I should be getting Windows 7 some time today, so this weekend I will be installing it.  At that point, I'll do a test run with GE to see whether it makes any difference.  I suspect not, but it's worth a try anyway.

As adrianff7 said - 8 Months, no solution.  It strongly seems that either this is an insoluble problem, would take too many resources for the number of people it (Apparently) affects, or Google don't care.  Ah well - C'est la vie.