Explorer.exe randomly taking focus - Windows 11

Anonymous
2023-02-08T00:52:23+00:00

Firstly, I've been using my same PC for 3 years (minus a few upgrades, graphics card etc) on windows 10 and never ever had this issue.

Recently I had the pop up saying I'm eligible to upgrade to Windows 11 - Cool, why not.

So I've been using windows 11 for a couple of weeks now and I'm enjoying it... apart from one VERY annoying issue I'm having.

When playing a fullscreen application (or borderless window, it doesnt matter) It will randomly minimize itself to start bar, the same kind of action If I were to Alt-Tab out of it.

This isn't an issue with any one program, it can happen in any game I'm playing, or even just fullscreen applications I leave running, such as Heaven benchmark or other benchmarking programs.

Its not an accidental press of windows key or anything daft like that, It even happens when gaming with a PS5 controller, hands nowhere near the desk.

This can happen within a minute or 2 of playing a game, or sometimes go as long as 20 minutes without happening, but it WILL happen and will repeat itself periodically.

I figured somehow another window is taking focus out of my game and tabbing to it, but no other window or notification etc actually pops up, I'm just left staring at my desktop.

I managed to find a program online someone created which logs which windows are in focus in order, so using this program I was able to determine that when im gaming and this happens, the window taking focus is 'Explorer.exe'. which is suspiciously the same thing that is in focus if I just click on my background on my desktop from another program. Its essentially like my PC is just tabbing itself to desktop for no reason.

As mentioned above, ive not had this issue ever in 3 years with windows 10 and its only started happening when upgrading to windows 11 so clearly something new or different is causing this.

Things ive already tried... Disabling notifications, Turning on/off 'Game Mode'. Changing power plans. Disabling 'minimize when a second monitor is plugged in or removed.

None of these have solved this. At this point im thinking of just reverting back to windows 10 for now.

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Performance and system failures

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  1. Anonymous
    2024-09-23T16:06:18+00:00

    You do the basic stuff.

    You disable everything that is not microsoft and reboot, see if it happens again. Start there, because in your case it could be something else?

    Disable All Startup Programs using the MSConfig app

    1. Open the Run window by pressing Win + R on the keyboard.
    2. In the Run text box, type msconfig.
    3. To open MSConfig, click the OK button.
    4. To disable this feature, uncheck the Load startup items checkbox on the General tab.
    5. To save the updated boot settings, click Apply and select the OK button.
    6. On the dialogue box prompt, click Restart.

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  2. Anonymous
    2024-09-23T16:02:35+00:00

    Press start and type Winver and press enter, what version of Windows do you have?

    What GPU do you have?

    For me, the problem is completly gone but I don't game on the computer that had the problem.

    If you game? maybe try installing Windows10, that's why I have on all my gaming computers.

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  3. Anonymous
    2024-09-22T13:21:01+00:00

    Sorry, but i have latest updates on everything and the exact same thing is still happening, so no it is not a fixed problem.

    Perhaps temporarly but not a solid fix for the problem.

    I can't understand how this issue can't be fixed by Microsoft, it's been too long! :(

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  4. Anonymous
    2024-09-21T17:45:56+00:00

    It has already been fixed, make sure you're running latest windows 11 build. Upper in this thread there should be the name of the hotfix that fixed the problem (some months ago)

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  5. Anonymous
    2024-09-21T17:34:42+00:00

    I have this issue with Explorer.exe tabbing me out from Windows on both my computers, i have diffrent OS installed on the two PC's one on Win 11 Pro and one on Win 10 home.

    What is this??? I would love to enjoy playing games in fullscreen and watch movies but this is really frustrating and in my opinion the Windows managing team does not think this is a big problem to fix? Is that true, it's been TWO years! of people telling you that this is a major problem and people build PC's for 4000-5000 dollars to enjoy playing games or other fullscreen related things to get shot down by Windows itself.

    It's not acceptable.

    So what do you do?

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