[1703, cu] Start menu freezes

[Sheridan]

Anyone having issues with the start button and menu hanging? We've got this on various random 1703 PCs, the start button does nothing and only the desktop icons and ctrl alt del option still work.

 

The only thing that fixes it is a log off.

[3s-gtech]

Not hearing about it as a general thing, got 1703 on about 500 PCs now. Some quirks with Start, like quick searching for SIMS brings up the application but clicking the link does nothing. Finding it in the programs list works fine. I'll just blame SIMS for that one.

 

My machines are on a mix of May and August CUs at present so no change in behaviour there.

[nicholab]

I have had some user reporting freezing of the menu I was thinking it was me I am using classic shell. A couple of staff have complained about the machines yet other have been fine.

[mulderite]

We are STILL getting issues with File Explorer freezing, which in turn stop the Start Menu & Taskbar from functioning, usually with a message in File Explorer saying ‘Working on it...’ The only “fix” is to restart Explorer.exe or log off/on again. This normally happens when browsing mapped network drives. I’ve tried over a dozen or so suggested fixes for this problem, including removing Quick Access, turning off indexing, turning off thumbnails etc. Certainly if you google it you’ll get bombarded with websites detailing this issue. Some fixes have alleviated it but I’ve never completely solved the issue.

 

What I have found is this only happens for users who tend to leave a File Explorer window open for longer than 20-30 minutes – hence not all users experience it. Certainly on my Win10 test machine, if I open a File Explorer window and let it sit for a while then go back to it, it will (90% of the time) freeze when clicking on any mapped network drive. It’s incredibly annoying!

 

Edit: I also used to think this was because we use ClassicShell, but I have since done deployments without ClassicShell and I can confirm the freezing/hanging would still occur, so ClassicShell is definitely not the culprit with this particular annoyance.

Edited September 8, 2017 by mulderite

[Sheridan]

We use Classic shell but its also happening on those without. We had these issues from day one of testing W10 and looks like it still hasn't been sorted out.

 

We've upgraded about 1/3 of our PCs to W10 as a trial, so far I'm regretting it!

[mulderite]

Yep, we've had the 'Start Menu/Taskbar/File Explorer' hanging/freezing issue from day 1 as well. Not done a full school rollout as yet, only a small number of Win10 users in the admin area are using it so far. I really want to get this particular issue sorted before we rollout to the whole school next year!

[OrangeExige]

Anyone having issues with the start button and menu hanging? We've got this on various random 1703 PCs, the start button does nothing and only the desktop icons and ctrl alt del option still work.

The only thing that fixes it is a log off.

 

We were experiencing this issue with all of our machines which are now on 1703. This was the case for both mandatory and roaming profiles which could be replicated by repeatedly opening the start menu until eventually it hangs and explorer restarts. For students the start menu would hang almost instantly. Looking at the event logs, there was no indication as to what was causing explorer to hang so we started uninstalling applications, starting with Impero. As soon as we uninstalled Impero (version 6.1.68), the issue was resolved and the start menu speed was noticeably better. Impero has since added injection exclusions for explorer.exe and dllhost.exe

[nicholab]

Do Netsupport have any comment on adding injection exclusions for their software as I am running DNA? I not updates to the latest yet. Or does their software work differently?

[abaxter2]

I not seen this issue since using netsupport, before i was using windows 10 1607 build with impero and did see these issues but over the summer I moved to windows 10 1703 build with netsupport and so far these issue are no longer, windows 10 1607 was known to have the start menu problems even with local profiles

[Matt_NetSupport]

Hi Nicholab, I’m not 100% sure but I think ‘injection exclusions’ is an Impero term, I would be fairly confident in saying we do things differently so you should not have to worry about this.

 

Looking at the start of this thread (relating to start menu issues) and some previous threads where injection exclusions are suggested to fix other issues, NetSupport DNA does not have these issues and I cannot see how our code would impact on these areas of the OS.

