Adobe Reader will not launch in XP Home Edition SP 2

[Guest]

Just bought a new desktop with XP Home Edition, Serv Pack 2. Have downloaded
and installed Adobe Reader 8.x. System "says" installed correctly and shows
desktop shortcut, but when double click on .pdf files, hour glass appears for
second or 2, then goes away. No file open happens. Tried old versions of
Adobe Reader (7.0.1), exact same results. No error messages displayed
either. So far, this is the only program I am having problems with.

 

[Maincat]

Just bought a new desktop with XP Home Edition, Serv Pack 2. Have
downloaded
and installed Adobe Reader 8.x. System "says" installed correctly and
shows
desktop shortcut, but when double click on .pdf files, hour glass appears
for
second or 2, then goes away. No file open happens. Tried old versions of
Adobe Reader (7.0.1), exact same results. No error messages displayed
either. So far, this is the only program I am having problems with.

Have you got the pdf associated with Reader?
Control Panel - Folder Options - File Types

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

Just bought a new desktop with XP Home Edition, Serv Pack 2. Have
downloaded
and installed Adobe Reader 8.x. System "says" installed correctly and
shows
desktop shortcut, but when double click on .pdf files, hour glass appears
for
second or 2, then goes away. No file open happens. Tried old versions of
Adobe Reader (7.0.1), exact same results. No error messages displayed
either. So far, this is the only program I am having problems with.

Try this:
- Copy a sample .pdf file to c:\Test.pdf
- Click Start / Run / cmd {OK}
- Type these commands:
assoc .pdf > c:\test.txt {Enter}
notepad c:\test.txt (Enter}
- Report the contents of c:\test.txt
- While still in black screen of the Command Prompt,
type this command and report what you see on the
screen:
c:\Test.pdf

 

[Guest]

Maincat, yes PDF file types are associated to Adobe Reader.

 

[Guest]

Pegasus:
Results of command "notepad c:\test.txt"
Window with the message, ".pdf = AcroExch.Document"
Results of command "c:\test.pdf"
nothing

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

Something appears to block the Acrobat reader on your machine.
It might be your firewall, your anti-virus software or some
malware. Disconnect your machine from the Internet, temporarily
disable your virus scanner and firewall, then try again.

 

[Guest]

Did all 3: disconnected the internet, turned off my virus software and turned
off the firewall. (Scanned for spyware and viruses first however - none
found.) Exactly the same outcome. Two interesting symptoms: 1. same happens
for older versions of Adobe Reader all the way back to 5.x, and 2. every now
and then when trying to launch the reader by clicking on a pdf file I get
that Mictosoft message stating that the program has a problem, then it
presents me with the "send a report to Microsoft" option. I always say yes,
but don't expect to see much from them.

Thanks for your continued suggestions... I'm lost!

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

I have run out of ideas. If this was my machine then I would
either use System Restore (if the problem occurred after a
specific date) or else I would reload Windows from scratch.