vista problem

I got Vista 32bit. It seems when I leave my computer on for a long time (several hours) that weird things start happening. The taskbar will turn blue and everything will slide to the left. I wont be able to click anything. I click the start button and the menu is all blue. The only way I know to fix it is to reboot or I kill explorer.exe and restart it. That does the trick everytime. Just wonderin if anyone has this problem and knows what causes it? how to fix it?

Any info is greatly appreciated.

Find more posts tagged with

Free for TechExams community: Cybersecurity salary guide

Compare cert salaries and plan your next career move

Button

Comments

undomiel

If it is fixed with restarting explorer.exe then I'd first be checking for spyware and viruses. Are you using Aero? Do you put it into sleep mode at all?

Schluep

undomiel wrote:

If it is fixed with restarting explorer.exe then I'd first be checking for spyware and viruses. Are you using Aero? Do you put it into sleep mode at all?

I would definitely recommend checking for Viruses/Spyware as mrhaun03 suggested. I have never encountered any of the above and have been using Vista extensively for home use since August with Aero turned on. I have left it on for long periods and also used sleep/hibernate many times without issue. Maybe some of the Microsoft pros here know more if this is some type of common issue that is occuring, but I have never experienced it.

dynamik

Is it sitting there idle or are you using it? Is there anything such as sleep, hibernation, screen saver, etc. taking place before this happens? Does this happen if you with aero disabled? Maybe try updating your graphics driver.

undomiel

I only brought up aero and sleeping because I have noticed cases of video memory cache getting corrupted for aero and a restart of explorer.exe tended to refresh that. I suspect in that case though it is related to crappy video drivers plus a crappy onboard video chipset. mrhaun03's case sounds more like viruses/spyware I do agree.

mrhaun03

I do check for spyware. I do find some once in a while and clean it up, but it always find MyWay Web Search which it can't delete. In Program Files I don't have permissions to delete the folder. Any suggestions? BTW, Aero isn't being used and I don't put it in sleep/hibernate mode. It tends to happen after NOT being used for a while, then I start doin things on it and it happens.

dynamik

Try SpyBot: http://www.safer-networking.org

Also, with the bigger-name spyware, you can sometimes download utilities to remove them from their website or just remove them through add/remove programs. You should still update your drivers if necessary as well.

undomiel

I'd also recommend doing a scan with hijack this to see what else could be glomming on. http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/programs.php

Of course you could always do a reinstall since that will probably take less time than all of the troubleshooting to find it, especially if it is putting hooks down into explorer.

ally_uk

Uninstall and reinstall Xp problem solved

mrhaun03

ally_uk wrote:

Uninstall and reinstall Xp problem solved

I'm really thinking about it.....

mrhaun03

I reinstalled Vista and I'm still having the same problem. Anyone got any other suggestions?

dynamik

Post your system specs. It's got to be a hardware/driver issue if it's happening on a clean installation.

vCole

Bad video drivers.

mrhaun03

I'm at work right now, so I can't give you everything. But it was made for Vista. I know their's a Gig of RAM. I was thinking that maybe it was the RAM causing it, but I'm not sure.

dynamik

I'm going to go with my original post and FadeToBright; that sounds like a graphics driver issue. You'd probably have more serious problems if it was bad memory. Be sure to check your event log as well. You might find something in the application or system log when it happens. I'd install SP1 and make sure all your drivers are up to date, and then go from there.

mrhaun03

FadeToBright wrote:

Bad video drivers.

Why do you say video drivers? I guess it's possible, but I"m just curious why you say that.

vCole

mrhaun03 wrote:

FadeToBright wrote:

Bad video drivers.

Why do you say video drivers? I guess it's possible, but I"m just curious why you say that.

It's the display that's the problem. RAM usually causes applications/OS to randomly crash when using an app or installing a new app.

Also, what video card do you have??

mrhaun03

FadeToBright wrote:

mrhaun03 wrote:

FadeToBright wrote:

Bad video drivers.

Why do you say video drivers? I guess it's possible, but I"m just curious why you say that.

It's the display that's the problem. RAM usually causes applications/OS to randomly crash when using an app or installing a new app.

