>>I experienced this behavior few times already. I am not exactly sure what is the pattern.
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>>Say, my Outlook wants to notify me of something (I configured some posts to go to another folder and notify). I click somehow and then Windows goes crazy. Several applications that are in the taskbar now instead of opening up when I click on them, start blinking. I have hard time switching between apps and the ALT + TAB also doesn't seem to work.
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>>Usually I end up re-starting Windows.
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>>Do you know what may cause such behavior and is there a way to fix it once it started? I'm experiencing it now and haven't yet re-started.
>
>I got something like that a while ago with WS FTP. For some kind of reason, when that software is running, it causes a similar situation. I created a thread for that several months ago. I think it is along those lines. The main thing to do would be to try to isolate which one is causing that. If you run Outlook alone, do you have the problem? Once the application located, if this is cause by one specific, you would then be able to ask the vendor if you could get a 64 bits version of it. I had this since I moved to Windows 7 64 bits and still have some 32 bits applications running.

I use Windows 7. Basically, I think it usually starts with Outlook. Once it gets into Notify status, other applications also start to blink instead of normal reaction to the mouse click. I re-started my laptop because of this problem.