Why does notepad crash on desktop files in the save-as dialog?

Question

Here's a puzzling problem - maybe somebody has an idea. Right now I am out of ideas.

On Win7 64bit, the following crashes Notepad:

1. On Desktop, right click, select "New | Text Document". This creates "New Text Document.txt".
2. Right click on that file, select "Edit". This opens notepad with the empty file.
3. Select "File | Save as": Notepad crashes and Win7 reports that "Notepad has stopped working".

Now, move the file to c:\temp and repeat steps 2 and 3: no crash this time and the save-as dialog appears normally. I can create similar steps for the "open" dialog.

Things I have tried:

• Safe mode - does not work, same problem
• Create a new user and try again logged in as that user - no crash
• Name file differently, or create elsewhere and then move to desktop - same problem
• Use Wordpad instead - same problem
• Review shell extensions with ShellExView - nothing extraordinary here
• Stare at the event log entries for each of the crashes. Does not enlighten me.
• At time of crash look at the process explorer stack view. Hangs at a function "TaskDialog".
• sfc.exe /scannow repaired some files but the problem persists.

This is how the event log entries look like:

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Application Error
Date:          14.12.2010 00:33:48
Event ID:      1000
Task Category: (100)
Level:         Error
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Description:
Faulting application name: NOTEPAD.EXE, version: 6.1.7600.16385, time stamp: 0x4a5bc9b3
Faulting module name: COMCTL32.dll, version: 6.10.7600.16661, time stamp: 0x4c6f6e4b
Exception code: 0xc000041d
Fault offset: 0x00000000000db770
Faulting process id: 0x198
Faulting application start time: 0x01cb9b1e140ab92a
Faulting application path: C:\Windows\system32\NOTEPAD.EXE
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\WinSxS\amd64_microsoft.windows.common-controls_6595b64144ccf1df_6.0.7600.16661_none_fa62ad231704eab7\COMCTL32.dll

What else should I try, short of dumping my user and starting over with a new profile? Thanks...

Answer 1

Sounds to me like the previous save-as path (or a network drive) are the hold-up. It wants to render the path it's at and can't because an entry probably either offline or unavailable.

I wish i remembered where notepad stored it's last save path, but the location escapes me. I would try either waiting it out or looking online for the last save location and change it. See if that resolves the issue.

EDIT

Looking in to the COMCTL32.dll it appears it may be loading a thumbnail from a file in the select file dialog that is crashing. Anything in your My Documents (or where ever you've previously saved to) folder that thumbnail generation would bomb out on? You may have the folder size small in normal file explorer (wouldn't generate a thumb) then larger int he save-as dialog which would invoke it. (I can't image it's using the TaskDialog or Drag and Drop abilities)

Answer 2

I had a similar problem. I also happen to have Notepad++ installed (although I never really converted over to it and still use plain vanilla Notepad) and what I did was I opened the file in Notepad++ then tried the Save As and it worked fine. I was then able to manipulate the file with Notepad. Not sure what caused the problem in the first place though

Answer 3

The problem exists in a dll shared by multiple programs (comctl32.dll) which is the common dialog control, used to display the usual "FileOpen" and "FileSave" dialogs which ressembles an Explorer window browsing a folder. If there is a shortcut to an offline network location it may freeze applications, including Explorer itself. If there is some file that causes applications to crash upon browsing a directory then this is another cause. If this is the case, it could be caused by eg. a malformed image/thumbnail, malformed document (.RTF,.DOC,.PPS,.XLS,etc), bad coded codecs that are loaded to render video thumbnails, etc, etc.

Also remember that the "Desktop" is a special system folder, which has a registered CLSID and a related module (dll) which will be loaded when the directory is browsed. This DLL may have dependencies, either native or third parties. If any of these modules (dlls) contains a bug it can causes applications that loads it to crash.

You should reproduce this in an environment without any third parties softwares installed. If the problem exists then it is a bug in the Operating system itself and Microsoft should be contacted and bug reported. If the bug exists in another software, then the responsible module (DLL) should be identified and bug reported to the vendor.

Answer 4

I have the same happening, with win7 64bit version only. I've pinned it down to the following sequence of events:

It happens with notepad, wordpad, paint, openoffice; not tried anything else. It happens only when the default path for "save as" is the desktop, which it typically is if the file is opened from the desktop (by right click or double click). As soon as the "save as" dialog opens, it greys out and the application crashes. In my case, if the file is not opened from the desktop, then doing "save as" and changing the path to the desktop will work. (But I cannot then open and do "save as" again).

What may help is that I have found that it only happen with the following options set:

Explorer>Tools>FolderOptions>Navigation pane:

Show all folders: unchecked Automatically expand to current folder: checked

Any other combination is ok.

I have no idea why or whether there's a better fix.

Answer 5

I asked about this problem in 2010 - just tried it again and it works now. I don't have the faintest why. Maybe some Windows update solved it. Or I uninstalled something during the last 12+ months...

This is not really answering the question but I am not sure how to deal with it now that the problem is gone. I suppose it would not be correct to keep it unanswered.