This has been a consistent problem in 26. I haven't mentioned it before as I thought it might be addressed in subsequent builds.
This can occur in a number of different situations, but most frequently when I'm editing my library. I've addressed most of the common culprits - Malwarebytes conducting a search of the disk drive, Windows Security - and disabled any functionality that might be causing a problem. I've also pursued all the steps out lined in Roderick's helpful post.
The program doesn't crash, it simply rolls down to cover the task bar, like a Venetian Blind, and just sits there indefinitely, with the hour glass cursor spinning. If you try to use it, it becomes greyed out.
I can get to the task bar by opening Task Manager, which rolls back the MC screen, and can continue to use other applications, but MC doesn't budge, and if you click on it, you;ll be presented with the wait/close options. You can of course close it and reopen rather quickly, but you'll lose work that you hadn't saved before the hang commenced.
This is not one off, it occurs quite frequently, but almost always when I'm trying to do work on MC, such as editing tags for files not currently in use while MC is playing another file. Its almost if I'm putting undue strain on the program performing multiple tasks at the same time. Is MC's functionality restricted so multiple tasks will cause the system to lock up?
