I've recently run into the following problem. I start a Windows 2000 machine and it stalls on a blank desktop. If I bring up task manager and stop explorer.exe and load it from the run command, the desktop appears. I see the following in regedit HKLM_run c:\winnt\system32\explorer.exe I don't remember ever seeing explorer loading this way. Any help greatly appreciated.

Remove that run entry and delete the c:\winnt\system32\explorer.exe


The valid explorer.exe is in c:\winnt\

I tried that but it poped back up.

Create a directory on your hardrive to save HijackThis.exe. A directory like c:\hijackthis. If you do not do this, you will not be able to use the backup/restore features.

Download HijackThis from:

HijackThis Download Site

Save this file into the directory you made previously and then run the program named hijackthis.exe. When the program opens click on the Config button, then click on the Misc Tools button, and click on the Check for update online button. When it completes checking/applying updates press the back button.

Now click on the Scan button and when it is finished click on the Save Log button. A Notepad window will open with the contents of this log. Click on Edit then click on Select all. Then click on Edit and then Click on Copy.

Create a reply to this post here and right click in message area and select paste to paste the log into the post.

Someone will reply to you after reading this post. DO NOT fix any entries unless you understand what you are doing.

To see a tutorial with screenshots on using HijackThis you can click on the link below:

How to use HijackThis to remove Browser Hijackers, Malware, & Spyware