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Explorer.exe priority issue

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ph0b0s

Registered
Joined
Feb 3, 2005
Location
UK
Just wanted to pass on something I found that does not seem to be documented much anywhere. Sorry if it is something well known that I am just repeating.

I had the following problem. If I was listerning to an mp3 or watching TV and doing file operations in explorer, the mp3 / tv would pause or freeze. Especially when right clicking on a file. I also run Relex Action / Entbloess which also had problems when I right clicked on files in explorer.

I found to stop this happening I had to turn off the 'launch folder windows in a separate process' function in explorer. After doing some research I found that this function makes the extra explorer.exe processes run at high priority.

If the setting is not enabled you will always just have one explorer.exe process running at normal priority. If you enable the 'launch folder windows in a separate process' function then you will get 2 explorer.exe proccesses (as you would want). One is the explorer process that is your desktop, taskbar, etc and still runs at normal priority. The other is for any explorer windows you open. This is the one at high priority.

Now whether this is by design by microsoft or a bug, I don't know. Maybe some one else can elaborate and give any solutions to stop it running in this way.

I have this freezing problem with explorer running at high priority on my single core processor. But my brother who has a PC, who's only hardware difference is a dual core processor, does not have any freezes with explorer running at high priority.

This is only something I have tested on Win XP SP2 and x64. I don't know about 98, 2000, Vista

Athlon 4000+
1 Gb Corsair XMS
Asus A8N-SLI Premium 1009
WD Raptor 150 Gb
Geforce 7800 GT
Audigy 4
Enermax Liberty 500W
Gigaworks 750
 
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