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Help - Windows Explorer Keeps Closing

Discussion in 'Windows - General discussion' started by MagnusD, Apr 3, 2007.

  1. MagnusD

    MagnusD Regular member

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    I've been having a strange error for the past couple of days when I open programs. It doesn't happen every time but when it comes up it's an annoyance.

    When I open up a program, for example Nero, I get a message saying this (this isn't the exact message, but as close as i can remember):

    "For your own protection, Windows XP has closed the following program:

    Windows Explorer"

    I don't know why this message is showing, nor do I know why it's Windows Explorer that I have to close. Once I close the message the screen goes blank before (usually) the screen goes back to normal with none of my programs running.
    There are occasions where nothing comes back and I have to manually start explorer.exe again. If I have to do this I get the error the second I enter another program, to the point where I have to restart to get things working again.

    I've done a full adware and spyware check, and nothing came up, and I also did a virus scan which also didn't produce any results.

    Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to solve this problem.
     
  2. MagnusD

    MagnusD Regular member

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    Since nobody has helped so far, here's some new information. When the message mentioned above appears, when I close it I now get a "Windows Explorer has encountered a problem and needs to close" message and Error Report message. Below are details on what the error report contains-

    Error Singature: EventType : BEX P1 : explorer.exe P2 : 6.0.2900.2180 P3 : 41107ece
    P4 : unknown P5 : 0.0.0.0 P6 : 00000000 P7 : 0176640e
    P8 : c0000005 P9 : 00000008

    Technical Information-

    The following files will be included in the error report-

    C:\DOCUME~1\COMPAQ~1\LOCALS~1\Temp\WER5848.dir00\explorer.exe.mdmp
    C:\DOCUME~1\COMPAQ~1\LOCALS~1\Temp\WER5848.dir00\appcompat.txt

    So can anyone help based on this new information
     
  3. Morph416

    Morph416 Active member

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    Anything new you've installed recently? Drivers? Apps? Particularly apps that run with right click menu options?
     
  4. MagnusD

    MagnusD Regular member

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    There's nothing that I've installed with right click options before the errors started coming up, at least not to my recollection anyway.
    The only thing i can think of that I've done over the past few days was a spyware check where i removed some spyware that had installed on my computer (I think it was just cookies rather than anything physically on my computer though, barring one program which I removed physically).

    Here's the full message that I am getting-

    Data Execution Prevention - Microsoft Windows

    To help protect your computer, Windows has closed this program

    Name: Windows Explorer
    Publisher: Microsoft Corporation

    Data Execution Prevention helps protect against damage from viruses and other security threats.

    Also, there's a little message where you can find out what you do, but when I click it I get the same error message, only instead of Windows Explorer it's "Run a DDL as an App"


    And another thing that's come up is that a script has been picked up as acting suspicously by by my virus scanner. It's from the following location

    C/WINDOWS/pchealth/helpctr/binaries/helpctr.exe

    This is all very strange to me but I'm thinking it's some sort of new virus that hasn't been picked up yet discuised under a Windows message.


    Any ideas based on that?
     
  5. lego_fred

    lego_fred Member

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    Hi,

    I had the same symptom on my pc as well. And exactly after a threat with pchealth was indentified.
    I have not been able to spot the culprit.

    It seems that this occurs whenever an avi file is present in the directorty that is opened by explorer.
    Could be the video icon or miniature display....
    Not sure.
    Any hint welcome Thks
     
  6. lego_fred

    lego_fred Member

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    I fixed it ... takes few seconds.

    >Cause : new windows protection mechanism that is not compatible with some software. Guess what... it is not Microsoft software...


    Solution descativate that protection (if you have a good antivirus and refreshed defs plus a peronal firewall actif... that might be good enough)... Let'live dangerously.

    How to desactivate.
    Open your desktop/rightclk - properties
    In advanced tab select perf parameters
    Then select prevention of execution tab
    select explorer as an exception
    exit
    reboot
    done




     
  7. vitus

    vitus Member

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  8. country61

    country61 Member

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    What type of windows are you running and what is your pc I have that same problem and I am running win,xp I have a dell 2400 dim.And when I click on the front of my desktop prop, there is no advanced tab,
     
  9. scorpNZ

    scorpNZ Active member

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    DEP is used by windows to stop .exe files running by programs that have suspicious script that can corrupt windows & in turn the possability of openining windows for malicious attack or have take control of by an outside source,so the reason you're getting that message is a software you have installed has either really piss poor coding or is a real threat to the core of the OS,your best bet is get rid of the offending software and get a replacement that works.

    @ Magnus
    that pchealth folder is a real app that is part of your windows from HP,but it says there is a helpctr.exe file inside that folder,i have an hp and i cannot see that helpctr.exe inside the pchealth folder the only thing that even comes close is a round blue icon with a question mark in it's centre ,your best bet is to go into the WINDOWS folder and have a poke around and if there is a .exe save it to rom then delete it then start the pc health and see if it breaks if so reinstall the .exe and assume your being given a false positive by your scanner
     
  10. country61

    country61 Member

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    I found the pchealth help folder. But it is empty. Go to Run do a pchealth search in folders and click on the black pchealth it has a help folder + another help file there but that one is empty ..go figure.
     
  11. scorpNZ

    scorpNZ Active member

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    Yeah mines empty also i personally would'nt be concerned with the pchealth thing being flagged i get the same with AVG when it detects DAP8.0 as having a trojan when in fact it's file that's used to erase my download history..lol.. ,the only thing i can suggest apart from using ccleaner or easycleaner & a defrag as well as disk cleanup,is to go to windows update (not auto update there should be a icon in start menu or the prgram list at the top) and select any of the updates that will be there & if that don't work i'd reformat & start again simply coz the amount of time you can spend trying to fix a prob you can usually have it sorted a dam sight faster by reformat,only this time just put in a few of the most used apps first then update the OS leaving your least program installs to last,defragging as necessary as you go as well as using diskcleanup
     

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