Every so often (often enough to be a concern) my system freezes me out (mouse can be moved but not clicked on anything). If I don't have a large window hiding it, I can see on the desktop that all my icons vanish and are then repainted in place.

I cannot run Task Manager whle this is happening, so that's no help. It happens without regard to my on-net or off-net status. I don't see anything in Task Manager that raises red flags, although I can't say that I know what vsmon.exe and wanmpsvc.exe do.

Has anyone else observed this kind of behavior, or knows what might be causing it?

Thanks,
Richard in Texas

When your system hangs, does it eventually allow you to regain control, or do you have to resort to manually restarting it?

Causes of this may include:
- not upgrading to the latest video card drivers
- incompatible programs
- programs not cleanly installed / uninstalled
- other random stuff

The next time this happens, once you regain access to your computer, go into Administrative Tools in the control panel, and then to the Event Viewer. Take a look at the details for the latest errors, and whether or not these hangs were reported in the event viewer.