Windows XP forum: Window Explorer Crash

using "Windows Explorer" or opening folders in "My Computer" when this occurs?

You're browsing files on your "Storage Partiton"???

Established the problem, Did you scan the partition for viruses & spyware. Defrag it as well.

Have to start with a clean partition before you can properly diagnose anything

I tossed a MPEG file from my HP 812 camera to some other PC. Explorer promptly crashed when we went to that directory.

It appears that Explorer has issues in decoding content.

While it can be debated why Explorer does this and whether it's a bug or not, the fix for that one was to install HP's CODEC.

If we extend this example to other images and files we see Explorer's wheels falling off on many other media files.

Your choice what to do here but I see no fix in the pipe over this one. You can find the file that crashes Explorer and figure out how to fix it or look at other file browsers that don't crash.

Bob

Whenever this happens, it means that access has been blocked. Try again. But before accessing, press down on the Control (Ctrl) key and you should have no problem. As a matter of fact, if you have any doubts about accessing, press on the key. If it's not necessary, it won't matter anyway. But if it is, it will save you the trouble of re-accessing.

Roy Weston
Vancouver, B.C.
CANADA

Windows explorer is crashing on her, NOT internet explorer.

I had a similar problem where my Windows Explorer would crash after about 5 minutes of use. It didn't seem to matter what drive, folder, or file types I was browsing.

I could even be playing a game w/Windows Explorer open in the background and it would crash.

HOWEVER - it didn't seem to happen in safe mode (since I never figured out how to trigger it I was unable to 'prove' that it stopped in safe mode).

Anyway, I suspect it was related to some video codec but even after uninstalling pretty much everything it still did it. Even a repair install back to SP1 and re-installing SP2 etc. didn't fix it.

I ended up doing a fresh install on another partition. I still have the 'bad' one around for testing, but I suspect I'll never get it fixed.

So, um, on to you ...have you tried running in safe mode and seeing if it still happens?

Hi

bit late to the party - however. I was having the same problem with mpegs. Certain mpegs would crash explorer. To start with all I needed to do was open the folder that contained the files and windows explorer would crash.
You can get it to stop crashing as soon as you open the folder by turning off thumbnail cacheing.
To do this
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Open windows explorer on a freindly non-crashing folder and go to tools> folder options >view >check Do not cache thumbnails - [Apply to All Folders]
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however I was left with another lesser problem. Everytime I clicked on the file windows explorer would crash. I was not playing the file or anything just highlighting it with windows explorer. What solved this problem for me was unregistering media preview.


to do this
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Open the Run dialog box from the start menu (Start->Run or press the Windows and r keys together):

To remove media preview, type and hit enter
regsvr32 /u shmedia.dll
To readd media preview, type and hit enter
regsvr32 shmedia.dll
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a bit of waffle

This method is more of a work around than a solution.
I knew it wasn't a virus as the computer hadn't been connected to the internet. My understanding is that when you click on a media file with explorer it tries to create a preview. If explorer can't create a preview for what ever reason it crashes ( instead of say moving on ). By unregistering this capability you prevent it from even trying and therefore prevent it from crashing. However unregistering media preview limits the amount of information exporer can give you about a media file - ie length, dimension, bit rate etc. This has no effect on windows media player capabilities (or lack of them) and explorer can still display overall file size. It is also a reversalble process.

PS a similar process works with image files
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To remove image preview, type and hit enter
regsvr32 /u shimgvw.dll
To readd image preview, type and hit enter
regsvr32 shimgvw.dll
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nb all original spelling mistakes are the copyright and intellectual property of yourpotential-ourcrashing YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!

Try this one it works, go to start>computer>sysytem properties>advance system settings> and in the advance tab click settings from performance and in the visual effects tab uncheck "show thumbnails instead of icons". I think the problem occurs when it tries to show the "thumbnails" especially some of the video formats, it fails to view the picture preview in that video. unfortunately this settings apllied to all files like images,mp3's etc.but I guarantee you, your problem will be solved.