Windows 7: Taskbar icons act like I'm hovering over them when I'm not

This started about a month or so ago. I don't remember changing or installing anything around that time, though.

Basically, my taskbar icons don't behave correctly. After I click anywhere on the taskbar, the taskbar acts like I never remove my cursor from the taskbar. Like icons keep that 'glow' on them as though my cursor were over them, and then they pop up a tooltip with the name of the window, or an unopened program's icon gets those little lines to the sides and the glowy bit at the edge as though I were hovering my mouse over it.



Here's a screenshot (I drew in the approximate location of my cursor at the time)


Furthermore, when this is happening, I can't hover over taskbar icons to get the window previews. It just shows a tooltip with the window name, or nothing if it's a group of icons. As far as I can tell my Aero settings are all fine, and I know I haven't changed them in at least a year. Here they are anyway:




The only way I can fix this is if I drag an icon so it displays the jumplist. Right-clicking to display the jumplist does not fix it. Only dragging does. Then all's well until the next time I launch via the taskbar. I can hover for window previews, there isn't a glow when there shouldn't be one, etc.

Welcome to Seven Forums aurens. Have you using a custom theme or added any customizations? I'd suggest you run the System File Checker:

SFC /SCANNOW Command - System File Checker

If you do have any custom themes, you will have to patch your system again to use them.

A Guy

If you are using a custom theme, you need to run the Universal Theme Patcher before you can use that theme.

If it's not a theme error, then it may be a driver error. I've had that, where parts of one theme would carry over into another theme. Simply reinstall your VGA driver and that should fix the issue.

I have never done anything with custom themes nor added any customizations. I also haven't changed anything with my theme in at least a year. Not even adding a wallpaper or changing the color.

I'm running sfc now, and I'll reinstall my graphics driver after that.

SFC didn't find anything and reinstalling my video drivers did nothing. I even noticed that it still happened when there were no drivers installed.

That's bizarre O.O

I have no idea what to tell you then... try restarting you comp? I know it sounds lame but I've fixed many things that way.

I have rebooted many times since it started happening.

I suspect it might be some arcane problem like your mouse software, but it will be very difficult to track down. You could try a clean boot to see if it is software related.

How to troubleshoot a problem by performing a clean boot in Windows Vista or in Windows 7

You could almost assuredly fix this with a repair install. this will preserve all your files, programs and settings.

Repair Install

A Guy

In my experience, this happens when the computer is doing too much for its resources then something (not exactly sure what) goes wrong that requires ending and then restarting explorer.exe, which fixes the issue. I don't know if SP1 will fix this issue though I certainly hope it does. And I've tried across many installs, different versions of Windows 7, different hardware and video cards and it just happens. I don't get it too often on my home machine as I have plenty of resources but on my more limited machine at work that runs a Pentium 4 3 Ghz w/HT CPU and 1 GB of RAM, it happens very often.

Essentially, as far as I know, it's a bug of sorts.

Like A Guy said, it can be nearly impossible to track down exactly what is causing this to happen.