I had the same type of issue - I just reinstalled it and it worked fine.
On another system that I had an issue of it wouldn't go further then loading the program - I deleted the core from the system and it just downloaded a new core and worked fine.
As for the minimizing the other programs - I use TweakUI to not allow other programs to take (steal) focus of any app I am currently using. Hasn't let me down yet!
