Windows Freezing after Logging in

[tone12]

Hi guys, I've recently been running into an issue where my desktop PC is hanging or freezing after logging into my user account.

This only really started happening after putting my PC to sleep on and off over a couple of days without completely turning it off. (Keeping research links etc open for writing University papers... sucks!)
So, I'd go from leaving my PC on for approx 5-6 days, putting it to sleep over night to continue with work the next day.

Once I finally turned it off after these periods and then went to use it the next day, my problem would start occurring.

My PC would load up completely fine to the welcome screen for logging into my windows account, I would proceed to login, then be greeted by a blank desktop (no desktop icons) with no taskbar icons either, including pinned programs, time/date, running program icons etc.
The mouse will move around completely normally, but when I click ANYTHING, it will start with the blue spinning loading icon and stay like it.

Hopefully this image gives you an idea of what I'm talking about.

So, my desktop will then stay like this (I haven't tested it by leaving it like this for a while, but it usually stays like this for atleast 5 minutes)

If I restart my PC and attempt to login, my PC will get stuck at this screen.

The ONLY way I've been able to fix this issue so far is to do a system restore to an earlier date, this usually only works if I roll back to before the most recent windows update, OR before the beginning of where I've been leaving my PC on for extended periods of time.

I would really appreciate any help on fixing this random issue, as It's getting frustrating to have to perform a system restore every time it happens!

A further note, this has just happened to me last night, after only using my PC during the day yesterday, turning it off, then starting it up today. I ended up rolling back to the windows update at 11pm yesterday evening which fixed it. (temporarily i assume...)

 

[Colif]

I thought you were getting a completely blank screen, but now I read it as you still have a taskbar? The fixes may help pin the cause but that is different to what I expected

One fix for a blank screen after logon is to check the problem isn't your peripherals. Unplug everything and see if it changes anything. You may want to leave keyboard in to get past logon but that doesn't discount keyboard from blame if it happens still.

Microsoft suggest you do a clean boot (http://www.thewindowsclub.com/what-is-clean-boot-state-in-windows) just to see if its caused by a program in your start up menu.

You might also want to try these two: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wiki/windows_10-update/system-file-check-sfc-scan-and-repair-system-files/bc609315-da1f-4775-812c-695b60477a93 as it looks like explorer is part of the problem but fact taskbar is still there is confusing.

What happens if you restart pc? I had a problem last year where i got no desktop at all, including a taskbar, my only answer was ctrl alt del and normally then the restart would fail to stop pc. That was caused by my speakers dying.

 

[tone12]

I thought you were getting a completely blank screen, but now I read it as you still have a taskbar? The fixes may help pin the cause but that is different to what I expected

One fix for a blank screen after logon is to check the problem isn't your peripherals. Unplug everything and see if it changes anything. You may want to leave keyboard in to get past logon but that doesn't discount keyboard from blame if it happens still.

Microsoft suggest you do a clean boot (http://www.thewindowsclub.com/what-is-clean-boot-state-in-windows) just to see if its caused by a program in your start up menu.

You might also want to try these two: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wiki/windows_10-update/system-file-check-sfc-scan-and-repair-system-files/bc609315-da1f-4775-812c-695b60477a93 as it looks like explorer is part of the problem but fact taskbar is still there is confusing.

What happens if you restart pc? I had a problem last year where i got no desktop at all, including a taskbar, my only answer was ctrl alt del and normally then the restart would fail to stop pc. That was caused by my speakers dying.

Thanks for your response!

Basically, the task bar is there, but there are no pinned program icons or date/time as you should be able to see in the first screenshot.
If I click or try to ctrl+alt+delete during this time, the windows pointer turns into the loading pointer but frozen and everything becomes unresponsive (I am still able to move the mouse around normally, but cannot perform any actions)
Every now and then when this happens, a 'Windows has stopped responding' or 'Windows has encountered an error' dialog appears (not sure which off the top of my head), but this is not 100% of the time, it seems to be fairly random from what I can see.

I will attempt a clean boot if anything like this happens again, unfortunately I have a feeling that the issue stems from a driver or program hanging on startup or crashing explorer, as that would explain the errors/loading mouse pointer.

Usually when the problem occurs, when I start the PC, I get to the second screenshot and my PC gets stuck, with a constant loading animation next to the 'Welcome' under my user information.
After multiple restarts I get the option to do a system restore, which I do, which solves the problem temporarily...