WIN XP HELP NEEDED. (I-D-10-T Error)

me | today | me

[Hazelwood Redneck Brain Trust]

Again I must turn to the smartest conglomeration of people I know for help.

I am running Win XP (service pack 3, I think) and have really messed up. On the task manager screen, I unintentionally did an "end process" on explorer.exe (I thought this was Internet Explorer which I do not use.)

Now I am really hosed b/c my bottom toolbar is gone, my start button is gone, all my shortcut icons on my desktop is gone. Everything is gone. I only have access to the Task Manager and Firefox. (I already had Firefox open.)

I am afraid to shut the computer down, or do much of anything else for that matter.

Can anyone here help me?

Thank you in advance! :)

[Hazelwood Redneck Brain Trust]

Oh, and I tried my recovery disk but it didnt autostart like I thought it would when I put it into the CD drive, so I dont know how to access it either.

[vet7279]

It should be ok if you reboot... If not, oooppss

[ican'tbelieveit]

Restart.

[FReepaholic]

All you need to do is reboot.

[ThunderSleeps]

I think you can hit ctl-alt-del and pop up a task launcher window. Enter “explorer” and see if it restarts. Something like that - been a while since I had to do this kind of thing.

[Shady]

Can you do a system restore?

[AppyPappy]

Reboot works. And quit killing stuff.

[Ainast]

Go back to task list. Click file run (something like that) type explorer.exe. Hit enter

[RightFighter]

Press CTRL-ALT-DEL, then click “Run” and type in “explorer.exe” and click OK.

[TheZMan]

Same as the others. Reboot is easiest, but File->Run->explorer in task manager will fix it. I did that on a regular basis intentionally whenever XP lost its mind.

[Revolting cat!]

IBTJ (In Before The Jokers!)

[Ingtar]

Windows key - R, type in Explorer at the command prompt. Hit enter. Shut down your programs and restart the computer. Running Explorer this way can be unstable.

[Hazelwood Redneck Brain Trust]

This is why I LOVE!! Free Republic.

It is indeed a beautiful conglomeration of really smart people!

I posted my problem...
waited just a few minutes...
refreshed...
there were several responses!

Oh, and it’s working again!
Thank you all again for your help!

[TomGuy]

Just reboot.

It should restore everything

[ThunderSleeps]

Should I make the obligatory “you should run Linux” comment? Or the “you should use a Mac” comment? :-)

[freedumb2003]

IIRC XP doesn’t have the built in System Restore

[American Constitutionalist]

It's ok, you only shut down a process for that session ( each and ever time you start a computer is a session ) .... just restart or reboot.
Hold the start button on the computer case until the computer shuts down.
Now, sometimes shutting down Windows suddenly without shutting down Windows properly might cause a error in Windows or your hard drive disk, but, if you don't have any other way to shut it down you have no other choice.
Once you get your computer back up and running ok, go to SCAN DISK and set up a scan disk operation when you start the computer again, now this may take some time to do, but it will scan your hard drive for errors.
I don't think you mess up or damaged your PC much, at worst ? just reinstall Windows XP again after you have backed up all your data.... besides ? if you reinstall Windows XP again you PC would run much better.

[American Constitutionalist]

Do you still see the recovery option on your screen ( while the PC is going into the BIOS screen ) like pushing the F-10 or F-9 button for setup or recovery ?
It sounds like your driver(s) for your CD drive took a dump or is lost/ or corrupted.
The CD you do have ? check out it's physical condition ? are there scratches on it ? is it clean ? maybe the Laser in your CD drive is dirty ? it could be many things.
Hopefully ? you still have a recovery partition still on your PC and you might be able to access it.
If you have not shut down the PC, please do, then ? with a paper clip put it in the small hole on front of the CD drive and push carefully, that will open the CD drive physically.
Put the Restore disk in it and start the PC again, hopefully it will read the CD drive again... make sure your recovery disk is not damaged in anyway like dust on it, scratches, dirt on it.

[GeorgeWashingtonsGhost]

Ending a task is only SESSION-ORIENTED, not permanent! Simply Restart! If you permanently want to stop a task from running just deselect it from your Startup routine; Click ‘Start’ then toggle ‘Run...’ then enter ‘msconfig’ then toggle ‘Startup’ then deselect unwanted processes.

[Lucky9teen]

I see nobody made the “are you logged in?” comment....