Fix: Copy Paste not Working

People use the utility of copy-pasting almost every time when they use their computers. From copying small website snippets to copying a whole page of text, this utility saves us a lot of time which we will spend typing otherwise.

Even though this is one of the most basic necessities in the computing world, there are numerous cases where the utility doesn’t work. The item doesn’t get copied nor do you get any prompt of an error. This can be really annoying and may even cease your work if not fixed. The workarounds for this problem are quite simple and hopefully, at the end of this article, you will have your copy paste working in no time.

Solution 1: Resetting ‘rdpclip.exe’

rdpclip.exe the main executable for the copying mechanism. It provides functionality for Terminal Services server which allows you to copy and paste between the client and the server. Even though it is recommended not to manipulate this process, we will try restarting this and see if this fixes the problem. This process might have gotten in a stale state or become unresponsive because which the modules may not be working.

1. Press Windows + R, type “taskmgr” in the dialogue box and press Enter.
2. Once in the task manager, locate the process ‘rdpclip.exe’, right-click it and select End Process.

3. Now close your task manager and open it again. After opening, click on File > Run new task. In the dialogue box type ‘rdpclip.exe’ and press Enter. The service will be restarted. Check copy pasting and see if this fixed the issue.

If you are unable to find the process in your task manager, you can use the command prompt to achieve the same result using a single line. This might be useful if you are accessing your machine remotely and don’t have proper control over it.

1. Press Windows + S, type “command prompt” in the dialogue box, right-click on the application and select Run as administrator.
2. Execute the command:

taskkill.exe /F /IM rdpclip.exe

3. Now type the following and press Enter.

rdpclip.exe

4. Try copy pasting and see if this did the trick.

Solution 2: Resetting Desktop Window Manager

The Desktop Window Manager ‘dwm.exe’ helps manage visual effects found in Windows operating systems. These include the aero theme, alt-tab windows switcher, and many other modules. To cut things short, it manager your entire desktop and its interactions with the user. This module also hangs or gets in a stalemate every once in a while. We can try resetting it and see if this does the trick.

1. Press Windows + R, type “taskmgr” in the dialogue box and press Enter.
2. Once in the task manager, locate the process ‘dwm.exe’ in the details tab, right-click it and select End task.

3. Now close your task manager and open it again. After opening, click on File > Run new task. In the dialogue box type ‘dwm.exe’ and press Enter. The service will be restarted. Check copy pasting and see if this fixed the issue.

Solution 3: Using ‘echo off’ in command prompt

Another workaround which we can try before moving on to individual cases is executing a command in the command prompt. This will reset the entire Windows clipboard, erase all data stored in it and get it functional to you in no time.

1. Press Windows + R, type “command prompt” in the dialogue box, right-click on the application and select “run as administrator”.
2. Once in the command prompt, execute the following command:

cmd /c"echo off|clip

3. Close the command prompt and try copy-pasting again. Hopefully, the problem will be solved.

Solution 4: Checking individual cases

There are in fact many modules which render the process of copy-pasting useless because of their activities. Since we cannot list each of them in a separate solution, we will list them here one by one. Not all of them may suit your case so only perform those which do.

• If you are using IObit (Advanced system care), make sure that the option ‘clean clipboard’ is not checked. Navigate to advanced system care, click on SmartRAM present underneath Optimize, then select Settings and uncheck the option.

• If you are using Skype add-in on your browser, you can disable it and try again. Do the same for all Microsoft Office based applications on your computer. It seems there is some memory management problem with these modules.
• Removing key-logger software also tends to fix the issue. Keyloggers keep track of the entries on your keyboard and store them in some remote file. They also tend to disable the copy pasting mechanism. Make sure you disable them before trying again.
• Disable any third-party copy pasting software on your computer. These include programs like ‘ultracopier’ which provide alternative to you.
• You can even try disabling your antivirus software and see if it is conflicting. There were cases where the antivirus software ‘AVG’ was causing the issue.
• If the problem is occurring in Internet Explorer, go to Internet options (inetcpl.cpl) > Advanced tab > Reset. After resetting, restart your computer and check.
• Try killing/uninstalling Adobe Acrobat. This software is also known to cause some issues.
• Restart your computer or if you are using a virtual machine, restart your VM application.
• If the problem still persists, consider rolling back or doing a clean install of Windows.

The post Fix: Copy Paste not Working appeared first on Appuals.com.