Problems Solved
What’s causing File Explorer to falter?
QSometimes my File Explorer suddenly falters or stops completely, freezing for seconds or minutes. Eventually, it carries on, but soon enough there’ll be another stall. Is this a known issue? I keep my PC up to date, so is it something that may have happened during a Windows 10 update process? Currently, it’s very frustrating.
AA problem like this has so many possible causes that it’s impossible to serve up a deadcert solution, but we’re happy to offer a few ideas. However, let’s first consider Windows 10 updates. While we can’t completely rule out Microsoft machinations as the cause, it’s unlikely: Windows 10 has millions of users, so post-update bugs become known rapidly. We’re not aware of any specific Windows Update-related bug that would lead to this particular problem.
It’s much more likely to be a problem specific to your setup. For example, have you recently installed any new software or hardware devices? If so, we’d suggest investigating these.
If you’ve installed a manufacturer’s supporting software for a new external hard drive it might have a preset option to power down (or ‘spin down’) the disk after a few seconds or minutes of inactivity.
You can also check Windows 10’s own power settings. To do this, first press Windows key+r to open a Run box, then type powercfg.cpl and press Enter. Next, alongside the selected power plan, click ‘Change plan settings’ (see screenshot above), and then ‘Change advanced power settings’ (see screenshot below). Now, in the Power Options box, click to expand the ‘Hard disk’ category followed by ‘Turn off hard disk after’. If your PC is a laptop, you’ll see options here for ‘On battery (Minutes)’ and ‘Plugged in (Minutes)’; on a desktop, it’ll just be ‘Setting (Minutes)’. Make sure the entries alongside all read 0 (that’s a zero).
Another possibility is that File Explorer is stumbling over something that it cannot locate or that is otherwise taking an inordinate amount of time to process. For example, there might be a ‘Quick access’ shortcut that is currently unavailable (because it ‘points’ to a disconnected drive, say), or a shortcut that leads to a folder with very many files that take a long while to index. If this sounds likely then, in File Explorer’s left-hand pane, look under the ‘Quick access’ heading, right-click the suspect and choose ‘Remove from Quick access’.
Similarly, could you have inadvertently or even intentionally changed your File Explorer view? The ‘Extra large icons’, ‘Large icons’ and ‘Medium icons’ views all take longer to process, as File Explorer has to pull up and display image and document thumbnails. To change this, click the View tab at the top and then, in the ribbon’s Layout category, choose ‘Small icons’, List or Details view. To apply this view to all folders, still on the View tab click the Options button. Then, in the Folder Options box that appears, click the View tab followed by the ‘Apply to Folders’ button.
Finally, there’s always the chance that your hard drive is going kaput, as regular pauses could indicate problems reading areas of the disk. To check, use a free drive-monitoring tool such as Passmark Diskcheckup ( www.snipca. com/32900). Launch the app, then click Disk Self Test tab.
Now open the ‘Test type’ dropdown menu and choose Extended Test, then click the Start Test button.