OS: W98se fully patched (except for net framework 1.1) / ~17 GB free space
(40 GB HD-D) / P4 2.0 GHz / 1 GB Sdram / IE6 SP-1 fully patched.

System was working fine, and then I decided to learn how to use Ad-Aware SE
Pro 1.05 with AdWatch. :-\\
I opened AdWatch and checked out its configurations and so forth. One option
was to permit it to run at start-up; I clicked that to see what was what,
and Regprot displayed "a new key (AdWatch) would be added to the Registry,
did I want that?" I decided no, and then also un-ticked the run AdWatch at
start-up. Not really understanding how it all worked, I decided to *close*
it after fooling with a few of its options.

When I "closed" AdWatch, it didn't close, but was then minimized to the
taskbar. No coaxing or method would actually serve to close it down. It
wasn't "running" as a process in the Systray either. It had run and was
present in Systray once (~1 week ago) when Ad-Aware SE Pro was first
installed, but I had chosen to not have it load at start-up. This was and is
the present status of AdWatch of which I am presently posting. So, anyway, I
had to Ctrl-Alt-Del AdWatch. It took a minute, but it did shut down. End of
that story.

I then tried to open other executable shortcuts, but nothing happened. I
clicked, but there was no other activity. Mind you, I have 68 desktop icons
of which 3 are "namespace" icons, 4 are "sort of temporary" but are not
shortcuts, and a few webpage shortcuts and two text files. You know how you
might temporarily place a notepad text or some saved webpage as a "create
shortcut" thing on your desktop. What I'm getting at here is that of the
several desktop icons I tried, nothing worked. I should have maybe tried
clicking every one of them, but I didn't. :-\\

Next: I then decided to re-boot and.... virtually every desktop shortcut
icon - whether they were standard OEM icons or Custom icons became the
Windows default icon. Ditto for the score of QL Toolbar icons as well.
Furthermore, all were changed to .lnk extensions. Excluded from this anomaly
were the My Computer, My Documents, Recycle Bin, Google shortcut, Teoma
shortcut, another help forum shortcut, and two or four folders which are in
C:\WINDOWS - such as an "Unzip folder", a "Desktop Folder", a "Files for
Editing folder", and the like. The latter three are not shortcuts. I was
going nuts, and became "unscientific". e.g. I should have clicked those
which still remained "normal", to see the results.

If I clicked any of the now default windows.lnk icons, it opened Filealyzer.
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/f...zer/index.html

If I R-clicked any of these shortcutsPropertiesfind target the .exe's
were also default icons but maintained their correct extensions (IIRC),
therefore a left-click wouldn't open any of these programs.

So I searched around Google for a bit (amazed that the shortcut with it's
custom icon still worked), but found but few references, "how-to's" for XP
from so other forum. Decided to forgo on those, as there wasn't anything
which pertained to W98(se).
http://www.techsupportforum.com/arch...hp/t-8664.html

Then decided to try another re-boot (2nd try), same result, but as ZoneAlarm
Pro was loading, it brought up Filealyzer again as a Zapro.lnk file analysis
GUI. Tried one more re-boot after a period of ~ 5 minutes. Same deal... No
go on the icons. Then decided to try to get into DOS, by a restart in
MS-DOS, to do a Scanreg /restore. No dice! It too brought up a Filealyzer
GUI on the DOS program! OK, I'm thinking if I keep re-booting, I'm going to
soon be running out of useful Registry backups. (??)

Eventually I get into DOS by the F8 key method, and reluctantly try for a
Scanreg /restore. Two attempts (or was it three?) failed. Grrrrrr This
seems to *always happen* at the critical moment when you need the blasted
thing !!! Anyway, the 3rd or 4th try gets me a successful Registry back-up.
gleeful But I'm still somewhat worried, as on a few occasions (too many) a
successful Registry Restore did not fix the problem I was hoping it would.
UN-gleeful

OK, so as it is re-booting, I'm sitting there with my eyes closed in the
hope that when the Machine has completed its "thing", that all would be back
to normal. To my total and utter amazement, it had performed the hoped for
miracle! VBS (That's an absolute *first!* Praise the lawd!) :-D

So, my questions, after having written this mini-novel are.... What do you
think may have happened? Aside from the course of action I had pursued, was
there any other solution to fix this? Should I ever attempt to use AdWatch
again??? G ??

Thanks,
--

LuckyStrike

The best Tweak and your ally for IE = **Disable Active Scripting**
http://www.infinisource.com/techfiles/surf-safe.html
How to make a good newsgroup post:
http://www.dts-l.org/goodpost.htm
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