Troubleshooting chronic DDE slowness

[Guest ajkessel]

I've posted a similar question here before, and seen the same question

posed elsewhere, with no useful responses, so I'm trying again.

 

Running fully patched, up to date, virus-proof and adware-proof, etc.,

Windows XP SP3, Office 2007.

 

Often DDE-enabled file types open slowly. For example, if http links

are set to open with DDE, it might take 5-10 seconds for the link to

appear in the browser; if DDE is disabled, it opens instantly.

 

The machine has plenty of resources: Thinkpad x61; Dual core 2.0 GHz

CPU; 4 GB RAM; relative recent fresh installation; no extra services

etc..

 

I've disabled the Network DDE service, which is the one suggestion

I've seen out there, but it makes no difference.

 

Once a DDE call has been made, the next several are much faster. For

example, clicking on a link from Outlook might take 5-10 seconds for

the link to open in the (already open) web browser via DDE, but after

that successive links open pretty quickly. If it's been a while since

the last link, however, it is slow again.

 

It seems like perhaps some sort of DDE service that should be staying

active is dying and needing to start up again.

 

Any ideas how to troubleshoot or fix, short of disabling DDE on all

relevant file types (which Windows seems to like to reset frequently)?

This problem appears to be fairly common with no solutions.