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Help and Supprt

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I have two machines running Win XP (SP2 & SP3)What happened to my Help and Support? When I click on it nothing happens. I have started and restarted the service in services and it still will not come up.

11 replies

by rob miners

You cannot open Help and Support Center in Windows XP

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/888018/en-us

SYMPTOMS

When you click Help and Support on the Start menu in Microsoft Windows XP, you may experience one of the following symptoms:? You receive an error message that is similar to the following error message:

Windows cannot find HELPCTR.EXE

? The My Computer window appears so that you can locate the HELPCTR.EXE file.

CAUSE

This behavior occurs if a registry key is missing or corrupted.

RESOLUTION

Important This section, method, or task contains steps that tell you how to modify the registry. However, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For added protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
322756 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/322756/) How to back up and restore the registry in Windows

To resolve this issue, you must modify the registry. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, click Run, type Regedit, and then click OK.

2. Locate the following registry subkey:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths\HELPCTR.EXE

If this registry subkey does not exist, right-click the following registry subkey, click New, click Key, type HELPCTR.EXE, and then press ENTER:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths

3. In the left pane, click HELPCTR.EXE, in the right pane, right-click (Default), click Modify, in the Value data box, type C:\WINDOWS\PCHealth\HelpCtr\Binaries\HelpCtr.exe, and then click OK.

4. Quit Registry Editor, and then restart your computer.

Let us know how you get on.

by yntbom

Great suggestion; looked at the registry and everything looks okay. Still no success.

by rob miners

Try this in Safe Mode.

1.

Download HijackThis

http://aumha.org/downloads/hijackthis.exe

It will help you to both identify and remove any hijackware/spyware with
assistance from an expert. Don't try to fix anything just yet. Post your hijackthis log
to an appropriate forum and follow their instructions.

http://forums.spywareinfo.com/lofiversion/index.php/
http://forums.spybot.info/forumdisplay.php?f=22
http://castlecops.com/forum67.html
http://forums.subratam.org/index.php?showforum=7
http://aumha.net/viewforum.php?f=30

Helpful Sites

Checking for Help with Hijackware
http://aumha.org/a/parasite.htm
http://aumha.org/a/quickfix.htm
http://aumha.net/viewtopic.php?t=5878
http://wiki.castlecops.com/Malware_R...:_Introduction
http://mvps.org/winhelp2002/unwanted.htm
http://inetexplorer.mvps.org/data/prevention.htm
http://inetexplorer.mvps.org/tshoot.html
http://www.mvps.org/sramesh2k/Malware_Defence.htm
http://defendingyourmachine2.blogspot.com/
http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/...moving_Malware

2.

The Key is to find out the Name of the Virus. Once you have that you can use Google to find the Removal Tools. From another PC download and install these two programs and copy the the installed folders to a USB Stick.

Download Spybot - Search & Destroy 1.5.2 and install it. Update it. http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html

Download Sophos and the latest IDE Files. Install it and extract the IDE files to the C:\SAV32CLI folder.
http://www.sophos.com/support/knowledgebase/article/13251.html

Copy and paste the below two lines into Notepad and save the file to the USB Stick as sophos.bat, it will scan and remove. When it has finished check the Log File for the names of anything that can't be removed.

===============================

CD SAV32CLI

SAV32CLI -REMOVE -P=C:\REMOVLOG.TXT

===============================

3.

I would try sfc /scannow and see if that fixes it.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310747

by yntbom

Thanks for the info; the registry looks okay, but the help and support still will not load. One of those small things that make you wonder what else is being affected.

by yntbom

I have Help and Support, it just will not open. I have tried the registry edit and nothing is working. It acts as if there is a pop up blocker; when I click on it, nothing happens.

by jaqui

just another mis tagged post screwing up the navigation by tags.

by rob miners

Check that the Help and Support service is running.

Click Start, Run and type services.msc and press Enter or click OK.

In the the right hand pane scroll down until you see Help and Support. Make sure that the Status is Started. If it says Disabled double click on it and select Automatic for the startup type and then click on Start to start the service. Click Apply and OK.

< speel chuker >

by older mycroft

After you click on 'Start' in services.msc, are you clicking 'APPLY' before you click on 'OK' ?

by jdclyde

security, it management, linux, vpn, hardware, networking, none of these have anything to do with your topic.

Didn't put much thought into your post, did you?

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