gdiplus.dll missing - win7

All of a sudden I'm getting this error when I try to double-click a Powerpoint in an email: "PPTVIEW.EXE - System Error: The program can't start because gdiplus.dll is missing from your computer. Try reinstalling the program to fix this problem."

"The program?" Do they mean that I need to reinstall the PowerPoint Viewer? Or do I need to download gdiplus.dll from somewhere? When I click "OK," I get the error one more time and then the PPT opens normally - ??

OS: Win 7 64bit

 

http://pcsupport.about.com/od/findbyerrormessage/a/gdiplus-dll-not-found-missing-error.htm

anyway you can reinstall powerpoint? or office?
also, try running the command sfc /scannow from a command prompt

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929833

 

Well, I ran sfc and it said that it fixed some corrupt files, but I'm still getting an error that says that gdiplus.dll is not on my compuer. PowerPoint and the rest of my Office 2007 programs seem to be working just fine, it appears to be the PowerPoint viewer that's having a problem. I guess I'll try re-installing the viewer program tomorrow and see if that fixes the problem

 

Rats... I re-installed PPTVIEW.EXE and I'm still getting the error - any ideas?

 

Uninstall PowerPoint viewer and go directly through PowerPoint?

 

I uninstalled PPTVIEWER and now when I double-click the attachment in Outlook, nothing happens. PowerPoint will start up if I start it manually, but double-clicking a PPS file does not start PowerPoint.

 

What happens if you right click and select open?

 

Nothing happens - I realized that somehow the association to PowerPoint had been lost, so I re-established that association and now double-clicking a PPS will indeed open PowerPoint - not as good as opening the slide show viewer, but I guess it'll work.

The thing that really bothers me is that GDIPLUS.EXE is not installed - I'm worried that some other program may need it. But I cannot find anywhere to download it (except for the "DLL Downloader" websites that are frequently bogus). I don't know what GDIPLUS.EXE does, but it appears from what I've read that it was replaced by DIRECT2D or something in Win 7 64 - But if that's the case, why is PPTVIEW.EXE looking for GDIPLUS.EXE? The other strange thing is that when PPTVIEW.EXE was installed, double-clicking a PPS attachment would cause the "GDIPLUS.DLL is not installed" error - TWICE - but then the PowerPoint show would start up normally. Something's just not quite right -