Typically 3-5 minutes.

sounds like a muddy OS

do you use a program like CCleaner to keep things tidier? that might help

At first, I thought you might be referring to the winmm.dll problem some (older) games have on Windows 10. I remember grabbing a patched version from a forum (might have been the Tie Fighter forum here?) and dropping it in the game's folder which allowed the game to run and play its music.

Pretty sure the logical answer for that particular problem is simply outdated audio APIs which are now deprecated. The .dll is trying to make calls that Windows 10 no longer understands, causing it to hang. But since you claim this happens on Windows 7 as well, this probably isn't the problem you're faced with.

can we re-title this post:
"This one weird glitch has gamers stumped!"

My talents and abilities make me a complete garbage person :|


on a serious note, I second drealmer's prescribed hoojoo. I frequently optimize my registry with it and never have issues like this.

It's a damned shame computers and technology are such arcane things, imagine how much easier life would be it there were some actual SCIENCE to them?

I've had this on a couple of games, Can't remember which now.

I think compatibility mode helped.

I'll check next time it happens.

Sounds like a famous Games Explorer glitch.

To fix the problem open c:\windows\syswow64, rename gameux.dll to something else e.g. gameux_.dll and restart your PC.