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First off, my situation appears to be unique compared to any that have posted on the web so far. I have done extensive google searches and have not come up with an answer to my situation.

For some reason (no unusual software loaded, OS was re-installed 2 days ago with SP3), my File Search or Search in the Startup Menu or a right click on a folder or drive, will not pull up and (this is the unique part) explorer.exe is taking up 1/2 of the all system processes (50%, no more, no less). The taskbar also locks up and the only way to get the taskbar responding is to end process on explorer.exe and due a new task for it (manually).

I've tried everything from Install from Inf folder in Windows (with SP3 extract for one part and Windows XP sp2 CD for another, since I don't have an actual SP3 install CD). I've uninstalled my F-Secure Antivirus/ Firewall and I have ran Spybot checks and fixed anything it found only to arrive back at square one. If anyone is familiar with Kelly's corner, I've done just about anything people have posted on that, but I think my situation is different.

If anyone can shed some light on this crazy situation, I would greatly appreciate it. By the way, I have a desktop system with highly similiar configs and progs running SP3 without this problem. System in question is a Dell 6400 or E1505 Duo Core 1.7GHz, 2 Gig Mem.

Thanks,
Zip

try this right click on your hard drive in my computer select properties and make sure there is a check in the box for Allow Indexing Service to index this disk for fast file searching option. Also try enabling the Indexing Service in Windows XP

Open “Control Panel”, select “Administrator Tools”, and open Services applet.
Scroll down and locate Indexing Service and then double click on it and enable the service

I also enabled the indexing service just for grins but I don't see the point in that, as a faster search is not necessary, just getting it to come up is what I need. By the way, before I posted, I am able to pull up the search in Safe Mode. Anyway, no dice on the suggestions.

Thanks for posting.

ok try this
Open a shell (start -> run -> cmd):
regsvr32 /i C:\Windows\Srchasst\srchui.dll
regsvr32 /i urlmon
regsvr32 jscript
right-click windows/inf/srchasst.inf > install

Also have you check to see if the service is enabled

Daniel,

I followed exactly what you posted and yes the service is running. I'm starting to wonder if explorer.exe is somewhat corrupted. I actually got a hold of a full-install. sp3 cd today, I'm going to try and replace explorer in safe mode under cmd prompt, will let you know the outcome.

Thanks,
Zip

that also did not fix the problem... I guess I am just going to have to reformat and install... that just pisses me off b/c I just reformatted 2 days ago and was not ever having this issue with this system. The only good thing is that I have the full-install cd of sp3 now.

Obviously beware of this damn bug, whatever it may be. The pisser is that it locks up explorer and renders the taskbar useless. And you still don't get the damn search tool to come up.

Later,
Zip