I have been haveing problems with my version of Photoshop. When I try to open it, the program will not run: the background screen will appear (with the toolbar saying "File" etc) but the components will not load up and the program freezes. Task Manager sees it as not responding. Some times, it loads once I close down a program (remove my flash drive, close down Firefox). When I run the same program on an old laptop running Windows 98, it loads just splendidly (much quicker than in XP). This leads me to think it might be due to me running the program on XP. Any ideas on how to fix this? It is hurting production for my projects that need this program.

If you're still trying to install version 5.02, I think that is your problem. I don't believe that old of a version will even install in XP. Don't squat with your spurs on!

Verison 5 will install and run just fine on Windows XP, based in experiance in a larger (newspaper) enviroment. Did you actually install the version 5 on Windows 98, or is this a supposedly self contained program folder that you got off the Internet and you copy the folder from the XP computer to the 98 computer? Aside from that, you can try trashing the preferances file, a common cause of hangs in Photoshop, or at least that version era as I remember, and see if that resolves it. Assume that I already did an Internet search.

Actually, the program is a downloaded copy. It still works just fine in my laptop with Win 98. I can't seem to find the preferences file. I did try renaming and later deleting a file called "Adobe Photoshop 5 Prefs.psp", but that didn't do anything. What other tricks are there?

I've relieved the problem somewhat: now I'm using CCleaner to keep the registry files uncluttered. My copy seems to be running more smoothly and even loading faster now. Not being on the internet before hand also seems to help.