Established users revert back to "new user"

[Woodnwine]

Hello,

I have XP Pro, SP 2 with all updates. I use Avast, Spybot, and Adaware. I
have one pc with 4 users set up with different logins. It has been this way
for at least 2 years.

Lately, two users profiles have defaulted to "new users". In other words,
all setting have vanished and when logging in to one of those two users, it
appears as if you are setting up a user for the first time. I go into
Explorer and can see the original user, with all files in tact, but the user
isn't pointing to the settings.

I have created new users and copied all of the old settings to the new users
and this will "fix" the problem. But recently, this happened a second time.
I can't figure it out.

I have run the above stated programs, but really don't find anything.

Can anyone give a helping hand?

Thank you,

Alex

 

[Mark L. Ferguson]

I would try Error Checking the drive. Rightclick drive icon in Explorer,
Properties, Tools tab.

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[Woodnwine]

Mark,

I ran Chkdsk as you suggested. This had no effect. Do you have any other
suggestions?

Thanks,
Alex

 

[M.I.5¾]

Hello,

I have XP Pro, SP 2 with all updates. I use Avast, Spybot, and Adaware. I
have one pc with 4 users set up with different logins. It has been this
way
for at least 2 years.

Lately, two users profiles have defaulted to "new users". In other words,
all setting have vanished and when logging in to one of those two users,
it
appears as if you are setting up a user for the first time. I go into
Explorer and can see the original user, with all files in tact, but the
user
isn't pointing to the settings.

I have created new users and copied all of the old settings to the new
users
and this will "fix" the problem. But recently, this happened a second
time.
I can't figure it out.

I have run the above stated programs, but really don't find anything.

Can anyone give a helping hand?

I have observed this behaviour before. The users profile remains on the PC
and is intact. What seems to happen is that Windows somehow doesn't like
the profile and creates a new one from the default profile. Thus two
profiles appear, the old called '<accountname>' and the new called
'<accountname>.001'. The old profile can be copied into the new, but if
the new one then gets disliked, the process repeats. I do not know what
causes this, but it is quite possible that you reason is very different to
mine.

 

[John John (MVP)]

If the profile is corrupt you should not copy the Ntuser.dat,
Ntuser.dat.log and Ntuser.ini files to the new profile.

If you experience repeated corruption running the User Profile Hive
Cleanup Service (UPHClean) may help.

John