Solved Event Viewer Event Log Online Help Links don't function

[tjg79]

My Win 7 Pro x64 system just started acting up. When I select an event in the Event Viewer, the More Information: Event Log Online Help link doesn't open IE10. When I click on the link, the Event Viewer pop-up confirmation box open to confirm sending information across the internet, but when I click "Yes" the box goes away and I get a momentary indication from the cursor that the action is processing then nothing. It will not change the active IE10 page or open IE10.

Is there a solution with out a system restore?

Thanks in advance for your assistance.

Regards

 

[UsernameIssues]

I don't know much about this kind of stuff - but here is what I dug up using Microsoft's Process Monitor and Process Explorer.

The mmc app (event viewer) sends info to one of the svchost instances (netsvcs).

Svchost writes some info to the registry about a scheduled task and then runs that task.

This starts taskeng - which starts wscript.

Wscript runs a temporary VBS file that is supposed to send a URL to the operating system (shell).

The OS is supposed to open your default browser.

Here is the contents of the VBS file from my testing:

Set shell = createobject("wscript.shell")
Shell.run """C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Temp\tmp78C0.url"""

You might try http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1538-sfc-scannow-command-system-file-checker.html

And let's hope that some other forum member can suggest things that you should check.

 

[tjg79]

Thanks for that info.

SFC /SCANNOW was one of the first steps I took to resolve this issue. SFC indicated that it didn't find any integrity issues.

I think I'll try a restore point.

Regards

 

[tjg79]

I resolved my issue with system restore.

I had run a Microsoft Fix it 50267 for some minor issue with IE10 the day before. I then noticed on a subsequent run of CCleaner Registry Cleaner some unusual registry keys were identified as having a problem. I think the MS Fix it made some changes to the registry that changed the chain of events that occur from when you click on "Event Log Online Help" to the point that the OS opens IE.

Thanks again for your research into the processes involved.

Regards

 

[UsernameIssues]

You are welcome.

Glad that you got it fixed