Dell Dimension 2400

[mar4far]

HELP!! I'm using a friend's computer because mine is DOING NOTHING -- when i reboot my computer it goes to the main desktop but i get no icons -- nothing -- it won't even let me right click, left click, the keyboard windows button does nothing -- the only thing i can do is CTRL/ALT/DEL and get the TASK MANAGER -- but i don't know what to do from here -- i tried a sytsem restore in the MSCONFIG run box, and while it went through the motion of restoring -- it didn't do anything -- and when i went in to perform another system restore -- all previous dates were wiped out -- DELL wants me to pay a fortune to get the answer -- ANY SUGGESTIONS???

P.S. RUNNING WINDOWS XP

[Matacumbie]

Press CTRL-ALT-DEL to bring up Task Manager. And click File, New Task (Run..) and enter regedit and click OK. This will run the registry editor. Now look for the below registry keys (navigate thru the registry). Make sure you only look for these exact keys listed below and let us know if they are present.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\explorer.exe

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\iexplorer.exe

Steve

[mar4far]

Thanks for response Steve. I'll check for those two files -- only have to wait a bit because my tower is being looked at by someone right now, and I don't have access to it -- if they are unable to fix it -- I'll look for the files and let you know.

Marsha

[Matacumbie]

OK. If they are there you need to delete (remove) both of them. After removing them your desktop and taskbar should return, if not, restart the computer.

Make sure you only look for and delete the exact keys I listed.

Steve