Win 7 show hidden icons arrow flashes when I put cursor on it

Hello,

Hope I'm putting this in the right place. I've searched all over the internet for help with this problem but can't seem to find anyone posting the same problem. I've seen many problems to do with the show hidden icons arrow and have tried many of the solutions but have had to undo the changes because it either caused another problem or just didn't work to help the problem I'm having. I always clone my drive before trying these changes. It's actually more of an irritation than a problem.

Win 7, the Show Hidden Icons arrow in the taskbar flashes when I put cursor on it. The balloon keeps flashing on and off. If I manage to click when the balloon isn't showing, it opens the list of programs. If I click while the balloon is showing, it does absolutely nothing. It flashes very quickly so I sometimes have to click several times before it opens the menu. Approximately 2 1/2 to 3 months ago, because the system was getting sluggish and slow, I deleted the partition, formatted and reloaded Windows. I then took a snapshot of the partition before installing any updates or programs. Over the next couple of days, I did all updates and added the programs I use. As soon as this was done, I cloned the drive again. Everything went fine for the first month or so. Then I started having the problem with the show hidden icons arrow. I redid the system from the clone and still had the same problem. Just for the halibut, I booted off the clone. Still had the same problem so obviously I just never noticed the problem before the backup. I should note that I clone the system every 2 weeks so the original clone was overwritten.

I've tried everything I can think of and many ideas from forums. Nothing seems to work. If anyone has had this problem or has seen it before or even thinks they might have a solution for this problem, I would greatly appreciate any help you can give. I really don't want to have to go through a new install if it can be avoided.

System: ASUS M5A97 R2.0 motherboard, AMD FX-6100 6 core processor, Win 7 Pro 64, 8GB Kingston Hyper X RAM, ATI AMD Radeon HD-5450 Vid card, 1- 1TB drive and 1- 350Gig for dual boot (Win 7 and Win XP. XP never has access to the internet), and 2 1TB drives for backup.
Avast Premier, Superantispyware, Malwarebytes. Avast does a quick scan everyday and a full scan once per week. Superantispyware and Malwarebytes I run once per week. I use CCleaner every night before shutdown and usually follow it with Glary Utilities every Friday night. I defrag the system once a month.

If you need any further info, please just let me know.

I thank you in advance

Rob

Hello Megahertz07

I just double checked and drivers are up to date. As for a program, it runs once and then it runs in the background. I downloaded and ran it again as well and problem is still there. I reset all controls to manufacturer (I never changed them when i originally installed). Everything there seems to be fine and program is listed in MSCONFIG.

Thanks for the suggestion. It was worth a try.

Rob

Hello again Megahertz07,

Yes, I shut it down. When that didn't work, I uninstalled the program and reinstalled it. Problem was the same whether the program was shut down or not and continued after reinstall of the problem. I also did a reboot after uninstalling the program and a reboot after it was reinstalled with the problem still persisting.

I tried everything here and nothing worked so I did the unthinkable....repartitioned, formatted and reinstalled windows 7 as well as programs I use. So far, problem is gone.

I can also say with confidence that I don't think it had anything to do with the mouse. I uninstalled the program for the mouse and removed drivers and went back to a wired mouse. The problem was still there. Only thing I can think of is that there was a glitch in the previous win7 64 installation. Problem seems to have been resolved with the new install but time will tell. Going to wait for a couple of weeks before using the wireless mouse again. If problem starts again I will contact microlimp and they can figure it out.

I really want to thank you, Megahertz07, for your input and ideas. It may not have solved the problem but at least you responded to my thread and you were the only one who did so I have my suspicions that this wasn't a problem anyone had run into in past.

You take care and have an awesome week and again, I appreciate your input.

Rob

Megahertz07, I'm about 2 steps ahead of you on the backup. Took a snapshot of the partition as soon as I had windows installed with all updates and then another as soon as I had all programs installed. So far so good.

Take care.