Windows 10: Windows 10 COM Surrogate turns on and off repeatedly, pulling focus from active window

At random times throughout the day ... most often when my Lenovo P50 laptop comes out of sleep, or an application is opened (but not always), a background process named "COM Surrogate" will pull focus away from the active window for about a second, then return it, then pull it, then return it, etc. This can continue for a few seconds, or as much as 30-45 seconds. During this time, every time the process pulls focus away from the active window, the title bar of the window will go gray, and any typing that is happening at the time will not be recorded. For instance if I am typing "Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their county." the application might display "w istime all gmen ome aid oir cy" skipping any characters that were typed while focus was pulled away from the active window.

Dragging a window or trying to select an item from a dropdown menu while this is happening will return the window to its original location or close the dropdown menu.

While this is happening, I can view the COM Surrogate process appearing and disappearing in the Task Manager Processes window under Background processes.

I have also found that if, while the process is pulling focus, I copy (Ctrl-C), and then later paste into a text reader, the following is what was copied:



[Window Title]
COM Surrogate

[Main Instruction]
COM Surrogate has stopped working

[Content]
Windows is checking for a solution to the problem...

[Cancel]



I have found only one way to reproduce a portion of this problem consistently under all circumstances. If in the Task Bar I click on the search icon (magnifying glass), the COM Surrogate process will pull focus away once only.

This behavior has occurred since the installation of Windows 10, and only since then.

This appears to be exactly the problem that user KevinM267 had in the now locked thread in the community forum that can be found by searching: "windows-10-com-surrogate-turns-on-and-off"

In my case, I have looked for solutions and have tried an article on WindowsReport that can be found by searching "Fix Problems with COM Surrogate on Windows 10"

Options 5, 9, 4, 6 were tried, including:

Adding COM Surrogate to Data Execution Prevention exclusion list

Switch to List or Details view / disable thumbnails

Disable thumbnails and use Process Monitor to find problematic file

Re-register dll files using Command Prompt



I have also followed the recommendation of Yashwanth Kotakuri in the previous Microsoft Community post, disabling services and performing a Clean Boot.

In all cases, the problem eventually returned.

Can anyone provide a solution or a suggestion for troubleshooting tips?

:)

 

Windows 10 Tweaks

Pressing “Windows+Pause Break” (it’s up there next to scroll lock) opens the “System” Window.

Windows 10: In the new version of Windows, Explorer has a section called Quick Access. This includes your frequent folders and recent files. Explorer defaults to opening this page when you open a new window. If you’d rather open the usual This PC, with links to your drives and library folders, follow these steps:

• Open a new Explorer window.
• Click View in the ribbon.
• Click Options.
• Under General, next to “Open File Explorer to:” choose “This PC.”
• Click OK

credit to Lifehacker.

 

Windows 10 COM Surrogate turns on and off repeatedly

Hello Kevin,

Thank you for contacting Microsoft Community.

We understand your concern in this regard.

• Did you made any changes to your PC?
• Is your PC up to date with Windows Updates?

Component Object Model (COM) is Microsoft's framework for developing and supporting program component object. This COM Surrogate point to a process dllhost.exe. The true dllhost.exe file is a safe Microsoft Windows system process, called "COM Surrogate.
You can only see the appearance of COM Surrogate in Task Manager, when an instance related to it running in background or in front. Say for example, when you launch Task Manager, you can see immediate appearance of COM Surrogate under Background Processes.
It indicates that an instance that related to COM Surrogate has been trigged while launching Task Manager. At the same time you can also see dllhost.exe process running under Details tab in task manager.

In view of the same, disappearing of COM Surrogate in task manager, doesn't mean that there is some issue with your system performance. So, you can see appearance of COM Surrogate in Task Manager, when an instance process related to it has been triggered
or when it is running in background.

Keep us posted if you require further assistance.

 

Windows 10 upgrade problem, no input accepted

I really hate having to come here and ask for help, but I really am stumped. It hurts my geek pride. I have a PC with fairly modern hardware in it. It has a p8p67 pro in it. I have tried upgrading windows 10 on it twice now. Both times I have had the same result.

After windows finishes upgrading it goes to the log in/set up screen. I can't do anything. No keyboard or mouse input is accepted.

I will list some, or hopefully all, of the troubleshooting steps I have tried:

• Move keyboard and mouse to different USB ports.
• Try different keyboard or mouse.
• Restart computer, repeatedly.
• Google for related issues.
• Update Bios, because why not.
• Create boot media and revert to windows 7.

The windows 10 system restore boot media works fine with keyboard and mouse. All USB ports work in windows 7. I don't know what is wrong. I suspect that windows 10 is lacking a driver of some sort, but since the computer accepts no input I have no way of checking for which driver let alone installing it.

Please help me figure this out. If I have to revert back to windows 7 again, I am not going to get it upgraded to windows 10. Thank you in advanced.