hinarei wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I have a machine that seems to run two instances of explorer.exe. Using
> Process Explorer, it seems to launch explorer off of a <non-existent
> process>:<number>.
>
> Opening a folder/My Computer/My Docs/network resource launches a second
> explorer.exe instance as follows: "explorer.exe
> /IDLIST,:<number>:<number>,/S" (with random numbers)
>
> Unchecking “Launch folder windows in separate process” or editing/deleting
> what I assume is the correct reg key doesn’t work, it always resets itself.
>
> [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Curre ntVersion\Explorer\Advanced]
> "SeparateProcess"=dword:00000001
>
> Right clicking leads to long pauses and crashes.
>
> Booting in to Safe Mode launches the same two processes of explorer.exe, but
> when I killed those and re-ran explorer after disabling 'Launch in separate
> processes", only one process stayed open and launched folders as I would
> normally expect.
>
> This wouldn't normally be an issue, but the machine seems to be acting up
> and not running as quickly as it could, added to the fact I don't seem able
> to change the setting back.
>
> Any ideas, please?

Don't forget that explorer.exe is the process responsible for providing
you with a desktop, start menu and taskbar, so if you open a My Computer
or any other browsing window you *will* see two processes, this is
normal behaviour.

It sounds like in your efforts to stop this you may have broken something!

Try doing a system restore back to before you started changing things -
and also check for malware infestation.

Alister