Windows taskbar clock freezes

Hello,
Sorry to hear you are having issues. Need more details on your issue.

1. Windows full version and OS Build number. Please use Winver.exe
2. If you're also have Start11 installed in your system. Need to know its full version number.
3. If you have Windowblinds installed, need it full version number and if the issue skin specific.
4. How often the issue appear? Any specific steps to recreate the issue to appear?
5. If you restart Explorer.exe, does the issue goes away?

Thank you,
Basj,
Stardock Community Assistant.

Windows 24H2 (OS Build 26100.3194). See full profile below. Plenty of HW.

Here's a photo. Notice the photo timestamp in upper right matches windows clock but not the taskbar clock which was frozen since 10:19:09a

No WindowBlinds

Re start11 version #, I did check to make sure it was up to date...just before I uninstalled it today. But I did not record the version #. It was causing me to miss appointments and I was anxious to avoid further embarrassment. 

It happened over the weekend and I assumed it was an oddball windows bug. Restarted on Sunday and seemed fine. Then Monday afternoon the time froze again. Restarted again. And then this AM it happened again. So started searching around and could not find a windows bug but tripped across an old post about Start10 which matched my experience. Which is when I uninstalled.

I seem to recall updating start11 very recently. Maybe in the last week??

LOVE the product but can't live with a bad clock

OS Name Microsoft Windows 11 Pro

Version 10.0.26100 Build 26100

Other OS Description Not Available

OS Manufacturer Microsoft Corporation

System Manufacturer LENOVO

System Model 21FV0027US

System Type x64-based PC

System SKU LENOVO_MT_21FV_BU_Think_FM_ThinkPad P1 Gen 6

Processor 13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-13700H, 2400 Mhz, 14 Core(s), 20 Logical Processor(s)

BIOS Version/Date LENOVO N3ZET45W (1.32 ), 9/5/2024

SMBIOS Version 3.4

Embedded Controller Version 1.14

BIOS Mode UEFI

Platform Role Mobile

Secure Boot State On

PCR7 Configuration Elevation Required to View

Windows Directory C:\WINDOWS

System Directory C:\WINDOWS\system32

Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume1

Locale United States

Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "10.0.26100.1"

User Name P1-Charlie\charl

Time Zone Pacific Standard Time

Installed Physical Memory (RAM) 64.0 GB

Total Physical Memory 63.7 GB

Available Physical Memory 38.2 GB

Total Virtual Memory 67.7 GB

Available Virtual Memory 28.9 GB

Page File Space 4.00 GB

Page File C:\pagefile.sys

Kernel DMA Protection On

Virtualization-based security Running

Virtualization-based security Required Security Properties

Virtualization-based security Available Security Properties Base Virtualization Support, Secure Boot, DMA Protection, UEFI Code Readonly, SMM Security Mitigations 1.0, Mode Based Execution Control, APIC Virtualization

Virtualization-based security Services Configured Hypervisor enforced Code Integrity, Secure Launch

Virtualization-based security Services Running Hypervisor enforced Code Integrity

App Control for Business policy Enforced

App Control for Business user mode policy Off

Automatic Device Encryption Support Elevation Required to View

A hypervisor has been detected. Features required for Hyper-V will not be displayed.

Please try, uninstall Start11v2, reboot immediately (important), download latest version available (v2.52 Beta) from your account product download page: https://store.stardock.com/myaccount/products. Install it, reboot immediately again. Retest it and report back.

Thank you,

Basj,
Stardock Community Assistant

Installed 2.521Beta

Within 2 hours of install the clock froze. I've let it go for hours without any change. Again, photo timestamp and windows clock match. But taskbar clock is frozen.

Uninstalling again.

Charlie

Something is blocking that clock from working properly. As a possible workaround when it happen, try restart Explorer.exe and see if that help with your issue. How to restart explorer.exe: https://www.howtogeek.com/198815/use-this-secret-trick-to-close-and-restart-explorerexe-in-windows/. Try it and report back.

Thank you,

Basj,
Stardock Community Assistant

Hi Basj,

Restarting explorer is not a practical solution because it just defers the problem for a few hours. That's the same as suggesting that I just stop using that clock because as soon as I restart explorer, it will soon be wrong again. What value is a clock that will always be inaccurate after a few hours?

Given that this problem is consistently reproduceable, how about giving me a debug version so I can help you track down the bug?

Charlie

I am a little unsure what a debug version could be logging in this situation.

Start11 does not paint the clock, or update the clock at all.  Thats purely a Windows thing.  On Windows 10 (which the previous post you found was using), Start11 doesn't even provide any part of the taskbar either.  The only thing Start11 does which might relate the clock (bar vertical taskbars), would be for showing seconds and this wouldn't be in use on Windows 10 at all, only Windows 11.

Over the years we have had the very occasional report of clocks not updating, but nothing has ever shown it to be Start11/10 at fault and not Windows as there are also posts on the internet about the very same issue who don't seem to use Start10/11.  For example https://www.reddit.com/r/WindowsHelp/comments/18lhi3g/hi_i_have_a_problem_with_the_displayed_time_on/

https://www.reddit.com/r/WindowsHelp/comments/1b78pdm/win11_taskbar_freezes_but_is_responding_to_clicks/

I guess the first obvious question is if you uninstall Start11 does this still happen as you mention it has started recently?

The next thing to try would be to disable the show seconds on the taskbar option as I saw mention of using that online and possible issues. I can certainly imagine a scenario where it tries to sync itself accurately to 1 second updates (vs 60 seconds) and accidentally sets the timer to 0 and so it never triggers again.

Interesting. Well what I can say so far is that without stardock, the taskbar clock runs fine. It's been some 18 hours without an issue.

I'm game to do a few tests. As a first control, I'm going to reinstall stardock, note the time and see how long it takes before the clock freezes. Then I'll uninstall, set to "no seconds" and try again. We'll see what happens.