Classic Shell: Forum

Hello all,

Some of our computers have been getting the error message: "Runtime Error! Program C:\Windows\Explorer.EXE" (For the full error message please see attached image).

This error message occurs for every user, for every computer once. Once you press OK Explorer crashes and then it restarts and everything is well again for that user for that computer. It is annoying though because we have many users in our Active Directory and many computers (University Campus).

I figured out the error message was coming from Classic Shell by disabling each Startup Program one at a time to figure out what was causing the problem and it is definitely Classic Shell.

I have tried updating Classic Shell to the newest version but the error message still comes up.

Attached is 3 Crash Dumps that I gathered.

We are using Windows 8.1 64-bit.
Classic Shell Version is 4.2.1.

The crash happens in the igfxCPL.cpl file. From what I can guess, it is the Control Panel applet for Intel graphics. Classic Shell is trying to gather the contents of the Control Panel on startup so it can pre-cache the information. It is possible the graphics applet is not ready yet for some reason. Maybe it is counting on some process to start, and usually startup processes on Windows 8 are delayed by 10 seconds (or maybe the process was manually disabled?)

Please run the following test - disable Classic Shell from staring. Add a shortcut to the Control Panel on the desktop. Make sure it opens in icon mode and not categories. Restart, and as soon as you log in, open the Control Panel as quickly as you can. See if there is a crash.

Since the crash only happens early, you can delay the start menu by some time. Go to HKLM\Software\IvoSoft\ClassicStartMenu, create a new DWORD named AutoStartDelay and set it to the delay value in milliseconds. Try something like 8000.

You can also see if there are newer drivers for the graphics chipset. Maybe Intel has fixed the problem.

I tried running that test with the Control Panel shortcut but unfortunately there is no way to really do it based on my circumstances. (The error only happens the first time a user logs in. Since the user's information is not available beforehand, I cannot create a shortcut on the user's desktop.)

Regardless, I did both of your suggestions and they both seemed to work I think.

For the registry edit I did that but had to use 15000 instead of 8000. I might be able to use less than that but it seems to work alright.

I also updated the Intel graphic drivers which seemed to work but I only tested it on one computer so I'm not sure. It does take a while to download and install the Intel Driver Update software and then download and install the drivers for each computer so I think I'll use the other method.

So thanks, and if I don't reply again this probably worked.