Hidden process switching me back to desktop from games?

[rikilii]

I have recently noticed a strange phenomenon that occurs when I'm playing WoW (in full screen mode).

If I do not touch the keyboard or mouse for a few minutes, my computer will automatically switch back to the desktop as if I had alt-tabbed out of the game. Note, this does not happen if I am playing (i.e. using the mouse and keyboard).

The most peculiar thing is that when it switches back, there is an extra application button with a default windows application icon on my Taskbar. It disappears in less than a second.

This problem seems to have started a few weeks ago, and as far as I can recall, the only things I have downloaded and installed are a few Addons for WoW, all of which are very widely used. After I noticed the problem, I installed McAfee, which has not detected anything.

I've scanned with Adaware, Spybot and McAfee VS to no avail.

Anyone have any ideas what might be going on, or how I might find out?

Some suggested to me that I might have a "rogue screensaver" taking over. But I have no screensaver activated, and I have never downloaded a third party ss. Perhaps it could still be true, but how could I confirm/fix it if it were?

 

[mzkhadir]

you could always find the screensaver files and put them in a different folder to see if it happens again.

Look in your windows folder or your program files to see what rogue folders you have sitting out there.

 

[Homerboy]

I got $20 says its McAfee if thats your A/V
I run McAfee at home (through work license) and it will drop be out of games. If I kill McAfee in SysTray before going into game all is fine.

 

[CrackRabbit]

Could it be Blizzards background downloader app?

 

[rikilii]

Originally posted by: Homerboy
I got $20 says its McAfee if thats your A/V
I run McAfee at home (through work license) and it will drop be out of games. If I kill McAfee in SysTray before going into game all is fine.

I can't say with 100% certainty, but I'm almost positive that this started before I installed McAfee. In fact, I think I installed McAfee because of this problem.

Also, I'm pretty sure this problem continues even if I disable it in the tray. Doing so still leave several McAfee-related processes running in the background, but I have gone into my process list and ended all the ones that appear to be obviously related, and I'm pretty sure it still happens.

I'll check all this stuff tonight when I get home, and I'll also check to see if it happens with other games.

 

[rikilii]

I tried disabling McAfee, and as I expected, same deal.

 

[rikilii]

anyone else have ideas/solutions?

 

[nova2]

yes. (good thing you posted again, I finally decided to look at this thread, heh)

download filemon from sysinternals.

in the exclude programs list filter (control + L), put all the programs currently filling up the filemon window, you don't want to see them.
you may want to include wow, too.

leave filemon running when playing wow like normal, when it happens again, hopefully a new process starts AND does some disk activity -- filemon will catch this unless the program is masking its tracks like a rootkit (doubtful), just make sure:
> filemon is monitoring all partitions(volumes).
> you catch the time when it happens, so you can go to the correct time in filemon.
> an example filemon exclude list looks like this: idriver.exe;taskswitchxp;nsl.exe;typeandrun;litestep

additionally, you could also try using regmon from sysinternals if filemon doesn't yeild anything.

> we could also log your process list (we'll try this if filemon/regmon don't help), but this might not be fast enough using pslist (it can't log faster then 1 second)
download PsTools from sysinternals.
psl = pslist.exe

run > cmd.exe > "psl -s 21600 -r 1 >>c:\proc.log" (no quotes)
control+c to stop it logging. (else it'll log for 6 hours = 21600 seconds)

after it happens again, open the log, and search for the time when it happened.
if its too much of a problem, upload the log somewhere, or email me it (i'll pm you my email) and I'll narrow it down faster then you could.

 

[rikilii]

I used filemon, and it appears to be cause by a file associated with my HP printer.

Several HP related programs appear in the list together, one of which is always running in my process list, and several others which must be activating and deactivating rapidly.

The funny thing is, I have no idea how to get rid of these processes, short of deleting them from my harddrive manually.

I can't even see the option to uninstall my HP software anyway.

 

[nova2]

maybe you can deactivate your printer service via services.msc, and only activate it when you need to print something.

I do something similar for a lexmark printer -- enable the lexbce server via services.msc and then do a "start C:\WINDOWS\System32\LXSUPMON.EXE RUN" via a bat file. bam, ready to go.

 

[ShawnD1]

From your description of the problem it sounds like you are running Folding @ Home in the background. Close F@H and the problem will go away.