Windows XP SP2 Problems

[Guest]

I gave my friend my old computer with Windows XP SP2, Microsoft Explorer 7
with Outlook Express.

One day last week she put the computer on and walked away with her logon
screen on the monitor.

When she came back the screen was blank and nothing worked. She turned it
off and when It came back on and she signed on, some of her icons were
missing.

Her background and screen saver were gone. She went into properties to
change it back and it would not accept it.

I went to her house and did the following.

I opened START and noticed that all the icons on the left side were also gone.

I opened Programs from the START and the programs associated with the
missing icons were not listed.

I opened Computer and the Programs were there. I added a missing icon, but
when I restarted the computer, it was gone again.

Her AT&T internet dial up would not function, I could not even restore it.

I tried to System Restore, but it would not work on any of the avail. days.
Now there are none left.

I inserted the XP CD and did a Repair, but received errors of bad, missing
or corrrupt DLLs.

I managed to copy some of them and they all seemed to be connected to
Outlook Express and Microsoft Internet Explorer

They are: directdb.dll inetcomm.dll msoe.dll wab32.dll



I am going to try to back up her Outlook Express to a cd if I can, and then
I will reinstall Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 and see if it works.

If it does, I will then insert the XP CD and again try to Repair windows
and see if more errors pop up. I am sure there are more DLLs, since I am
having ICON problems unless Outlook caused her computer to go crazy.

She has a very bad habit of turning off her computer while still logged on
the AT&T , while in the middle of receiving emails.



What do you think?

Am I going about it the right way?

I will try anything to avoid reformating and starting from scratch.



Thank you

 

[JS]

How does she turn off the PC, with the power on/off button or Start/Turn Off
Computer? If she uses the power button then you can expect more problems.

JS

 

[Guest]

I have it set up so that the cpu and monitor is always on and all she has to
do is turn off one switch on her surge protector.
When she switches on, the CPU and monitor come on.

 

[peter]

Before you do that and after you admonish this person and show her how to
correctly shut down run a chkdsk ....
then do the system file checker from the recovery console........sfc
/scannow
This would replace all missing dll's from the XP installation.
peter

 

[Guest]

I am sorry, I just realized what you asked. I trained her turn off computer
from the start, but as I said before, she is thick headed and forgets what I
said and when she cannot get out of her emails because they are taking a long
time, she shuts it off from the power strip. That is why she has this
problem. I just want to know how to fix it.

 

[Guest]

I am going over to her house to try it now.
Thank you
I hope it brings back my icons, etc.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

How does she turn off the PC, with the power on/off button or Start/Turn Off
Computer? If she uses the power button then you can expect more problems.

What the power button does when you press it is a settable option in
Control Panel | Power Options. The default action is an orderly
shutdown, not an abrupt loss of power, and does not cause problems.