Desktop Manager Has Stopped Working

Hello All - this is my first post on the forum.

My problem is I keep getting the "Desktop Manager Has Stopped Working" message somewhat randomly when I'm using my computer.

This started about 3 weeks ago. I did not update any drivers or applications at the time this first occurred.

I have tried everything I've read on various forums or have been advised by the vendor who has been very helpful. (virus, scr, new drivers, etc...)

Also I've done the following:
1 Clean Install of Windows
2 Complete Re-Formatting the SSD Hard Drive (boot)
3 Buying a new Graphics card GeForce 1060 6GB (since both Microsoft tech support and my vendor concluded this had to be a hardware issue after reformatting the disk and likely was the Graphics Card).

After installing the new graphics card yesterday, it was only a few minutes before the dreaded message popped up on my screen again!

When the message first appears my three screens go black and then usually a few seconds later the pop up message gets displayed and my application (usually Excel) comes back to life. Although several times I have had to use Task Manager to kill the application.

The error message sometime occurs when I'm first opening a file and then sometimes when I'm editing a file.
I also resaved some of the application files where the problem seems to occur most to a different DIR and renamed them... (in case it was a corrupted file...) no luck there...

I do use mostly Excel and use VBA code that I've written. I don't go into the registry or anything like that... But I can't see how I've caused this problem either.

Any suggestion would be most welcome Thanks!

Run msconfig. Go to the Services tab. Disable all non-Microsoft services. Then reboot the computer.

Use the computer for a while, to see if that stopped the problem. If it did, then one of the non-Microsoft services that you disabled is the culprit. Run msconfig, and re-enable one service at a time, rebooting after each one that you re-enable, and then using the computer for a while. At some point, the problem will come back; you will then know which non-Microsoft service was the culprit -- it was the last one you re-enabled. Go back into msconfig and disable that service. And make note of which one it was, for future reference.

Continue re-enabling the non-Microsoft services one at a time, to see if there are any more problem services. Or, re-enable all remaining ones, making note of each one of them, in case the problem recurs. In this way, you'll know which ones you still need to check.

mrjimphelps.

thanks for your advice... unfortunately, after turning off all non-MS services, the same crashing behavior returned.

It's almost deterministic as to how to set the crash. I just have to open a particular file and run a very basic macro (which has worked for over one year).... and it crashes..

Does this sound like a software problem or hardware?

It could be either or both.

What type of file is it? Excel spreadsheet? Picture? Word document? AutoCAD drawing?

Also, describe the macro. What does it do?

It is an Excel file, which I've used for over one year.

The macro reads through several dozen worksheets and finds and then reports the last date found to another worksheet. These worksheets contain daily data.

I have also had intermittent crashing with at least one other macro which read data from one file and distributed data to these other worksheets.

Also, thinking that the file might be corrupted, I moved it to another hard drive, changed the name and then copied it back to the drive I normally use. This obviously did not help...

Appreciate your thoughts on this!

I should also mention that I get the same crashes occasionally when doing other things, such as editing a file, or opening a file (usually Excel, since I work mostly with that)....

Your macro might be bad. Turn off macros in Excel, and see if that solves the problem.

I've uninstalled Office 2013 and reinstalled a copy of Excel 2010 that I had lying around. Have been testing the macros and opening/closing all the previous offending files...

So far no crashes...

This makes me wonder if there was something wrong with my Office 2013 - even though I re formatted my hard drive and reinstalled it. I'll keep running with this set up and see.

mrjimphelps - Thanks for your help and attention.

Did you create the macro with a version of Excel that is older than 2013? Perhaps that could be the problem -- the macro was incompatible in some way with 2013.

If 2010 is working for you, great. There are still several years remaining of Microsoft support for 2010.