IE7 crashing as soon as a search started

[terrypin]

First, is there a group dedicated to IE7, as there is for IE6? My

newsreader couldn't find one. Meanwhile, maybe someone can help with

this urgent problem please?

My wife has IE7 on her XP Home PC. It's apparently been OK since she

upgraded from IE6 a couple of weeks ago, but today she has a serious

problem. As soon as she starts any search, IE7 closes immediately. No

message, nothing.

The search was set to LiveSearch when I first saw the problem. I

changed default to Google, but that hasn't helped.

I cannot help by trying to reproduce the problem on my XP Home PC, as

I have IE6, not IE7, as I use Firefox as my browser.

Hope someone can help us isolate and fix please.

--

Terry, West Sussex, UK

[Jeremy]

Download and run Dial-A-Fix (check everything off) and click "Go".

If you have Norton installed, please use this tool to remove it.

Spyware:

Download, install and update both Ad-Aware SE Personal v1.06R1 (or Ad-Aware 2007 Beta 4) and Spybot S&D v1.4. Do full system scans with both and clean/fix any infections they report.

Viruses:

Download, install and update Kaspersky Anti-Virus v6.0.2.621. Do a full system scan and let it clean anything it reports. Reboot if an infection cannot be initially cleaned/deleted.

Kaspersky's trial lasts 30 days. If you wish to use this product for one year legally, use the AOL version labeled ActiveVirusShield.

If you prefer freeware then use Avast! Home Edition v4.7 or AntiVir v7.00.03.02. The latter has an even higher detection rate than Kaspersky and NOD32. For more information about anti-virus products, please visit http://av-comparatives.org.

Just trying to cover as many bases as possible.

[terrypin]

Thanks, appreciate your reply. But I am 99% confident it's not malware/spyware (regularly scanned with Spybot and AdAware). She does have NAV running, and from research I gather that should have been disabled when she upgraded to IE7, but too late now!

I've spent most of the day on this issue, still without resolving it. But the crash now appears to be confined to one site. At least, we tried half a dozen others involving similar types of search, and IE7 didn't crash.

Using Manage Add-Ons, I disabled all 6 that were 'currently running', but same crash occurred. HOWEVER, when I used Start>Accessories>System Tools>'Internet Explorer 7 (Start with no add-ons)', it was OK.

If someone could try the exact same search it would be much appreciated please.

From http://www.lastminute.com/ with Flights+Hotels checked (which I think is the default), enter:

Departure point: London Gatwick Departure date: 5 April

Departure time: 09.00

Destination: Nice

Return date: 8 April

Return time: 17.00

Adults: 2

Class: I don't mind

Direct flights only: Checked

On clicking Search, we got the crash, either immediately or just after seeing the result.

FWIW, I've tried it many times on my own PC in IE6 with no problem.

--

Terry, West Sussex, UK

[Jeremy]

She does have NAV running

Garbage. Use this tool to remove it.

Why don't you just use Firefox or Opera?

[terrypin]

"Why don't you just use Firefox or Opera?"

I do. As I said in my opening post.

To close off the thread, happy to report I took the option to uninstall IE7 and roll back to IE6, which works fine.

--

Terry, West Sussex, UK

[immolation]

and if you reinstall it now again?

[terrypin]

Download and run Dial-A-Fix (check everything off) and click "Go".

That link appears broken, giving "Firefox can't find the server at djlizard.net.nyud.net."

But this works OK:

http://djlizard.net/software/Dial-a-fix-v0.60.0.24.zip

Why did you recommend running this BTW? Any downsides or precautions needed? As you may have seen from my post a few minutes ago, my wife's XP SP2 PC is now back on IE6, but I may try installing IE7 again sometime.

--

Terry, West Sussex, UK

Edited April 3, 2007 by terrypin

[terrypin]

and if you reinstall it now again?

There's a good chance it would probably now be OK I reckon, which I assume is your implication? But frankly, my personal curiosity apart, there seems little motive to do that, at least for a while. Apart from seeing a lot of posts on the groups and forums about IE7 issues/glitches/etc, there wasn't an awful lot of additional benefits over IE6, from my brief experience of it. The exception of course is tabbing, which I've had for years with Firefox. But it seems my wife hadn't really noticed that new feature, so I doubt she'll miss it much! Robustness and reliability are far more important to her.

Because of tabbing, I'd probably seriously consider trying it again myself (when it's stable), but I think it's an SP2-only update, and I'm still on SP1, for various reasons.

--

Terry, West Sussex, UK

[TheFlash428]

One great thing about IE7 in XP (as opposed to IE6), is that it is installed as an uninstallable component--quite easy to uninstall and re-install (IMO). I work in a LAN shop and had to install IE7 on about 100 computers, a few of which had small gliches or problems, but in pretty much every case an uninstall/reinstall did the trick.