Why does it boot to C:\Windows\System32 in Explorer?

[M Skabialka]

I reformatted an older PC and set it up with Windows XP Pro. I added an
external Zip drive, Office XP, and network printers. Everything worked
great.

Then I decided to hook up the old scanner. I had to use the Win 98 program,
then upgrade to Win 2000 and Win XP versions, as per the HP web site. It's
a HP Scanjet 5100C. It seems to scan OK - this isn't the problem.

The problem is that ever since I installed the scanner, every time the
machine boots and anyone logs on, it opens an Explorer window into the
C:\Windows\System32 folder. This has to be closed of course since I have it
set up to not show system or hidden files, so the window doesn't show any
files anyway. Besides, it's annoying to always have to close this before
anything else can be done.

I looked in the Start Menu and it isn't started there. I looked in the
registry for "C:\Windows\System32" but there are thousands of entries.

How can I find out what makes this window open, and then make that go away?
Nothing has been added since the scanner was added.

Incidentally, this also happened when the machine was set up in Windows
2000, but I hadn't realized it started when the scanner was added.

Thanks,
Mich

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

I reformatted an older PC and set it up with Windows XP Pro. I added
an external Zip drive, Office XP, and network printers. Everything
worked great.

Then I decided to hook up the old scanner. I had to use the Win 98
program, then upgrade to Win 2000 and Win XP versions, as per the HP
web site. It's a HP Scanjet 5100C. It seems to scan OK - this isn't
the problem.

The problem is that ever since I installed the scanner, every time the
machine boots and anyone logs on, it opens an Explorer window into the
C:\Windows\System32 folder. This has to be closed of course since I
have it set up to not show system or hidden files, so the window
doesn't show any files anyway. Besides, it's annoying to always have
to close this before anything else can be done.

I looked in the Start Menu and it isn't started there. I looked in
the registry for "C:\Windows\System32" but there are thousands of
entries.

How can I find out what makes this window open, and then make that go
away? Nothing has been added since the scanner was added.

Incidentally, this also happened when the machine was set up in
Windows 2000, but I hadn't realized it started when the scanner was
added.

Thanks,
Mich

Line 260. Click on System32 Folder Opens Upon Boot:
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm

--
Ronnie Vernon
Microsoft MVP
Windows Shell/User

Please reply to the newsgroup so all may benefit.
http://www.dts-l.org
http://www.mvps.org

 

[M Skabialka]

This didn't work - it looks as though this script is looking for a "SB
Audigy 2" (maybe Sound Blaster?) entry in the registry, but this machine has
no sound card.

Any other ideas?
Thanks

 

[Nathan McNulty]

Also, this is because a value (or a couple of values) in your registry
is set to this. If you want to find it for yourself, open regedit and
it is under
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVerison\Run and
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVerison\Run . See
the string value named (Defualt), just right click on it and chose
Modify, now delete the text that is in there (should be
C:\Windows\System32) and click ok. Do the same for both and it should be
gone

Nathan McNulty

 

[M Skabialka]

Found the answer!

I noticed in MSCONFIG that there was a line where there no program name or
path, just a check. When I took the check out the System32 folder didn't
open any more. But I wanted to find out what is was. I put it back.

In looking through
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVerison\Run I didn't
see anything out of the ordinary so went back to
www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm where there I found a utility to find
out what is running and what runs at startup. In the file was an autorun
entry from the registry that said:
hpppt =

I went to the HP site and found a troubleshooting entry which said to delete
this registry key if the system32 folder opens for no reason at boot. In
Windows 98 this is a Parallel port test. I guess they took that out in the
Win2K/XP ScanJet program but didn't delete the registry entry. I deleted
the entry.

Problem solved!

Thanks for all your help!
Mich

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Greetings --

This can be caused by a blank entry, such as can be left behind by
an incomplete program removal, in the
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and/or
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run keys. It can also
be caused by an entry in these same keys that starts with a " / ."

System32 Folder Opens When Logging on to Windows
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;170086

How to Troubleshoot By Using the Msconfig Utility in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;310560


Bruce Chambers
--
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