Windows 10: Windows 10 taskbar issue. Driving me absolutely insane.

This is an issue that has been happening to me for *years* off and on. Sometimes I think I've gotten on top of it, then, boom. It comes back. It has genuinely caused me quite a bit of distress and paranoia (I get spooked kind of easily. I know I know, it's dumb) with the feeling that someone's messing with my stuff, but logic dictates that if my network and several computers were *this* compromised, they would have done at least something to the effect of yoinking information from online shopping, passwords, or at least something more than making my tech life a living hell. Ahem. Anyway...

My taskbar, including clock freezes. Sometimes it takes several days, sometimes it takes just a few hours between failures. The only way to fix this is apparently a full reboot. Following is a list of everything I have tried and has had absolutely no effect. When in this state my machine closes to a crawl, applications become unresponsive, and about the only thing I can do is open up the start menu. Application icons no longer highlight.

General health checks such as sfc/scannow and dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth etc in CMD and powershell.
The disabling of automated processes/tweaking services
Driver changes
Fresh reinstalls with a ISO straight from microsoft (sometimes works for a while usually doesn't)
BIOS updates/reflashes
Driver reinstalls
Memtest 86
Complete machine rebuilds
Rollbacks
Booting into safe mode
Undervolting
Restarting explorer.exe
Performing clean boots and trying to diagnose which piece of software is causing issues (inconclusive, messes up anyway,)
Changing power settings, for example, the machine shutting down its drive on idle.
Threatening my equipment with an especially large hammer.



This has happened on several machines, with the only correlating factor being that they're all Windows 10.

submitted by /u/Thewaltham
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:)

 

Hard drive/ OS issue

a guy suggested :

• shutdown
• unhooked HDD
• restarted
• yay !!
• reconnected HDD
• restarted
• yay !!

also , try method 3
How do I unlock the drive where Windows 10 is installed?

 

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.

 

Optical Drive Issue

Hello Anak –

Appreciate your detailed return. Your added steps really helped.

Assuming I did the steps correctly, this is where I am now.

Screenshot 12 shows my CD Disc shortcut on my desktop.
Screenshot 10 shows the CD Drive shortcut listed in the “Send to” listing.
Screenshot 11 shows the “Send to” listing after the steps were taken, but the CD drive name is not listed.

So, it appears the steps did not work for me. And, I did try the steps, “If it still won’t do ……” and still no luck.

What do you think?

JerryA