The desktop stops working properly and strange pop-up messages appear.
The desktop stops working properly and strange pop-up messages appear.
Hello,
Every time I leave my laptop idle for 10 to 15 minutes and return, the whole desktop becomes unresponsive. I notice random news pop-ups appearing briefly—small grey rectangles with white text. This only lasts a couple of seconds before everything returns to normal. The taskbar remains unaffected; only the desktop and right-click area are impacted. I've tried using Malwarebytes and reinstalling Windows, but it hasn't helped. Occasionally, these pop-ups appear when I switch tabs between apps. They look like official Microsoft news, but they don't lead to any ads or links. I can share a screenshot if that would help.
I believe the screen saver is disabled, since I haven't seen it active.
It looks like the issue has been resolved. I kept the same steps as before.
Ah. That news widget is a Microsoft feature and can sometimes serve as a screen saver. On my home computer, I disabled it because it bothers me. Now only the Edge browser opens when I click on links within it.