Also, what video card do you have??

I'd have to check for ya when I get home later.

vCole

mrhaun03 wrote:

FadeToBright wrote:

mrhaun03 wrote:

FadeToBright wrote:

Bad video drivers.

Why do you say video drivers? I guess it's possible, but I"m just curious why you say that.

It's the display that's the problem. RAM usually causes applications/OS to randomly crash when using an app or installing a new app.

Also, what video card do you have??

I'd have to check for ya when I get home later.

nVidia's drivers cause 28.8% of Vista issues

http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/28/0326209

vCole

mrhaun03, you ever get this figured out?

mrhaun03

FadeToBright wrote:

mrhaun03, you ever get this figured out?

Not yet. It's my gf's PC and I haven't gotten over there to take a look at the video card. I will post back as soon as I get a chance.

mrhaun03

The video card is an NVidia GeForce 6150. I'm reinstalling it now to see if that's the cause. There's nothing I can do generate the problem, so I'll just have to wait it out. But I'll keep you guys posted and thanks for you the help.

hypnotoad

What I would do --

1. Check the memory for issues.
2. Update the video drivers.
3. Boot up to a linux live CD and run for a day or two, see if anything is affected (or put another HD in with XP and see if it goes away).
4. Examine the motherboard/video card for visibly bulging/damaged capacitors.
5. Try adjusting the video settings in vista (i.e. turn down the performance and/or clockrate).
6. Test monitor/connection -- is it possible it's only losing the G of RGB?

Sepiraph

nl wrote:

What I would do --

1. Check the memory for issues.
2. Update the video drivers.
3. Boot up to a linux live CD and run for a day or two, see if anything is affected (or put another HD in with XP and see if it goes away).
4. Examine the motherboard/video card for visibly bulging/damaged capacitors.
5. Try adjusting the video settings in vista (i.e. turn down the performance and/or clockrate).
6. Test monitor/connection -- is it possible it's only losing the G of RGB?

+1

Probably check for adware/spyware first. It sounds like either a virus or graphics card issue (device driver may not be fully Vista-compatible). If you think it is a RAM issue, you can run memtest86 to check the memory integrity to check.

My laptop runs Vista and often I leave it on for days and I never had an issue.

vCole

Sepiraph wrote:

nl wrote:

What I would do --

1. Check the memory for issues.
2. Update the video drivers.
3. Boot up to a linux live CD and run for a day or two, see if anything is affected (or put another HD in with XP and see if it goes away).
4. Examine the motherboard/video card for visibly bulging/damaged capacitors.
5. Try adjusting the video settings in vista (i.e. turn down the performance and/or clockrate).
6. Test monitor/connection -- is it possible it's only losing the G of RGB?

+1

Probably check for adware/spyware first. It sounds like either a virus or graphics card issue (device driver may not be fully Vista-compatible). If you think it is a RAM issue, you can run memtest86 to check the memory integrity to check.

My laptop runs Vista and often I leave it on for days and I never had an issue.

He's already reformatted & reinstalled Vista, same issue.

Like I said, nVidia cards have cause about 29% of Vista issues.

mrhaun03

I updated the video card drivers and so far no issue. I left the PC running for several hours which usually will cause the problem to occur and it didn't happen. Thanks for the help fellas.

vCole

mrhaun03 wrote:

I updated the video card drivers and so far no issue. I left the PC running for several hours which usually will cause the problem to occur and it didn't happen. Thanks for the help fellas.

Glad to hear it.

mrhaun03

Got another question. I reinstalled the new driver and everythings working fine, but a couple days later the driver reverted to the older version and the issue came back. So, I installed the updated driver again and the same thing happened. I turned on the computer and I wasn't doing anything. The driver uninstalled itself and then reinstalled the old version again. Anyone see this before? I'm checking for any kinda spyware/viruses right now.

dynamik

You might want to check your driver update and driver signing options. You might have a newer version than what's available on Windows Update, and it's just "updating" itself when it notices there's a "newer" driver.

While it's possible, reverting to an older driver isn't typical malware behavior.