Windows lose focus, seemingly at random

Anonymous
2009-11-23T19:36:32+00:00

Since upgrading from Vista Business to 7 Business, I've run into an intermittent issue. Windows seem to lose focus at random. It may be happening more than I realize, since I have to be actively using the window to notice when it stops accepting my input. For instance, I might be scrolling to the bottom of a web page when I realize that moving the scroll wheel on my mouse no longer has any effect, or I might be typing something in Word while looking away from the screen, only to realize upon looking back that half of the sentence I'd typed was ignored because of a shift in focus. If I'm reading a particularly long web page, I'll occasionally notice the color of the transparent title bar change slightly when the focus changes, as though I'd clicked over to another program. I haven't been able to figure out what is stealing the focus whenever this happens, and it's a new occurrence under 7. Unfortunately, it's sporadic enough that trying to turn off programs running in the background to determine if they're the cause may prove kind of tricky. Has anyone else run into anything like this? If so, any fixes? I have a feeling the culprit may be the GMail Notifier or Trillian Astra, since they both pop up notices from time to time, but many (if not all) of those notices typically don't cause problems.

Any help you can offer would be great.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Accessibility

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Anonymous
2009-11-24T13:55:20+00:00

Hey karpar,

Any third party software conflicting with Windows components can result to this behavior. Hence, putting your system in clean boot state can help in determining the culprit application or program. A clean boot loads only those files and programs that are absolutely required by the Operating System. Upon determining the background application causing the issue, you may contact the vendor for assistance.

Steps to perform clean boot:

1)       Click Start, type msconfig in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER.

2)       If you are prompted for an administrator password or for a confirmation, type the password, or click Continue.

3)       On the General tab, click Selective Startup.

4)       Under Selective Startup, click to clear the Load Startup Items check box.

5)       Click the Services tab, click to select the Hide All Microsoft Services check box, and then click Disable All.

6)       Click OK.

7)       When you are prompted, click Restart.

After the computer starts, test and see whether the sporadic behavior of Windows loosing focus continues.

If not, we definitely know for sure that the behavior is contributed by third party software conflicts.

To determine which application, follow the steps mentioned in the article below.

How to troubleshoot a problem by performing a clean boot in Windows Vista or in Windows 7

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929135

After you determine the startup item or the service that causes the problem, contact the program manufacturer to determine whether the problem can be resolved

Having done so, don’t forget to return your computer to start normally.

Reset the computer to start as usual

1)       Click Start, type msconfig.exe in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER.

2)       If you are prompted for an administrator password or for confirmation, type your password, or click Continue.

3)       On the General tab, click the Normal Startup option, and then click OK.

4)       When you are prompted to restart the computer, click Restart.

Hope this resolves the issue.

Regards,

Shinmila H - Microsoft Support

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-05-05T23:27:01+00:00

    What I'd REALLY like to see is for Microsoft to figure out why either its OS or, in my case, Office 2010 (Outlook in particular), is causing this problem.  I'm guessing by the fact that I see this issue stretching back in various incarnations over several years that hoping for that is pretty much futile!

    I have the problem primarily at the beginning of typing a new e-mail in Outlook.  I'll be starting my first line or so and suddenly I'm looking at Outlook and not the new e-mail.  Easy enough to remedy, but not a satisfactory behavior.  Ah, well.  With luck the problem will just vanish one day, as others (rarely, but sometimes!) do with MS-related issues.

    Thanks for your corroboration!

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  2. Anonymous
    2012-05-08T00:30:57+00:00

    It seems to be wermgr.exe (Windows Problem Reporting) running and then exiting at random times. It could be that there's a program running and then crashing.

    Maybe Microsoft can use this to help track down the issue.

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  3. Anonymous
    2012-05-08T01:14:31+00:00

    could this  be a simple memmory access problem . when a program calls for  a memmory space and that space is in use by another program  then it goes to the page file .causing the mommentary focus loss..  maybe waching how much page file activity is going on  may be helpfull

    to find the couse .

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  4. Anonymous
    2012-05-08T01:24:15+00:00

    Good advice.

    I tried closing a bunch of memory hungry programs and it seems to have fixed the issue.

    It still should be addressed by Microsoft in my opinion.

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