Armada it was explorer.exe not IE.
there are some ways around this one, one is using a second thread to launch what you want, the second thread of course must start instantly (ie: delay like u encountered)
nonetheless i believe mirc shouldnt be prone to worry about other programs causing it greif when its not at fault. minor problem yet problem nontheless. its not happening now. but surely having mirc freezing up for any length of time can be frustrating.
