htm). It then affects only that instance
of Internet Explorer.
3 - I experience this on ALL my PCs, so it must be something that I
routinely set up, but I can't imagine what.
4 - This behaviour is exactly what would happen if a background process
were momentarily grabbing focus every few seconds, as has been
suggested in some of the threads I have read. I am very much inclined
to regard this as the cause of the problem, but which process?
5 - I have installed Process Explorer from www.sysinternals.com (What a
brilliant tool!). By watching which processes seemed to kick in at the
same time that the address bar reset itself, I detected that one of the
occurrences of svchost.exe seemed to happen at the same time as the
reset. I used Process Explorer to Suspend that process and the reset no
longer happened. Resuming the process brought the problem back again.
So I had found the culprit - and I confirmed that it was the cause of
both the WIndows Explorer and the Internet Explorer problems.
6 - Unfortunately, of course, svchost.exe runs lots of services, so I
had to try to find out which of them was causing the problem. But
Process Explorer helps out here by allowing you to either Pause or Stop
individual services within one instance of svchost.exe. I soon
discovered that stopping a service removed it from the list so that it
wasn't possible to start it again. So I tried pausing the ones it would
let me pause.
7 - Cut to the chase. Pausing ShelHWDetection stopped the problem.
Interestingly, however, resuming it didn't initially cause the problem
to come back. After a few minutes, however, it did reappear.
But what can I do about it? What does ShellHWDetection do? Why does it
need to grab focus every five seconds on my PCs and not for other
people?
Having taken it this far, I'm now a bit stumped.
I've been struggling with this issue for a couple of years, so any help
will be very, very gratefully received.
John
that I can type a few characters, then the whole address bar resets to
the folder I am currently viewing, as if I had Alt-Tabbed to another
window and back again. So the next character I type starts the address
again.
For instance, If I am currently viewing My Documents, and I want to go
to C:\Windows, I may get as far as typing C:\Wi. At that point the
address bar reverts to saying My Documents (highlighted). I continue
typing and end up with "ndows" in the address bar.
*** If you don't want to read the details, point 7 below identifies the
culprit ***
There have been a number of discussions about this problem, none of
which seem to have reached any conclusions, but I've done a bit of
investigation, and hope we can take it a bit further.
1 - it has nothing to do with AutoComplete, AutoSuggest, etc.
2 - this behaviour also occurs in Internet Explorer - but only after I
have visited a local html page (eg C:\Documents and Settings\John\My
Documents\My Websites\myhome.htm). It then affects only that instance
of Internet Explorer.
3 - I experience this on ALL my PCs, so it must be something that I
routinely set up, but I can't imagine what.
4 - This behaviour is exactly what would happen if a background process
were momentarily grabbing focus every few seconds, as has been
suggested in some of the threads I have read. I am very much inclined
to regard this as the cause of the problem, but which process?
5 - I have installed Process Explorer from www.sysinternals.com (What a
brilliant tool!). By watching which processes seemed to kick in at the
same time that the address bar reset itself, I detected that one of the
occurrences of svchost.exe seemed to happen at the same time as the
reset. I used Process Explorer to Suspend that process and the reset no
longer happened. Resuming the process brought the problem back again.
So I had found the culprit - and I confirmed that it was the cause of
both the WIndows Explorer and the Internet Explorer problems.
6 - Unfortunately, of course, svchost.exe runs lots of services, so I
had to try to find out which of them was causing the problem. But
Process Explorer helps out here by allowing you to either Pause or Stop
individual services within one instance of svchost.exe. I soon
discovered that stopping a service removed it from the list so that it
wasn't possible to start it again. So I tried pausing the ones it would
let me pause.
7 - Cut to the chase. Pausing ShelHWDetection stopped the problem.
Interestingly, however, resuming it didn't initially cause the problem
to come back. After a few minutes, however, it did reappear.
But what can I do about it? What does ShellHWDetection do? Why does it
need to grab focus every five seconds on my PCs and not for other
people?
Having taken it this far, I'm now a bit stumped.
I've been struggling with this issue for a couple of years, so any help
will be very, very gratefully received.
John