blank desktop

[Stepadery]

I’m running XP Pro.
I was organizing several saved files I have had stored for a while to burn them on cd for backup copies. There was one zipped file that had a virus on it, my antivirus program caught it and quarantined it. I thought. Don’t know if the is the problem or not.
When I started my computer several hours later the default logon screen came up (I was not using that before this problem) so I entered my user name and password (I have the administrator account).
Now my computer starts but I do not have any icons on my desktop. I hit (Ctrl,Alt,Delete) keys and the task manager shows up on my desktop. Cannot get access to any programs, no start menu. I have tried starting in safe mode and using “start using last known” and it boot up to the same blank desktop. Can someone help?

[HAL9000]

Is your virus scanner up to date? If not, update it and do another scan, or try scanning at http://housecall.antivirus.com . You can also try doing a system restore to a previous date where everything was fine.

[Stepadery]

HAL9000

My antivirus is up to date as of Monday.
I cannot get to any programs when it boots to the blank desktop.
About the only thing I can get to is the C: prompt but I have no idea what commands to type in to do a system restore or repair the registry. Is there not commands for these and somehow to repair system files without damage to original files?


Step

[HAL9000]

So you can't even get to the start menu at all? You may want to try booting from your XP CD and do a repair installation or run chkdsk.

[Stepadery]

Hal

Could you give me a quick walk through of the procedure of both?

[Stepadery]

Thanks to everyone with the responses!
The virus that I mentioned was the (W32DSS.Trojan). My antivirus program stopped it from opening and I quarantined it.
I posted on a few forums. Got several different suggestions on how to take care of the problem. Sorted through them and tried them in the order of which I thought would do less damage and used it first. This is the order in which I tried:
1. sfc /scannow – Did not help
2. Ctrl+Alt+Del to Task Manager I typed in (explorer.exe) in and it did populate my desktop. However the resolution and color quality was terrible. Color quality was 4 bit and screen resolution was 800x600 and could not adjust either. While I had access to my programs I went on to #3.
3. System Restore – Did not help (Had only one prior day saved restore point) Rebooted after this and went back to the original problem.
4. Was suggested that I do the following, which I did: Run regedit, check the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon has an entry Shell with a value Explorer.exe (Shell=Explorer.exe). The shell value there was for the startup of Norton Antivirus. I then changed the value to Explorer.exe exited out of Regedit rebooted and it did boot up to my desk top with the poor color quality and screen resolution. Maybe that’s where the virus comes in because, it’s my understanding that it adds to or replaces that registry key value with a (openme.exe) value.
5. It’s taking a little longer to boot up now but it seems like all programs are running fine. I still have the color quality/screen resolution problem but I’m thinking about deleting my graphics card drivers and reinstalling them.
Any thoughts?

[rw187]

Hello. I'm a newbie and I'm having the same problems using Win 2000 pro. Lost all desktop shortcuts, start menu, task bar, and every function with windows. I can only open programs via task manager.
Is there something wrong with my registry?

No Virus check
Hard drive is at max capacity

confused:

[BearEater]

in the task manager,go to File->New-> type
explorer
you should see start menu and desktop. the temporary solution is to plut explorer in startup menu.
but re-installing is the best (or the worst:P)

[Miz]

I'll throw this in for what it's worth....I've experienced the "blank desktop on boot" problem several times after a clean install. In all three instances, it was a video card/driver problem. Apparently, the standard VGA drivers weren't playing nicely with the card and, since they couldn't agree, they refused to display anything but a blank desktop....or something.

I booted into Safe Mode and set the color and resolution to the lowest available (which ends up making everything so large the OK button wasn't visible so had to navigate to it with the tab key), then rebooted into Normal mode where I could install the correct drivers for the video card. The problem disappeared...until a year or so later when I'd perform a clean install on any one of those machines...then I had to do that routine all over again.