Hi there! This is something that's been bugging me pretty much since XP days, across a whole bunch of different hardware: When I accidentally try to access a network share (or something similar - same thing happens with shortcuts to folders on network drives or shortcuts to FTP shares), Windows Explorer locks up for anywhere from 1 second to multiple minutes before showing an error message. In some cases, Windows Explorer even just dies - "Windows Explorer has stopped responding blah blah send report to Microsoft? Blah blah find a solution?" Just now, I took one of my NAS devices offline (permanently), and wanted to delete the link to the network share from my Windows Explorer Favorites - every time I'd right-click on the link to delete it, Windows Explorer would just lock up - I waited almost 10 minutes (almost half a HIMYM episode!), and nothing happened. It's also especially annoying when I take my machines out of my home network... the network resource isn't there, so just throw an error message and let me keep working - DON'T lock up the machine for 30 seconds while you try to reconnect 10 times. Is there a fix for this behaviour? Or will I just have to continue to throw laptops and printers and pull my hair out when it happens?

Hi, According the issue, I suggest you may perform a Clean Boot then check whether this problem is caused by third party software. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310353 If this problem disappears in Clean Boot, this problem should be caused by third party software. Note: Clean Boot is a step of troubleshooting, we can go back to normal by running MSCONIFG. Please remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

This happens on EVERY Windows install as soon as Ethernet/WiFi drivers are installed and a network drive is added. It's not a third party software issue of any kind...