Lost Desktop - please help

[Joss]

I have managed to lose my desktop.

I was working remotely from home and downloaded an .exe file and decided to
change the location of the file. When I attempted to drag the file to its
new location the desktop disappeared - just have a blue screen.

Any help is greatly appreciated

 

[Iceman]

I have managed to lose my desktop.

I was working remotely from home and downloaded an .exe file and decided to
change the location of the file. When I attempted to drag the file to its
new location the desktop disappeared - just have a blue screen.

Bring up Task manager and then do a File > New Task, and enter
explorer.exe /systray
This should reinitialize the desktop.

If that doesn't work:

Reboot Windows XP into Safe Mode
How to start Windows XP in Safe mode
http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2001060608000039

1) Open My Computer and navigate to C:\Windows\System32.
Search in the System32 directory for "explore.exe" or "explorer.exe"
If the file exists, delete it. NOTE: Do *not* delete "explorer.exe" from
your C:\Windows directory!
2) Go to http://housecall.trendmicro.com/ and scan your system for
virus.
3) Reboot your PC.