System is Windows XP SP2, fully up to date via Microsoft Update. MS Office XP
is also installed.

I frequently have very many windows open - 20 browser windows or more (I don't
use tabs) - and with this high number of windows open IE7 will sometimes crash.
The below is from the event log.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Application Error
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1000
Date: 21/01/2007
Time: 17:13:16
User: N/A
Computer: (Deleted)
Description:
Faulting application iexplore.exe, version 7.0.5730.11, faulting module
flash9.ocx, version 9.0.28.0, fault address 0x00098c81.

I had the same problem with 9.0.16.0.

I have yet to see the fault with fewer than a dozen or so browser windows open
unless IE7 has already crashed.

I've seen that there is a similar fault with Netscape. Is there a solution?

Quentin - we also see this problem in our terminal server environment - 6 x
WTS, 180 clients - We are seeing the same error across all servers:

Reporting queued error: faulting application iexplore.exe, version
7.0.5730.11, faulting module Flash9.ocx, version 9.0.16.0, fault address
0x00098c81.

We have not tried updating to version 9.0.28.0 to date.

I suspect you are right about the problem being related to number of open
browsers. Our worst time for these hangs is over lunch when the kids
play flash games.............

Our company has this problem very often. I have a physical stick of 1GB, with
a duo core intel processor, running xp sp2, ie7 with flash9b.ocx.

Heres how to make the problem occur: open a single browser window with a flash
object playing in it for a few hours. You will see your memory usage run sky
high. One time my system run up to 1.2GB. The app that is using the resources
is svchost.exe. Use a utility called process explorer (procexp.exe) to see a
breakdown of what resources it's using. Sometimes, even when you close IE, the
svchost doesn't clear up until logging off. Also check your application even
log. I can't find a fix for this yet, but I'll post it here when I do. This
has almost always happened when I mistakenly leave my browser open with
rotating flash advertisement banners.

flash player is fucin shite

see my posting on "flash performance issues: continuous page faults". Carry
out the instructions i give for the task manager and let me know if you are
observing these page faults also. might be related to the same thing - my
system gets very very sluggish with lots of flash animations running.

Kevin.

I was so wrong. The reason our PCs had memory leaks was because of the windows
automatic update service. If you are able to kill svchost.exe, the problem
does not return until you reboot. The memory leaks had nothing to do with
flash or IE. One use complained that they didn't open a browser at all, and
was leaking memory from svchost. See http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932494.
So far, it appears to have fixed my PC. If it doesn't happen again, it will be
implemented to all users in our company who have this problem.