IE hanging after clearing cookies

[Guest]

Just noticed this today but if you go to just about any site (including
www.msn.com), click a link or two, then clear cookies and try to click
another link, IE 6 hangs. This does not occur with Firefox or IE 7 and does
not happen on my computer that did not get the latest MS updates. I am
trying to restore back far enough to find out when this started but have not
seen anything about this online.

I have tried this on 5 different computers with IE 6. The 4 that have the
latest and greatest MS patches hang. The 1 that does not works fine.

Go to MSN.com. Click News link near the top (will take you to MSNBC.com).
Go to Tools, Internet Options, Clear Cookies, and click Yes. Now click on
"Sports" section. Computers with IE 6 and the latest patches will hang at
this point. Now try it with other sites.

 

[Guest]

Replying since I cannot edit.

I restored back to the 3/15/2007 restore point (last patch was installed on
3/16 on my box) and now IE 6 does NOT hang following the below method.
Something in the latest patch caused an issue. I am suprised I have not
found any more reports of this online yet.

 

[PA Bear]

What "patches" are now /not/ installed, Wink?

 

[Guest]

Ok, we have found that it is not the clearing of cookies. You can just go to
Tools-> Internet Options->click on Settings, then cancel (or OK) back out to
the IE window and it will hang on click.

It repros on some sites but not others:
www.msn.com - repro
www.msnbc.com - repro
www.nordstrom.com - not repro (though runs a lot slower with some links)
www.costco.com - not repro
www.cingular.com - repro
www.drugstore.com - repro

Very strange. We have tried inside and outside a firewall and that makes no
difference. Where is the best place to report this? The link I found to the
IE bug database does not work anymore (says it is down for now but will be
back up later). There is not a forum like they have for dev tools. Any
ideas?

Thanks,
Wink

 

[Guest]

That is the tricky part. Add/Remove programs showed 3 patches for Windows XP
installed on 3/16/2007. First I tried uninstalling those 3 and the issue
still reproduced. I then looked for other updates for IE but IE was not
listed in Add/remove so no "updates" were listed for it.

Once I was fully restored back to the 3/15 point the system started up the
automatic updates. While it was downloading them I verified that everything
worked without hanging IE. After it was done it asked to reboot to finish
updating. I just let it reboot (sending this on my Vista laptop that does
not repro the problem) and now it is running fine without repro. It just
informed me of another 4 updates to install so I am trying those also.

I have reproduced this on at least 10 computers both inside a corporate
firewall and outside the firewall (work DSL line outside the firewall and
home computer). I have done system restore on 2 of them and both stop
hanging after restoring to 3/15.

This does not repro at all on some websites (costco.com, nordstrom.com) but
it always repros on these machines on other sites (msn.com, msnbc.com,
drugstore.com - some pages there while not on others). This leads me to
believe that it must have to do with some type of content on the affected
sites in regards to the latest patches. We have not seen this happen until
earlier this week (first noticed on Tuesday but ignored at first). Today is
when we all started seeing this more often.

We found that it does not take clearing the cookies. All it takes is doing
something in Internet Options (including clicking the Set to default for the
home page) and then leaving the Options.

I am looking through the WindowsUpdate.log file trying to find out what all
was installed between 3/15 and today. Is there an easier, more user
friendly, way to get this?

Thanks,
Wink

 

[Guest]

Here are the 4 updates it found and I told to install. Something done after
I chose to install these has now caused the problem to repro again though
none seem to be IE updates:

Successfully installed:
Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool - March 2007 (KB890830)
Update for Outlook 2007 Junk Email Filter (KB931766)
Windows Genuine Advantage Notification (KB905474)

Failed to install:
Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition Service Pack 2 (KB 921896)

I am sure it is not the Outlook 2007 patch since only 1 or 2 of the systems
have that installed on (one I reproed on was a straight Win XP installed box
with no Office or extra programs on it). The log shows it failed the SQL
patch earlier so that is not it. That leaves the Malicious Software Removal
Tool patch and teh Genuine Advantage Notification patch.

Wink

 

[Gary Smith]

I can reproduce this on Win2K with IE6 SP1, but I had to actually delete a
file from the Settings | View Files box. It made no difference whether it
was a cookie or another type of file, or whether it was related to the
page being viewed. Using the "Delete files" option from Settings also
caused IE to hang.

Ok, we have found that it is not the clearing of cookies. You can just go to
Tools-> Internet Options->click on Settings, then cancel (or OK) back out to
the IE window and it will hang on click.

It repros on some sites but not others:
www.msn.com - repro
www.msnbc.com - repro
www.nordstrom.com - not repro (though runs a lot slower with some links)
www.costco.com - not repro
www.cingular.com - repro
www.drugstore.com - repro