Been a while, but I was waiting for Stardock to repair its website. : ) Anyway, I followed the directions exactly.  The same exact problem persists. Strangely, my Start!! "about" shows the version at 2.51, and there are no available updates if I have start11 check for updates. However, it appears that previously, I had somehow installed Start11_2.5.2.3-j205-Setup.exe ( i see this in my saved files on my local disk where I store installers), as well as per my notes in the first post in this thread. That doesn't seem to have made any difference though.

Here is some other info that might be useful.

"Enhanced" is not enabled.

If the taskbar is aligned on the bottom, it does not have the problem - only aligned at the top, which is where I want it (my primary reason for Start 11 purchase).

When the problem occurs, simply clicking on minimized apps in the top-aligned bar, the first few clicks seem to work okay with minimizing and maximizing, but as soon as you stop doing that, and switch to another app in the taskbar to maximize it, the problem reoccurs. That is, you click a minmized application, and it refused to maximize on the first click. You must click it a 2nd time.

Thanks again.

OK, after turning on Enhanced, enabling "always hide taskbar buttons", and recentering it, seems to work! (which is not to say it doesn't work in those other states, that is just how i want it to appear - taskbar on top of screen, centered, multiple open app windows stack on each pinned application)

I had purposely not turned on Enhanced before, because it looks like the same setup should work without it. I also figured the more Start11 features you enable, the more complexity you are throwing at Windows' ability to render.

I'll keep observing over the next week and see if it keeps working. : )

thx!