Tasbar vanishing closing all active programs

[JKDonald]

for the past few weeks my girlfriends computer has been expriancing some quite ritating problems.

It seems whenever it is doing 2 things or 2 open windows or anything like that the entire statrbar/taskbar vanishes for about 5 seconds then reapears having closed any and all active programs.

she cant go on msn for long because the conversation windows cause this to happen, but i dont beleice this beig caused directly by msn.

Does anyone ahve any ideas because for aslong as this is happening she cant do her college work as her computer closes progams like word whenever she attempts to do her essays.

Any help be greatly appreciated.

[-pops-]

Can you tell us the operating system and what you/your girlfriend have done to try and correct the problem (so we don't give the same advice as you may have already tried).

This may be useful to help out.

[JKDonald]

sorry its windows xp, home edition i beleive.

well theres not much weve tried im not an expert at computers but i usually know whats wrong and how to fix but this has me confused.

weve ran the usual virus scan,online virus scan, microsoft spyware,adaware. etc and nothing malicious has shown.

[Scarecrow Man]

Sounds like explorer is crashing.

If you have your windows disc, you can run sfc /scannow from the run prompt.

See if that has any affect.

Or from pops' post:

To Repair you operating system proceed as follows:

1/ Insert the Windows XP cd into your CD-ROM and Reboot your machine (You will need to make sure that your CD-ROM is set to be the first boot option in your PCs BIOS)

2/ At the Welcome To Set Up screen press Enter to start the Windows set Up

3/ Next accept the License Agreement

4/ Set Up will now search your PC for any copies of Windows

5/ When set up finds the copy of Windows XP already installed on your PC, select it from the list and then press 'R' to start the Repair process

[JKDonald]

Sounds like explorer is crashing.

If you have your windows disc, you can run sfc /scannow from the run prompt.

See if that has any affect.

Or from pops' post:

To Repair you operating system proceed as follows:

1/ Insert the Windows XP cd into your CD-ROM and Reboot your machine (You will need to make sure that your CD-ROM is set to be the first boot option in your PCs BIOS)

2/ At the Welcome To Set Up screen press Enter to start the Windows set Up

3/ Next accept the License Agreement

4/ Set Up will now search your PC for any copies of Windows

5/ When set up finds the copy of Windows XP already installed on your PC, select it from the list and then press 'R' to start the Repair process

I wont be able to get to the computer for a day maybe 2 but ill give all of these a try next time im round, Thanks for the help even if it dosnt work appreciate yout taking your time to assist :).

[JKDonald]

Turns out its just her windows account that has this problem, there are 4 accounts on her computer and only hers has the problem, and its recent shes had the computer years with no trouble

any ideas?

[jason.b.c]

Turns out its just her windows account that has this problem, there are 4 accounts on her computer and only hers has the problem, and its recent shes had the computer years with no trouble

any ideas?

Hard Core virus scans, spyware scans, adware scans, get a firewall, follow scarecrow man's advice and do the " SFC/Scan now " thing with your windows xp install disk, or boot from the disk and press "R" when prompted, ....????

[korgg]

this kind of behaviour can be the result of a not so good software, that someone used... Because it only happens to one user, I suspect it is a registry problem.. An old restore point might deal with it, but I cant guarantee.. That is just an explorer crash... Try using a newer version of MSN ..Or none whatsoever :) ...

[Scarecrow Man]

You could back up the users files, delete the account and make a new one. Restore all the files back again.

Some settings will have to be reset, but this will get rid of the error.