A while back I had this same problem and River Rat helped me and got it to activate. I know it was working a few months ago because I did a system restore. If I remember correctly he had me start in the safe mode to search for the files and then re-name them. Does anyone know of this way or can help me in layman's language get my system restore up and running. Thank you

Interesting... here's the only problem I can think of now in this situation: System Restore was shut off somehow because in a time period of a couple of months, many things can happen to your computer.
Check to make sure it's turned on by doing the following:
Open up the Control Panel
Double click on the System Icon to launch it (note - you may have to switch to the classic view, to do this open the control panel, look in the section labeled Control Panel, click Switch to Classical View).
Click on the System Restore tab.
Make sure that there is NOT a check next to Turn off System Restore.

If system restore is on, do the following: Click Start
All Programs
Accesories
System Tools
System Restore

Now try restoring to an earlier point. If my answer doesn't work, please don't hesistate to post back with another question because I'm sure someone will come up with the correct solution.

Hey Dtop...try this link...microsoft msdn...I hope this is a bit more helpful... ...this is for winxp so it prolly won't help but check it out anyway...you never know...

Here is the thread from last july you are referring to dtop.

Thank you HitSquad, kenith and Elendil for you help. HitSquad just what I needed; thank you for retrieving the thread from July. How did you do it? I'm going to print it this time in case I need it in the future.

You're welcome.
Used the search function at the top of the page.