Windows 10: File Explorer crashing and restarting constantly

File Explorer has started crashing the last few days and it's driving me up the wall. It hangs, then a progress bar starts creeping up the file location box, until everything disappears. During this process the pointer is a spinning blue circle and I can't click anywhere else or alt-tab away or whatever. When the explorer window disappears, it takes the taskbar with it. After a few moments, windows redraws a desktop and a taskbar. It doesn't restart Explorer.

After trying various folders, it seems to be happening in folders where there are some image files which don't (yet) have thumbnails. My image software is (64-bit) irfanview - maybe this is the problem?

I've tried clearing the file history, which apparently sometimes helps Explorer crashes. No luck.
Would anyone have any other ideas, or alternative image software I could try to see if that fixes it?

Thanks in advance!

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:)

 

file explorer crashes

Effective Way to Solve the File Explorer Crashes Issue

You can try the following steps:

1. Tap down the Windows button first to activate the search bar.
2. After that, in the search bar type control, and then click on the top-most search result, that is on Control Panel.
3. Next, in the search bar type file.
4. Now, from the search results click on File Explorer Options.
5. Then, click on the Clean button.
6. Lastly, click on Apply and then on OK.

References: https://www.****/knowledge/solved-windows-10-file-explorer-crash-easy-way/

 

File Explorer keeps crashing/restarting/flickering


I am having an incredibly frustrating set of problems that I believe started in the past two weeks or so. It's happening on two different computers but both are virtually identical: Windows 10, nVidia Quadro 4000m, Dell 5k monitors, and basically the same software installed on each.

I believe the problem is related to File Explorer. Here are the symptoms:

• File explorer crashes constantly. I can generally open File Explorer and navigate fine, but double-clicking on any new folder or drive opens at least one new window, but more often than not two new windows. I have open each folder in same window selected.
• If I try to double click a file to do something (open, view, etc.) the file will open but all the open explorer windows will crash. If I right-click and choose open or a specific action (e.g. open with Notepad++) File Explorer does not crash for some reason. Still have the problem saving to the desktop.
• If I save anything to the desktop, the icons flash/disappear and reappear, as if Explorer has crashed and restarted. Opening anything from the desktop also causes the desktop to refresh (and move icons around).
• File views (desktop and in other folders) do not always refresh (list new files and not list deleted files) automatically.

Here's what I've tried so far that hasn't helped:

• Change DPI from 250% to 100%. Didn't help. I have a 5k monitor, so 250% is the best DPI for me, but it didn't matter if I went down to 100% on either computer. I also made sure custom DPI was not set at the same time as the Windows DPI setting. They can both be on at the same time. This seemed to help for a minute, but not sure it wasn't an illusion.
• Made sure AV and Malware protection were off.
• Made sure open each folder in the same windows was selected but tried changing that setting and going back and forth.
• Tried open Window in separate process setting.
• Changed start in Quick Access to My PC (and back)
• Tried sfc /scannow but it shows now errors (it did and couldn't repair it but the error went away after the in place upgrade...File Explorer problem still persists)
• Tried disabling 3rd party context menu extensions with ShellExView
• Ran CCleaner on the registry to clean it out
• Completely uninstalled the nVidia drivers (using DDU for a clean uninstall in safe mode) and installed a version that I know worked. I also tried the latest drivers and the four releases in between the known driver and the latest.
• Did a system restore to three previous versions but the problem either was there or came back quickly, perhaps after an update.
• Turned off running background programs that seemed unnecessary.
• Tried Safe mode. It happens in Safe Mode too but in Safe Mode I get an error "A new guard page for the Stack cannot be created." Tried searching for bushell.dll but I don't have Norton on either computer.
• Do an in place upgrade/refresh using the Windows 10 media creation tool.
• Curse continually at both computers.

I'm about to do a full reinstall, but I'm worried about this just happening again. Any suggestions?

 

How do i stop File Explorer from loading and crashing over and over??

Holy moly! This solution seems to have worked! Two days now without File Explorer driving me insane with it's constant cycling of loading and crashing, loading and crashing. Hoping this is a permanent solution.

Thanks much for your help.

Two days later and the problem has returned. File Explorer loading on its own and crashing, though not constantly the way it was before.