The symptoms indicate that explorer.exe, the shell, is crashing.

Blank Desktop or Illegal Operations Error Message After You Install Internet
Explorer:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=249191

Follow the procedures here =
Recovering From a Failed Internet Explorer Upgrade in Windows 98:
http://linuxactivist.blogspot.com/20...om-failed.html
or
http://snipurl.com/lfix

Especially the section at the end (with edits by me):

"If you still have boot problems after you reboot, you should use the command prompt
to edit the c:\windows\system.ini file. On the command line type: edit
c:\windows\system.ini

Once it is open, change the line shell=explorer.exe to shell=progman.exe. What you
are doing here is changing the default shell (that is having problems) from the
Windows Explorer to the old Windows Program Manager shell. Press Alt, F, S to save
the changes; then Alt, F, X to close.

(As an alternative, you may use "winfile.exe" instead of "progman.exe").

"Reboot Windows. It should now successfully boot with no errors into an empty
Program Manager shell. Use the File | Run | Browse drop down menu selection to
browse to c:\program files\internet explorer (C:\Progra~1\Intern~1) or
C:\WINDOWS\Windows Update Setup Files (C:\Windows\Window~1) and launch ie5setup.exe
or ie6setup.exe (depending on what is there). (If neither of those files can be
found, you probably did not ever install IE from a download at Windows Update. In
that case, you will need to run ie6setup.exe from the CD you had installed from).
Do a Minimal-custom install and check all the Bold faced options. When the setup
program alerts you that these files are already installed, tell it to reinstall all
of the files.

When the Internet Explorer Setup program is done and reboots, hit the F8 key to
bring up a Boot Menu. Choose Command Prompt and boot to the command prompt. Once
there, type edit c:\windows\system.ini and, once it is open, change the line
shell=progman.exe back to shell=explorer.exe. Save and exit the file. You have now
set the shell back to the original value"

If you have problems during the reinstall of IE, you can try this procedure instead:
From a startup using Program Manager as described above, click the File menu Run,
type the following and press Enter (use the upper and lower cases as shown):

For IE6:
RUNDLL32 SETUPWBV.DLL,IE6Maintenance

or for IE5.x:
RUNDLL32 SETUPWBV.DLL,IE5Maintenance

Choose the option to "Restore the previous Windows configuration" and click OK.

If that succeeds in getting you back to Windows, then follow it with an upgrade
installation back to IE6 SP1, followed by a visit to Windows Update for all relevant
critical updates.

--
Glen Ventura, MS MVP Shell/User, A+
http://dts-l.org/goodpost.htm


"irimacale via WindowsKB.com" u23512@uwe wrote in message
news:6274730fc2e71@uwe...
Well, it restored something; it changed it back to the previous log in for
windows (I had recently changed it for a different user), so I know it did
something.

But it still does the same thing: Log in, task bar comes on and goes off and
then nothing.

Noel Paton wrote:
Try Booting to DOS - if that works, use the command

SCANREG /RESTORE

pick the latest of the 5 options that precedes your problem, and reboot on
request.

I sounds like your program is not compatible with the OS, and screwed the
registry on installation - what the above does is restore the registry from
prior to the installation - you'll have to manually delete the files
involved yourself.

The program (a proprietary program) asked to reboot (I was not manning the
install) and when we rebooted and logged back into windows something very
[quoted text clipped - 11 lines]

Booting into safemode produces the same result.

--
Message posted via http://www.windowskb.com