 

But should you need clarification or have a problem our support team will be able to help you straight away.

 

Have a good weekend - Matt (NetSupport)

Edited September 9, 2017 by Matt_NetSupport

[Sheridan]

We're getting this on vanilla 10 with or without classic start. It happened on first testing when 10 came out and seems worse/more regular with 1703. Why can't MS bring out a decent OS anymore?

[Sheridan]

We're now getting this on a wide range of PCs, very annoying. I knew I should have stayed with W7!

[Chuckster]

@mulderite suggested a fix which appears to work.

 

Set the option within File Explorer that says "Always show icons, never thumbnails".

 

This will prevent File Explorer crashing.

[mulderite]

Yes this was one of the many 'fixes' I had found through extensive googling. However it's not completely eradicated the problem for me.

 

However I'm glad if this works for others as this issue is annoying as hell!

Edited September 11, 2017 by mulderite

[maark]

got this problem - using classic shell 1703 net support manager and dna

Anyone solves please let me know.

Start menu can freeze or explorer can freeze - not consistently - task manager and sign out and sign in fixes it.

[Sheridan]

I've set the file explorer option in preferences so I'll how that goes over the next few days.

 

Its very frustrating, we've spent ages testing and tweaking 10 and rolling it out just seems to have been a nightmare. Of course, plenty of staff have commented that W10 works fine 'at home'.....

[nicholab]

I've set the file explorer option in preferences so I'll how that goes over the next few days.

 

Its very frustrating, we've spent ages testing and tweaking 10 and rolling it out just seems to have been a nightmare. Of course, plenty of staff have commented that W10 works fine 'at home'.....

 

Thing is I have new machines but I only had a windows 7 32bit image so I was not going to spend time building a 64bit image if it time to move on soon. I had machines only using 2.5GB of their 8GB of RAM. PAE does not seem to work on some machines which is a pain now.

[Sheridan]

We've had to roll back to W7 on a couple of PCs as W10 is hanging on the start menu, or explorer crashes so much the users are complaining several times a day. Utterly sick of W10 and its problems now.

[abaxter2]

If you was using windows 10 build 1703 you may want to have a look at the latest update 12/09/2017: https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/4038788

 

As it lists the following:

Addressed issue that sometimes causes Windows File Explorer to stop responding and causes the system to stop working.

[Sheridan]

If you was using windows 10 build 1703 you may want to have a look at the latest update 12/09/2017: https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/4038788

 

As it lists the following:

Addressed issue that sometimes causes Windows File Explorer to stop responding and causes the system to stop working.

 

So we have to install a 1gb+ update on the affected PCs! I would have thought the seperate update would have been deployed by WSUS by now?

[abaxter2]

The update was only released yesterday, so in my case was downloaded by my WSUS server last night and deployed today, so would be worth checking with your WSUS server to check the update has downloaded

[Sheridan]

The update was only released yesterday, so in my case was downloaded by my WSUS server last night and deployed today, so would be worth checking with your WSUS server to check the update has downloaded

 

Argh, my wsus server had thrown a wobbly! I t hadn't synch'd for a couple of days so I'm running it now to check.

[maark]

I've tried file explorer options and the update above on ten PCs but still hanging/crashing so it has not worked for me - pretty sure it is classic shell - going to have to get rid of it which is a pain. If user has roaming profile under classic shell then it don't produce proper start menu without classic and still having issues with xml layout file.

see post on classic shell forum Classic Shell • View topic - Windows 10 build 1703 get unresponsive with CS 4.3.1

[nicholab]

It also seem that file permission seem to upset this issue as well. If the share are setup other than ideally the document redirection seems to throw a wallaby.

[Sheridan]

Installed September 2017 CU and it still does it - its looking like CSM might be the culprit after all.

 

Much as I like CSM and admire the work done on it, I'm still annoyed that MS have released such a kak handed OS that I've almost been forced to use a third party tool to get a consistent and usable Start Menu.

Edited September 14, 2017 by Sheridan