System restore problem - profile error

[Sillywabbit]

Hi, hope somebody can help me out.

I'm running XP home ed. on an AMD machine.

Promlem is: Last night I was messing around with windows icons and messed things up a little. I thought, no problem, I will just system restore. So I did, and that's when my problems started It did not restore to the day before, as wanted. It came up with this!

"Windows cannot load the locally stored profile. Possible causes of this error include insufficient security rights or a corrupt local profile. If this problem persists, contact your network administrator.


DETAIL - The system has attempted to load or restore a file into the registry, but the specified file is not in a registry file format."

I tried to undo but it stillc ame up with the same message. Now EVERY time I boot into windows it tells me this. I have to configure everything again, each time I load windows. Background. email connection and everything! All my bookmarks, adress book, emails and some files are gone. I can't think what has gone wrong. The only one thing that I can think of is a problem with reg, as mentioned in error msg. I had recently used a program to clean the reg, so maybe??? I tried going into the reg program to restore the back up, guess what? It's gone.

What can I do???? Many thanks in advance!!

Martin

[Play_The_0dds]

do a on-line virus scan and make sure you dont have a virus.
http://www.pandasoftware.com/actives..._principal.htm
if you dont have a virus, restart the computer, as soon as the power starts back tap the F8 key until the boot menu appears. select safe mode and see if you can select a different date and restore.

[Sillywabbit]

Hi, and thank you for the repley

I don't have a virus. I have a firewall in place and AVG is updated and checked every day. I checked anyway, I don't have a virus

As I said, thank you for the reply But I don't see how your suggestion would help As I can alreadly select any date and time for system restore, that's not the problem.

Problem is, whatever date/time I select for restore, it won't work. It boots and I get the error msg that I posted before!

I created another account and that seems fine. Maybe I could just get XP to boot up this user profile in place of the other? It would be a pain but I could live with it. Better than a re-install

Thanks again for the help. It's driving me crazy! I'm getting really agitiated! Somebody better help before I throw PC out of the window, hunt bill gates down and drink his blood

Regards
Martin

[Play_The_0dds]

i understand you have a good anti virus, and firewall. i also see that many virus get by norton, mcafee, f-secure, pc cillin,avg,rav,......and many others everyday. not that they are bad programs, just nothing is fool proof. going by what you posted was just wanting to rule out the possibility of a virus first. you may not have one, but it is good to make sure before much time is spent, and suggestions made that would cause worse problems if a virus was there and we overlooked it. you can put your files in the shared file directory, create a new user account for yourself, once you are sure everything you need is there, delete the old one, agreed that is better then a reinstall.

[Sillywabbit]

Hi

Thanks again for the reply. Which files would I need to put into that directory? Also, where is the exact location of the directory that I need to put those files into?

I have, and using at the moment, A new user account called sillywabbit. So I could use this new account?

Sorry, I know a little about computers but not in depth

Regards
Martin

[Play_The_0dds]

if you go to, start, my computer, on that screen, at the top you will see the shared files directory. you can put your files in there to move them to the other account. things you will want to move will be any music, pictures,folders, documents you made or added. then you will want to go to my computer, double click the C: drive select documents and settings(you may have to show the contents of the drive and some sub folders,just click the show files link) now at the top of the window click tools,folder options, view, then check show hidden files. now go to the orriginal account name folder.you will find you favorites(internet explorer favorites) you can copy can copy the cookies if you want, you will need to put them in the same folder on the new account. as for emails, if you use outlook outlook express or other email that downloads mail to you drive, make a free hotmail, netscape, or other free webmail account and foward a copy of all you mails you want to keep to it. that way you have a copy saved on the net at all times.

[Sillywabbit]

OK, I think I got that.

Once all that is done, I can delete all the other profiles, including my main one, and then next time windows boots it will automatically boot with the new profile?

Thanks,
Regards
Martin