Right Click on desktop causing Explorer.exe crash!!!

[Nikolay]

Like many others I also have this problem.

 

[paucli]

Bitdefender the problem

For me BitDefender seems to be the problem.

Consistently now, if I turn off real time protention for 5 minutes, try the right mouseclick on the desktop (explorer hangs), restart explorer (restarts automatically after crash) then things start to to work. Right mouseclick works.

My problems started after 2 weeks or so of Win7 and Bitdefender. I suppose some autoupdate of Bitdefender caused the problem. OR maybe even a WIndows update.

I can live with the hassle - Im sure MS or Bitdefnder will eventually come out with a fix. Bitdefnder has to if they expect to sell this product into the future.

 

[paucli]

using Bitdefender 2010 Total Security

in case someone was wondering about mylast post.

 

[Mr Smiley]

Could I please ask all those who have experienced this issue if in your Action Centre's Reliability History section you have had at some stage received a critical event titled 'DllHost.exe Stopped working'? Please advise.

I am currently in ongoing discussions with a very helpful MS Technical Engineer about this error and I have a feeling it may be related to your issue with Windows Explorer, in which case I think I may have a possible solution.

Warmest Regards

Neil

 

[HDBanger]

None of the above.

I have my power saving set to high performance, no turning off disks or monitor. Two of my disks are ssd drives, so access time, spin up time, all irrelevant. It also happens with the os drive itself, so I dont see how power down has anything to do with it. As for entrys in action center, I turn all that off after fresh install, along with security center etc. Only av/spyware Im running in MS Essentials.

 

[Eddie48]

Could I please ask all those who have experienced this issue if in your Action Centre's Reliability History section you have had at some stage received a critical event titled 'DllHost.exe Stopped working'? Please advise.

I am currently in ongoing discussions with a very helpful MS Technical Engineer about this error and I have a feeling it may be related to your issue with Windows Explorer, in which case I think I may have a possible solution.

Warmest Regards

Neil

I have one critical event related to DllHost.exe stopped working...

Description
Faulting Application Path: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\dllhost.exe
Problem signature
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: DllHost.exe
Application Version: 6.1.7600.16385
Application Timestamp: 4a5bc6b7
Fault Module Name: ole32.dll
Fault Module Version: 6.1.7600.16385
Fault Module Timestamp: 4a5bdac7
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 0002f2c2
OS Version: 6.1.7600.2.0.0.768.3
Locale ID: 1033

 

[Mr Smiley]

Hi Eddie48

Thanks for your response and for the image.

Very interesting, very interesting indeed. It looks identical to the critical event I had before I made certain changes which have appeared to have rectified the DllHost.exe crashing and Windows Explorer appearing as having stopped working.

I have to go now to see my nephew on a TV show we have in Australia called The Apprentice, but I will release my findings to you and other members later tonight.

Warmest Regards

Neil

 

[TomasWin7]

thanks Mr. Smiley...it can only help.

and all I have to say is we've had over 6500+ thread views in 2 WEEKS. This problem spans past Bitdefender, memory, Firefox, etc..

I have done a CLEAN install of Windows 7 64-Bit Professional and I had the crash after JUST installing WINDOWS UPDATES!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I had NO THIRD PARTY APPS INSTALLED AT ALL, and I STILL got this "crash".

 

[DickFalcon]

Faulting Application Path: C:\Windows\explorer.exe

Problem signature
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: Explorer.EXE
Application Version: 6.1.7600.16404
Application Timestamp: 4a765771
Fault Module Name: ntdll.dll
Fault Module Version: 6.1.7600.16385
Fault Module Timestamp: 4a5be02b
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 0000000000051da0
OS Version: 6.1.7600.2.0.0.256.1
Locale ID: 6153


I too have this crash. Its happened 74 times according to the logs over the past 2 months. Sometimes my PC just freezes and it has to be restarted. I've seen a few BSOD too but I know how to avoid them now.

If I can't get this resolved in the next few days, I'll be going back to xp.

UGH!

I'm really starting to dislike 7... another crash:

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: mmc.exe
Application Version: 6.1.7600.16385
Application Timestamp: 4a5bc808
Fault Module Name: ntdll.dll
Fault Module Version: 6.1.7600.16385
Fault Module Timestamp: 4a5be02b
Exception Code: c000041d
Exception Offset: 0000000000051da0
OS Version: 6.1.7600.2.0.0.256.1
Locale ID: 6153

The random reboot should be right around the corner too

 

[Mr Smiley]

Hi All

Firstly, could I please ask if all of you have left Internet Explorer 8 'turned on', are using it, and have not made any changes to the Microsoft add-ons that come with IE 8, such as 'Discuss' and 'Research'? Please advise.

This DllHost.exe issue (in the sysWOW64 folder), happened to me on Vista Ultimate (x86 & x64) and up until two days ago, with Windows 7 Ultimate x64 (I haven't installed the 32-bit version of 7 so I can't comment on it.

Now I was so curious I spoke to a MS Tech Engineer last Friday in order to get to the bottom of this issue. I have performed over 6 clean installs to get to the bottom of it, call me stupid or a complete nutcase (which is probably right!)

The MS Tech recommended I don't use NOD32, Avast etc. after another clean install, but install Microsoft Security Essentials instead. I tried this, but I also installed Ad-Aware and MalwareBytes and the event showed up again in my Reliability History.

I'm not qualified to state that I believe the problem might be fixed, however, early yesterday morning I did another clean install, but this time straight after the install I went to the Windows Features section of Program & Features and turned off IE 8 (and Media Centre & DVD Maker BTW), and although it's too early to declare a fix, I have not received the abovementioned critical event or any other and Windows Explorer has been operating flawlessly (with both UAC turned ON and OFF).

