Monday, November 24, 2008

Windows can't find explorer.exe

I have had problems with explorer.exe not running.  The machine would boot up however no desktop.  If you tried to run explorer.exe from the task manager nothing would happen.

After doing some exploring, I had discovered that a registry entry was added to the

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image Execution Options\

The entry was a "debugger" key causing the explorer.exe to stop functioning upon execution.  Once I deleted the debugger key, everything started functioning.

NOTE: this is a registry fix so BACKUP before you attempt to make this change!

To fix this issue you will need to make a quick change to the registry.

  1. Start run command prompt: Regedit
  2. Go to registry area: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image Execution Options\
  3. Find the Key: Debugger and delete this key by right clicking over the Debugger key and click Delete.
  4. Now if you execute the explorer.exe from the windows folder everything will work fine.

If you are new to Regedit I would highly suggest that you backup the registry before you perform this operation.

Later, I have also discovered later that this was the cause of a virus and to ensure this virus was totally removed you should perform these functions after the restore has been fixed.

  1. Temporarily Disable System Restore
  2. Update the virus definitions
  3. Reboot computer into SafeMode [F8 Key on Bootup]
  4. Run a full system scan and clean/delete all infected file(s)
  5. Check the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image Execution Options\ area and remove all entries.
  6. Reboot the computer and re-enable system restore.
  7. As an added precaution I also removed all prior system restores.

 

Thursday, June 5, 2008

Open Lotus files from Excel (KB 938810)

We have installed Office 2003 Service Pack and now when trying to open Lotus files from within Excel I get an error, "You are attempting to open a file type that is blocked by your registry policy setting".

Here is what I did to fix this error: THIS IS A REGISTRY FIX SO MAKE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU ARE DOING!!!

To enable Excel 2003 to open files in earlier Excel file types, follow these steps:

  1. Exit Excel 2003.
  2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.
  3. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
  4. HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Excel\Security
  5. After you select the subkey that is specified in step 3, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click Key.
  6. Type FileOpenBlock, and then press ENTER.
  7. With the FileOpenBlock subkey selected, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click DWORD Value.
  8. Type LotusandQuattroFiles, and then press ENTER.
  9. Right-click LotusandQuattroFiles, and then click Modify.
  10. In the Value data box, type 0, and then click OK.
  11. Repeat steps 6 through 9 for the LegacyBinaryFiles registry entry and for the LegacyDatabaseAndDatasourceFiles registry entry.
  12. On the File menu, click Exit to exit Registry Editor.

To enable Excel 2003 to save files in earlier Excel file types, follow these steps:

  1. Exit Excel 2003.
  2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.
  3. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
  4. HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Excel\Security
  5. After you select the subkey that is specified in step 3, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click Key.
  6. Type FileSaveBlock, and then press ENTER.
  7. With the FileSaveBlock subkey selected, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click DWORD Value.
  8. Type LotusandQuattroFiles, and then press ENTER.
  9. Right-click LotusandQuattroFiles, and then click Modify.
  10. In the Value data box, type 0, and then click OK.
  11. Repeat steps 6 through 9 for the LegacyBinaryFiles registry entry and for the LegacyDatabaseAndDatasourceFiles registry entry.
  12. On the File menu, click Exit to exit Registry Editor.

There are also other files type effected as well so see this link (Information about certain file types that are blocked after you install Office 2003 Service Pack 3 ) for additional file type details.

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Microsoft Word 2007 won't close correctly

I had installed BlackBerry Desktop Software to use my BlackBerry Perl on my Vista HP Tablet PC.  After the install Microsoft Word 2007 would not close correctly.  It kept trying to recover the opened document and then corrupt the document save.

After researching Microsoft's site this fixed the problem.

Note that this is a registry fix so BACKUP before you attempt to make this change!

Start Regedit.
Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\Data
Right click on the "Data" folder and delete it.
Close Regedit.