Odd problem with Windows Explorer

[trax]

Hi guys,

I've tried this at a couple other forums and haven't received a response that's helped yet. Hopefully someone here will be able to help me out.

Here's my specs:

Iwill KK-266
Duron 750 (not OC'd)
WD 30GB 5400RPM (C: partition 10MB, D: partition 20MB)
Herc GF2 MX w/12.41 drivers
Linksys 10/100 NIC
no sound card (using on-board chip for now)
Win2K Pro SP2
4.31 4-in-1's

Here's the problem: Explorer.exe will crash when I am browsing through files in My Computer or Windows Explorer. It seems that the problem is caused by clicking on a media file (MPEG, AVI, JPG, or GIF... but strangely, not MP3) to select it, and then de-selecting everything by clicking somewhere else in the window. This doesn't happen every single time, but if I do it four or five times, explorer.exe will die painfully, giving me this error: "explorer.exe has generated errors and will be closed by Windows. You will need to restart the program." Also, this ONLY happens with those particular types of media - I can select and deselect all day long in a folder with, say, Zip files.

My first thought was a problem with web content in folders, since it generates a preview of the file, so I turned that off. However, that hasn't helped. Then I thought it might be the D: partition, because that's where I keep my movies, pictures, etc. - however, I moved one of the "problem" folders to C: and the same thing happened. I have also reinstalled the 4-in-1's, defragged and scandisked both partitions, and removed Windows Media Player 7. Nothing has worked.

Now here's the kicker: I recently upgraded to the Duron and Iwill. Previously, I had an Athlon Classic 500 on a Gigabyte GA-7IX (which is an AMD-750 board) with a SBLive (which has been removed due to the VIA/SBLive problem - I didn't want to take any chances yet), and I was experiencing the EXACT same problem. I initially believed it to be a corrupted copy of the OS, but I guess I was wrong.

There must be something that's consistent across both configs that's causing this problem, and I can't seem to figure out what it is. If you folks have any suggestions, I am all ears.

Thanks!

 

[heffe734]

Have you tried a fresh format and installing of windows...usually fixes many lil problems.
Bump

 

[trax]

When I put the system together, I did wipe the drive and put a fresh install of Win2K. However, here's something I wonder about: I have the Win2K upgrade CD and not the full version, so typically I install 98 and then throw 2K over the top of it. Now I know that Win2K claims to format the drive you're installing it on, if you choose to do it that way (which I did), but I'm wondering if perhaps it leaves some Win98 "residue" behind that's causing my problem. Any thoughts on this?

 

[Ionizer86]

Well, instead of installing 2k on top of 98, this might work: install 2k as if it were the full install. Partway through, it should notice that you have no OS to upgrade, and it will try to verify that you have a product qualified for upgrade. Then you pop in the 98 disk for verification. When you put the 2k disk back, it should continue installing.

I have a full version of 2k so what I wrote above might not be true. If not, I'm sorry. But hey, you can pop in a win95 disk during a full install with a 98 upgrade disk for verification. So this might work if you want to try a clean install.