I don't know, maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree, but I've been checking my Reliability History every hour since yesterday morning and it's still rating a perfect 10 as at the most recent report of 11:00pm this evening.

FYI, I've also attached the critical event report I was consistently receiving prior to turning IE 8 off.

I hope this certainly helps and we might be close to resolving this issue.

Warmest Regards,

Neil

 

[Andy1]

I have this exactly same crashing problem, but in addition I have problems with .net applications, for example keepass password safe will crash with .net error after indeterminate time, it works well until that and also few other softwares that use it. I have not been able to diagnose this one further but would like to know if anyone else has this in addition to the explorer.exe crashing?

 

[DickFalcon]

Yep. PC just froze on me again about 20mins ago. Was watching a tv show and it froze about halfway in, had to manually restart.

Windows Features section of Program & Features and turned off IE 8 (and Media Centre & DVD Maker BTW)

I applied these settings and also turned off Tablet PC Components & Windows Gadget Platform.

I'll post back in a day or so and let you know if its been any more stable.

Thanks for advice mr. : )

 

[papahood]

I mentioned about Firefox 3.5 with private browsing switch off also i didnt noticed Kaspersky also fix the problems as well (I used KIS 2010 with version 736) and add critical fix with "a" on it so think it fix the problem - it hasnt been any crashing for few days seem it now sort it out. Look like there some software you install that need to fix the patch like AV or anything else but still need to get some fix from Microsoft as well so maybe come up soon.

Oddly enough after having switched off private browsing in firefox i haven't had a single crash yet..i thought i tried all the fixes but must have overlooked this one and so far so good....i will keep you posted if it continues to work..btw I am running avast.

 

[Mr Smiley]

If you're not willing to turn off IE 8 completely, start by going into IE 8's Manage Addons section and disable the 'Research' and 'Discuss' addons and see if that makes a difference.

I'd also recommend you turn off Media Centre completely ... I don't think too many of you would be upset about that one including the MS Tech Engineer I'm in ongoing discussions with who also recommended I turn off UAC completely LOL!

I'm still convinced it has something to do with IE 8, sorry I can't offer a more technical reason as to why.

I know it's too early to claim a fix after making these changes only three days ago, however, after six or seven clean installs over the last week or so on a brand new custom built system, I had the DllHost.exe stop working every time within the first day both before and after reinstalling all of my software applications.

I'm currently running Firefox 3.5.5, ESET's Smart Security 4, MalwareBytes, Windows Defender, and IObit Security, and as of 9:00am this morning my Reliability History still remains at '10' and everything appears to be remarkably stable.

I should also point out that with this latest install, which I believe will be my last, I have followed Black Viper's recommendations with regards to tweaking the administrative services.

Once again, let's hope as a team we have, or can, put this baby to bed!

Neil

 

[Warhaven]

Whelp, I've narrowed my computer's problem down to coming out of sleep. Computer will work fine from a cold boot, but if I put my PC to sleep and then wake it up, Explorer becomes unstable in the usual fashion (random ntdll halts and right-click desktop crashes).

 

[belikexp]

If you're not willing to turn off IE 8 completely, start by going into IE 8's Manage Addons section and disable the 'Research' and 'Discuss' addons and see if that makes a difference.

I'd also recommend you turn off Media Centre completely ... I don't think too many of you would be upset about that one including the MS Tech Engineer I'm in ongoing discussions with who also recommended I turn off UAC completely LOL!

I'm still convinced it has something to do with IE 8, sorry I can't offer a more technical reason as to why.

I know it's too early to claim a fix after making these changes only three days ago, however, after six or seven clean installs over the last week or so on a brand new custom built system, I had the DllHost.exe stop working every time within the first day both before and after reinstalling all of my software applications.

I'm currently running Firefox 3.5.5, ESET's Smart Security 4, MalwareBytes, Windows Defender, and IObit Security, and as of 9:00am this morning my Reliability History still remains at '10' and everything appears to be remarkably stable.

I should also point out that with this latest install, which I believe will be my last, I have followed Black Viper's recommendations with regards to tweaking the administrative services.

Once again, let's hope as a team we have, or can, put this baby to bed!

Neil

You can uninstall IE8. I turned off all the accelerators.

UAC is off.


What is the Reliability History ? Is this located in Windows 7?

 

[Mr Smiley]

Hi BeLikeXP

Yes, you can turn IE8 off completely (and Media Centre & DVD Maker if you wish).

Go to Start Button > Control Panel > Programs and Features > then in the top left hand panel there is an option to "Turn Windows Features On or Off" > click on it then uncheck "Internet Explorer 8" then reboot.

Yes, your Reliability History is part of Windows 7.

Go to Start Button > Control Panel > Action Centre (you can also access the Action Centre by clicking the white flag icon in your system tray at the bottom right-hand- side of your taskbar > Open Action Centre > Click on arrow of Maintenance section > under "Check for Solutions to Problem Reports" click on "View Reliability History" and that's it.

BeLikeXP, let me know how you go and if I can help in any other way.

Neil

 

[PvtMatter]

Mr S. might be on to something. I turned IE 8 off a few days ago and I don't recall a recent case of "Windows Explorer not working".

 

[belikexp]

BeLikeXP, let me know how you go and if I can help in any other way.

Neil

I'm not having the problem stated in this thread. My system is A-OK

 

[Mr Smiley]

Hi belikeXP and PvtMatter,

I'll be very interested to hear from you regularly as to how your systems function from hereon in, but the early signs are encouraging.