Debugging systray progs - help!

[Ken Bessler]

Every now and then Explorer shuts down and restarts - the desktop
icons wink out for a second and several systray icons disappear. I'm
trying to see if one of those programs may be causing this activity so
I noted down the apps pre crash and post crash:

Here is a list of my systray icons pre crash:

1 Weather bug
2 Messenger
3 PGP tray
4 KaZaA Lite K++
5 Clone CD Tray
6 Hotsync manager (Sony PDA)
7 Nvidea Media Center
8 Diet K!
9 Volume
10 Safely remove Hardware
11 Memory Card Utility (digital camera)
12 Norton Auto protect

Now here is a list post crash with status:

Name Status
1 Weather bug Off & Won't restart
2 Messenger Still running
3 PGP tray Still running
4 KaZaA Lite K++ Still running
5 Clone CD Tray Still running
6 Hotsync manager Missing but still running
7 Nvidea Media Center Off & can't find to restart
8 Diet K! Off but restarts OK
9 Volume Still running
10 Safely remove Hrdwre Still running
11 Memory Card Utility Missing but still running
12 Norton Auto protect Still running

Note that weather bug crashed when I tried to start it - I'm wondering
if that is a hint that it may be the root cause of explorer crashing. Event
viewer says that there were no events for 9 hours then explorer restarted.
Next Explorer did it again when weatherbug hung when I started it.

I can't find the Nvidea control program to try to restart that.

For now I'm gonna uninstall weather bug and see if that program was
causing explorer to shut down. I understand there is little evidence to
support this idea but I'm kinda working in the dark here......

Any ideas?

Ken

 

[PJ]

You need to end task on one item at a time to see how IE
responds. Do not end task on Systray or Explorer. These
are Windows components and your system will shut down.
Once you have the items shut down you should be able to
figure out which program is causing the problem. Once that
happens you can get rid of the offending program. OR your
can use "msconfig" to stop them from running in the
background. Be careful in msconfig- only open the Startup
unless you really know what you are doing. Making changes
to the other Tabs can cause all kinds of Windows issues.