start menu/task bar freezing at startup

[tsunami2265]

i have been experiencing this problem recently, when i boot up my laptop, after the welcome screen the start menu and task bar freeze for about a minute.
All the icons on the desktop are accessible, but unable to access the start menu. I just see that busy icon for about a minute and then everything becomes normal, start menu becomes accessible. But then it doesn't show all the background programs in the task bar like it used to, except the time and the messenger icon. And because of that i am unable to exit the big programs running in background and so i experience fps drain in my games. I thought might be some background malware interfering startup, i did a thorough virus check and malware check, the ones i found and removed were virtually harmless so it didn't do any difference to the problem.
I checked various forums but didn't find any good solution...

[Shizakapay]

Never assume a virus is "virtually harmless". Just because they don't explicitly screw with something doesn't mean they couldn't trash it.

Beyond that, it'd help to know the OS, amount of RAM, was anything installed just before this started, etc.

[Ace Gamer]

If you try and access the start bar straight after logging on, it might just be that the PC needs time to boot up all the necessary drivers and software. My PC needs about 2 minutes to fully boot up, even though it looks ready in 5 seconds. Check if your CPU is working over 40% when you're trying to access the start bar (using something like CoreTemp) - if it is, then the PC might just be booting software and you just need to give it a minute. If not, then it may be an OS file corruption of some sort and a reformat might fix it.

I agree that we need to know your PC specifications to help you out further. Are you using Vista or XP? Single core or Dual core CPU? RAM?

EDIT: You say some of the background programs dont show up in the task bar - why not exit them using the Task Manager? Windows tends to hide some of the icons in the task bar whenever it feels like it :P

AG

[tsunami2265]

ok, im using XP SP2, 1 gig ram and 2 ghz intel centrino duo.

I cant exit those programs by using task manager coz i dont know which process belong to that specific program, i might end up screwing a process that is required. I had actually configured in msconfig which programs i need at startup, but there are some like the bluetooth manager and the battery meter i need them in taskbar, they never come.
As far as i remember, i did not install anything new except some source mods.

[suneelkumar85]

When it happens you can still switch between programs by hold the ALT key and pressing TAB until you find your desired window.

Something in the back of my mind seems to say that a dodgy Windows Explorer window may cause this so try end tasking them using Task Manager and it may correct itself.

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