XP PRO Help and Support not working

[see http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=82625 ]

This URL an old thread where Thai describes my symptom exactly - click Help and Support and an hour glass briefly appears twice and then nothing. Help in IE works, MS Excel help works; I have found the "head" of the help directory and can access some of the system Help via a shortcut.

My Dell came w/ Win XP Pro installed and no CD. I have the latest everything.

I've done all the things in the thread above:

1- run the downloaded file ref'ed in the thread which updates the Registry. - no joy.

2. run c:\windows\ing\phhealth.inf (rt-click select in stall). I borrowed a Windows XP Pro SP2 CD and pointed the error window (when it couldn't find a couple of files) to D:\I386. Oddly the .inf install does not fix up the directories where files are missing because when I re-ran it the same files are still missing and I have to browse again to find them. (I did a Search and found the files in other directories on my hard drive.) With either method, the install must have succeeded; however, there is no indication of that actually happening. Not at all friendly.

3. when I run the steps (copied from another link in the above thread) between the dashed lines below, I get stuck in step B at -
rmdir %windir%\pchealth\helpctr\packagestore /s /q

I get a file not found message. If packagestore and installskus are .exe files, they were not installed step 1 above. [Continue after second ------ line below.]
--------------------------
Re-Install the Help and Support service:
A. Right click this file and in the context menu select "Install" (Remember to enable hidden files and folders): %windir%\inf\pchealth.inf

B. Re-initialize the Help and Support data storage:
Press CTRL+SHIFT+ESC to start the Task Manager (TaskMgr.exe)
Select the Process-tab and stop the following processes (If they exist):

helpsvc.exe
helphost.exe
helpctr.exe

C. Open a command prompt (Press Start-button, Run... and open cmd) and perform the following commands:
net stop helpsvc
rmdir %windir%\pchealth\helpctr\packagestore /s /q
rmdir %windir%\pchealth\helpctr\installedskus /s /q
start /w %windir%\pchealth\helpctr\binaries\helpsvc /svchost netsvcs /regserver /install
start /w %windir%\pchealth\helpctr\binaries\helpsvc /register
-------------------

Ideas?

1. If the packagestore and installskus steps can be solved, maybe this will fix the problem. Or perhaps the .inf install did not complete. How to verify?

2. If not, I thought about somehow "merging" the CD with my hard drive. The Windows XP Pro SP2 CD autoruns but does not show an Upgrade choice in the splash screen as some other thread suggests. It does say Install Windows but I'm gun shy at this point. I want to insert missing files, update older files and leave newer files alone. I don't particularly want to reinstall all updates since SP2 again.

3. If not, the recent announcement for SP3 says that there is a 570Mb download from MS Support vs the 70mb download through autoupdate. With the big download, does anyone know whether this will do the merge function and basically replace my XP Pro with a shiny, new version?

My take is that some file, someplace, is missing or misplaced.

All suggestions appreciated.
Thx, Mike

 

Halo,
Thx for the quick reply.
I did the things you suggested. (have done them before too.)
a. Help and Support Service running and automatic.
b. system file check was OK - no errors reported.
c. ran the Registry update for H&S (had done this before too; also checked that the files referenced were present in respective directories)
d. reran the script above. I also got through the C. step above after I Wiki-ed the DOS rmdir cmd. The error was because the subdirectories packagestore and installedskus were not present.

I rebooted.
using Task Manager I notice that
helpsvc.exe
helphost.exe
helpctr.exe
are not running after I tried Help & Support from Start menu (again brief hourglass, pause, and another brief hourglass.)

I can get Help and Support running by using hh.exe. The first page contains a link to Help and Suport link ala the Start menu. I click it and notice in the Task Manager that HelpSvc.exe starts and then HelpCtr.exe starts. HelpCtr drops aff almost immediately, and then a few seconds (<10) later, HelpSvc drops off the screen too. Helphost does not start although all three of these are in Windows/Pchealth/Binaries.

Is there a trace log that can be used (or started) to trace the starting and stopping of these processes? Maybe a failure message will be generated.

thx, Mike