IE7 crashes if set for tabbed home page

Internet Explorer 7 running on XP Pro. If I configure IE7 for a two-tabbed home page. IE7 crashes when started from that point forward. The only way to restore IE7 then is to enter a URL into the XP Run command box to open IE without tabs and delete one of the Home Page tabs. I found nothing about this via a Google search; has anyone else encountered this?