I'm running Windows XP. Last night I was messing around with a USB game controller and inadvertently deleted what I now believe to be a vital USB driver. I think it was called something like libusb. This morning when I turn on my computer, none of the USB ports work at all. SO my question is, how do I go about reinstalling the USB drivers considering I have no way of actually interacting with Windows? If it helps, I have Mini XP on a CD and the USB works fine with that, so it's definitely a problem with the drivers on the main XP.
I never mentioned that when I say none of the USB ports work, I mean literally nothing will work on them. No keyboards, mouse etc
Look at the links below. The first is instructions on performing a repair installation of WinXP. The second one gives information on libusb.
Thanks, I'm actually halfway trough a Repair install at the moment. I've installed Windows plenty of times before, but I'm unfamiliar with Repair installs. From what I can gather by Googling it, it just replaces all Windows files, including drivers, but doesn't actually install another Windows. Would this be correct? Also, does it affect my previous programs and configurations in any way?
A repair install will overwrite the Windows install but leave programs and personal files intact. You may need to install service packs, updates and newer versions of IE.
Oh ok that's fine. Thank you for your help, hopefully this will solve the problem!
Now you know better than to delete system files.
Ok the Repair Install worked great, I'm posting this from the computer that was giving me trouble. But now I actually have another problem.... Earlier I tried to do a system restore using Mini XP to see if it would restore the driver (obviously it didn't work). I restored it to a point that was made about 3 days ago. However, within those past three days I had configured the login screen to show an Administrator account along with my regular account (which was called GF). Now, after the repair installation, when I log into GF it shows the desktop as it appeared on the Administrator account. And for some reason, all the files that were on my desktop and in My Documents are gone. I've looked all over my C: drive, in all the user folders, but I can't find them anywhere. My "C:\Documents and Settings\GF\Desktop" folder is empty. I don't see why a repair install would have done this, so I'm assuming it has something to do with the System Restore.
Try going back and UNDOING the system restore. Anytime a system restore does not do what you want it to do you should undo it. Best to undo it immediately. See if that works, needs to be done anyway.
That's the first thing I tried, but all the restore points are gone since I repaired Windows. I googled around a bit, and apparently repair installations erase all files in My Documents and Desktop anyway. I don't think there's anything I can do to restore them
Repair install should not wipe out the files in My Documents. Are you sure you performed a repair installation? I may be that you need to take ownership of the files/ folders in WinXP. View the link below to learn how.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308421
If you are not logged in as the same user the files were created under then they may not show at all.
Yeah I'm logged on as GF, which has Administrator permissions. It's also the profile I always use, so the files were created using it. As for the repair installation, I don't know what I did wrong. I put in the Windows install disk, pressed Enter to start the setup, chose the partition, and pressed R to Repair. It then continued as if it were doing a regular XP install. I see on the link you gave me that it says to exit Setup if the Repair option isn't available, but it definitely was.
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