Problems with IE8

WinXP Home SP3 - there are a few problems with IE8. First, when you go to Control Panel > Internet Options > Advanced tab, the window with all the check boxes is totally empty (see screen shot below). Second, when surfing the web, I'm accustomed to right-clicking on a link (on a Google search results page, for example) and then selecting "Open in new tab"; but "Open in new tab" is not one of the options (it's not even listed), and selecting "Open in new window" does nothing, as if I didn't click on anything.

I have tried numerous repairs: Dial-A-Fix (which doesn't work completely with IE8 ), a little program called Complete Internet Repair, I've tried these repair scripts, I've re-registered a bunch of DLL files from the command prompt, I tried to re-install IE8 but was told that it was not able to remove the old version, etc. None of this has worked, obviously. Any suggestions will be appreciated.

Thanks!

 

Does this reg fix work?

http://windowsxp.mvps.org/ieblank.htm

 

@ tgell: :confused The link you posted results in a "Service Unavailable HTTP Error 503".....

 

It came up okay for me. And I did a refresh and got the 503 :confused
I clicked it the first time and got the reg file as a text page. Then I tried to download and could not. I will keep trying to get the reg file.

Page said this.

When you open Internet Options and click the Advanced tab, none of the options may be displayed. This problem occurs if the following key (or some of it's subkeys) are deleted from the registry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Microsoft \ Internet Explorer \ AdvancedOptions

Method 1

For Windows XP, download and apply this REG. This REG file restores the entire AdvancedOptions key. If you have installed Windows in a different path, edit the REG file with Notepad and update the correct paths (and drive-letter) in the file.


Method 2

Click Start, Run and type this command

regsvr32 /n /i inetcpl.cpl

The missing options are now restored. This method works in Windows 9x systems as well.


Edit: I got the reg file. You might want to take a cruse through it. I am not sure if there is a difference in this key between internet versions. And, the site did not say if this was for a particular version or not.

 

I read some stuff about the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Microsoft \ Internet Explorer \ AdvancedOptions registry key also, but there are SO MANY sub keys in there that I decided to not mess with it. I'm in the middle of another repair attempt right now, if it doesn't work, I'll try the ZIP you attached and/or Method 2....

THX!

 

Problem solved - I ended up using nLite to build a custom XP Home SP3 install CD with IE8 built in to it, then I simply performed a standard repair install. Worked perfectly! I generally try to avoid repair installs because in cases where Windows is REALLY messed up, a repair install can actually make things worse, and I prefer to fix the problem and learn something in the process instead of simply reload the OS....

Thanks for the info tgell! I didn't actually get to try it out today, but I'm going to bookmark this thread and save the ZIP you attached above... I know I'll need it again!