Restart the Explorer when Windows hangs

One of the most popular source of annoyance in Windows is hanging of the explorer. We will not get into the causes of this problem because there are many possible issues.
Here is a simple solution (at least temporary) for that problem but this will only work if Windows is still responsive.

Shut down the Windows Explorer by hitting Start => Shutdown (Turn off Computer on Windows XP) and click cancel on the shutdown dialog while holding the CTRL, Shift and ALT keys.

This kills the explorer.exe process and all that we have to do now is create a new explorer.exe process to access all windows and functions again in Windows.
Then fire up task manager, click on File => New Task and enter explorer.exe in the window. This will restart the Windows Explorer and hopefully brought the desired result.