system does not finish booting but hangs - partly

[Margo Guda]

I've just installed windows xp service pack 1, and am in the process of
moving all my applications to the new OS. Now all of a sudden when I
start the machine the task bar does not fully come up, and the hourglass
remains over it; I can see my quicklaunch toolbar but I cannot access
it, although I can run applications from another toolbar I had
installed. I can in fact access most of my stuff from a new user account
I made. I have a feeling that I know what utility is causing the
problem, but I cannot find where I can get to it to stop it from
loading. I think windowblinds is causing the trouble, and preventing
other startup apps from running, but I don't get access to where
windowblinds is loaded. It is not on the startup tab in msconfig. How
does one find such misbehaving applications in xp?

Margo Guda.

 

[gls858]

I've just installed windows xp service pack 1, and am in the process of
moving all my applications to the new OS. Now all of a sudden when I
start the machine the task bar does not fully come up, and the hourglass
remains over it; I can see my quicklaunch toolbar but I cannot access
it, although I can run applications from another toolbar I had
installed. I can in fact access most of my stuff from a new user account
I made. I have a feeling that I know what utility is causing the
problem, but I cannot find where I can get to it to stop it from
loading. I think windowblinds is causing the trouble, and preventing
other startup apps from running, but I don't get access to where
windowblinds is loaded. It is not on the startup tab in msconfig. How
does one find such misbehaving applications in xp?

Margo Guda.

As the system boots up keep tapping the F8 key. This will let
you boot to safe mode where you should be able to uninstall
the suspect program.

gls858

 

[Rich Barry]

Margo, go to Start>Run type: regedit Click Ok
Navigate to Hkey_Local_Machine\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current
Version\Run, Run once etc. Open each run folder and look for WindowBlinds
entry in the rt panel. Right click and Delete if there.

 

[Margo Guda]

Rich,
Can I do this when not logged on to the offending account?

 

[Margo Guda]

I was mistaken. It's not windowblinds, but something else - I cannot
find what. I also cannot figure out how to stop the misbehaving thing.
I am now thinking it's the sequence in which apps and services are
loaded that may be causing the problem. I created a new user profile
which starts the same applications, and here I have no problem.
I had downloaded a thing called xptweaks, and the problem is there since
installing it. I have now found out that it changes memory allocations
and tries to load more of the kernel in physical memory. Where can I
change that sort of setting? Would this be limited to the one user
account I installed this from? Since I have no problem getting my system
to work correctly for other user accounts. If it's not that I'll have to
keep looking...

 

[gls858]

I was mistaken. It's not windowblinds, but something else - I cannot
find what. I also cannot figure out how to stop the misbehaving thing.
I am now thinking it's the sequence in which apps and services are
loaded that may be causing the problem. I created a new user profile
which starts the same applications, and here I have no problem.
I had downloaded a thing called xptweaks, and the problem is there since
installing it. I have now found out that it changes memory allocations
and tries to load more of the kernel in physical memory. Where can I
change that sort of setting? Would this be limited to the one user
account I installed this from? Since I have no problem getting my system
to work correctly for other user accounts. If it's not that I'll have to
keep looking...

If another account works fine then it's possible that your user account
has been corrupted. The following link explains how to create a new account
and copy over settings from your old account.

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=811151

gls858