You'll need to find person with xp home disk, because I pretty sure you don't have to enter a activation code if your just install over original the install (I could be wrong)

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tst sorry thought you had to log in first when you reboot. It sounds like you had spyware or even virus somehow. This happened to me last week when I installed a program lost my desktop completely. What I did is rebooted pressed f8 and selected safe mode. then i went in to start run typed msconfig i changed the start up to normal load all start up items, devices etc. Applied and exited.. If you can get in that way I would run Adaware immediately and a virus scan. Good Luck to you

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Robbie: i'm gonna try as you outlined above but question. when you booted into safe mode, did you have a desktop in safe mode? or, as with me, it's the same where all you have is your wallpaper? i can tell you that about a week before this i had some concerns regarding the "mydoom" virus & i downloaded the little program from norton & it said i was clean. i run adaware & spybot S&D on a more than regular basis. as a matter of fact, i'm a spybot S&D user from just about day one when it came out & i had a 'Marketscore' spybot problem on my windows 98se that took me down to a C: & no windows for about a month a half till i figured it out with major help from patrick kolla & his wonderful program. been singing it's praises to everyone who'll listen ever since. i run it at least everyday... sometimes 2 or 3 depending on how much surfing i've been doing. i would've sworn i had everything zipped up as tight as i possible. have tested regularly at Steve Gibson's site & others. i surely don't know how something could've slipped through but as we all know, with these marvels of technology, anything & everything's possible. back when i was using win98se, i found myself using msconfig & other such utilities to stomp out fires tirelessly, but in the almost year i've been using winXP i've had relatively few problems. so few that i'm ashamed to say i just kicked back & enjoyed the ride for a change instead of delving into it's functionality. but then 'necessity is the mother of invention' or something like that! lol for some reason i didn't think winXP utilitized msconfig. is it the same as in 98se? anything i should know before jumping in feet first. i will have to access it by way of >Task Mgr>file>run...which is why i was asking whether you had a desktop in safemode or not. do you foresee any problems? ...i just read that & thought to myself--as if any of us could or do with windows! lol i am so grateful for your help. but then again, 'misery loves company'. ok ok it's cliche' day. sorry, once i get started my brain wants to stay in that mode...anything not to be in 'computer problem mode'! brain fry! it's such a drag navigating without explorer! it's been a week now & it's driving me crazy!! so your time, energy & commradarie is, as i said, so very very appreciated. oh just remembered stuff i tried that i should tell you about. i tried to setup a new user account to see if it would open normally. couldn't access the 'user account'...is it applet? i got the window to open but just like on the 'organize favorites' nothing is in the box. also like that on the 'explorer bar' no foldertree, etal. i seem able to open most of the control panel components separately...i know i was able to open the internet cpl & display cpls. tried changing the display settings like wallpaper & theme & such to see if that helped but in my heart i know this has got something to do with the shell...& maybe the java machine? whatever it is that runs these scripts. well that's all i can add from messing around with it earlier today. will check in after a bit to see if anyone's posted more. later...tst :0 sorry for the length, i tend to babble on...

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