IE6 process starts but does not open a window

[Spotting Bad Guys]

Afternoon all

I am running Win XP with IE6 (I know, I know - too many other things to do...) and have recently come across a problem in that many times when I click "Internet Explorer" not much happens. I get a momentary 'hourglass' and then....nothing. If I open up task manager I can see the IEXPLORE.EXE process running, and can easily get five or 6 'blind' processes running like this before Explorer actually opens.

Any thoughts?

Cheers

SBG

[Keef]

I'll give the obvious recommendation.

Dump IE and get Firefox. Better in every way!

[Saab Dastard]

Check to see if there's anything in the Event Log.

Remove and re-install IE.

Search the MS knowledge base on their website.

Or as Keef says, install FF!

SD

[DrKev]

On my GFs laptop it happens quite frequently with Firefox and iTunes, particularly just after start up. Then the machine won't shut down and you have to pull the battery.

So, it may not be an issue with IE, it might be an issue with something else, e.g. a program or service, during startup that is not responding or waiting for a response that it is not getting and f**king things up.

I'll let more knowledgeable people jump in with potential solutions.

[Avtrician]

Try doing the CTRL-ALT-DEL thing, to bring up task manager, in the applications window right click on the ie6 lable, and select maximise (maximize). That should fix the problem hopefully.

[JamesT73J]

I've had this plenty of times on machines at work; users keep trying the icon and you can find several instances of iexplore.exe in the task lists, but no windows. I've no idea what causes it. I shutdown those processes by hand and then reboot the machine.

As others have suggested, I would try firefox.