I degragged my HD and now I'm getting the error message 'rundll32 is not responding' when I shut down.

April 27, 2004 10:04 AM

A couple months back, I defragged my HD. Since then, I can't shut down (I'm using Windows 2000 Pro) without getting "rundll32 is not responding." Is there an easy answer?
posted by davebush to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

i recently started having the same problem....anyone have a solution?
posted by batboy at 1:05 PM on April 27, 2004

rundll32.dll can be used to launch other services, including unwanted ones. If there's a piece of mal- scum- ad- spy-ware in there, it may no longer be exiting properly. Use Spybot, Adaware and Hijackthis to clean any undesirables. Not abad idea, even if this isn't the answer to this specific problem. Malware is an increasing problem, similar to spam, harder to delete.
posted by theora55 at 1:46 PM on April 27, 2004

The defrag might only be coincidence. You can think of rundll32 as a kind of dll conductor - it's used by applications to get at the functionality of other programs. Your problem could be a symptom of poorly made software not releasing resources when it should or maybe something running in the background that shouldn't be.

I agree with theora55, you need to check for anything on you machine that you might not want or know about and nuke it. Do a virus check with recent definition files while you're at it. Did you install any new software around the time the problem started?
posted by normy at 1:56 PM on April 27, 2004