Vista - Can not open control panels

I have upgraded from XP Pro Service Pack 2 to Vista Business, now whenever I
try to open Control Panels, Windows Explorer crashes and restarts. So I can
not access control panels at all.

I tried changing the option on the start menu to show control panels as a
menu to bypass the control panels home window, but I had the same problem as
soon as I clicked on or hovered over the control panel entry in the start
menu.

System is:
Core 2 Duo T6200
Gigabyte Motherboard
256mb nVida GeForce 7600 Graphics Card
2Gb Ram (667Mhz DDR2)

Sounds like some software incompatibility issue to me. Some drivers/software
are configurable through applets in the control panel, maybe one of these
applets is not compatible with Vista but then again there can be other
causes as well.

You could try downloading Process Monitor and start monitoring as you hover
over the control panel and stop monitoring as soon as Windows Explorer
crashes and then based on the Process Monitor log determine what caused
this. In Process Monitor you need to set a filter to Process Name
"control.exe". If it crashes try to see what dll was trying to be loaded.

Another possible solution is to open the crash dump file in Debug Monitor
and analyze that.

Gabriel Lozano-Moran

"Kevin" <Kevin@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:293F7F1B-3EB6-4885-A9C5-06B3E72B35DD@microsoft.com...
>I have upgraded from XP Pro Service Pack 2 to Vista Business, now whenever
>I
> try to open Control Panels, Windows Explorer crashes and restarts. So I
> can
> not access control panels at all.
>
> I tried changing the option on the start menu to show control panels as a
> menu to bypass the control panels home window, but I had the same problem
> as
> soon as I clicked on or hovered over the control panel entry in the start
> menu.
>
> System is:
> Core 2 Duo T6200
> Gigabyte Motherboard
> 256mb nVida GeForce 7600 Graphics Card
> 2Gb Ram (667Mhz DDR2)

How do I find the crash dump information?

"Gabriel Lozano-Moran" wrote:

> Sounds like some software incompatibility issue to me. Some drivers/software
> are configurable through applets in the control panel, maybe one of these
> applets is not compatible with Vista but then again there can be other
> causes as well.
>
> You could try downloading Process Monitor and start monitoring as you hover
> over the control panel and stop monitoring as soon as Windows Explorer
> crashes and then based on the Process Monitor log determine what caused
> this. In Process Monitor you need to set a filter to Process Name
> "control.exe". If it crashes try to see what dll was trying to be loaded.
>
> Another possible solution is to open the crash dump file in Debug Monitor
> and analyze that.
>
> Gabriel Lozano-Moran
>
> "Kevin" <Kevin@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:293F7F1B-3EB6-4885-A9C5-06B3E72B35DD@microsoft.com...
> >I have upgraded from XP Pro Service Pack 2 to Vista Business, now whenever
> >I
> > try to open Control Panels, Windows Explorer crashes and restarts. So I
> > can
> > not access control panels at all.
> >
> > I tried changing the option on the start menu to show control panels as a
> > menu to bypass the control panels home window, but I had the same problem
> > as
> > soon as I clicked on or hovered over the control panel entry in the start
> > menu.
> >
> > System is:
> > Core 2 Duo T6200
> > Gigabyte Motherboard
> > 256mb nVida GeForce 7600 Graphics Card
> > 2Gb Ram (667Mhz DDR2)
>
>

On Feb 25, 3:08 pm, pbs67 <game...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> I noticed that when the Software Licensing Service is Stopped the
> Control Panel No Longer Functions. Check this from the Services.msc
> which can be started in the run dialog box. Ensure that it is set to
> automatic and Started. It can also be launched from the System32
> directory by running the SLsvc.exe.
>
> Hope this helps.:smile:
>
> --
> pbs67

I too had this problem and sure enough I had shut off software
licensing. Turning it back on fixed the control panel issue.
thankyou!!

Hello Kevin,

I had the same problem on my vista ultimate. I monitored the problem with
the computer management program and discovered that a quicktime control panel
(QuickTime.cpl) caused the crash. I removed it and the problem is now
solved!!!

I hope it will work for you
--
Richard


"Kevin" wrote:

> I have upgraded from XP Pro Service Pack 2 to Vista Business, now whenever I
> try to open Control Panels, Windows Explorer crashes and restarts. So I can
> not access control panels at all.
>
> I tried changing the option on the start menu to show control panels as a
> menu to bypass the control panels home window, but I had the same problem as
> soon as I clicked on or hovered over the control panel entry in the start
> menu.
>
> System is:
> Core 2 Duo T6200
> Gigabyte Motherboard
> 256mb nVida GeForce 7600 Graphics Card
> 2Gb Ram (667Mhz DDR2)