Missing M.E. files

I am currently communicating with my laptop trying to fix
a problem with my DESKTOP, that uses Windows M.E. At
startup, the Windows Welcome Screen appears, but then an
error message appears:
"Error loading Explorer.exe. You must reinstall windows."
Clicking OK, another message appears:
"A required DLL file: WINSPOOL.DRV was not found."
Clicking OK did nothing.
Using Ctrl-Alt-Del to bring up the close program box, I
was able to close the two programs shown there, but I
could still not shut down, so I just shut the main switch.
Rebooting using the Emergency Boot Disk, I was able to
see that all of my files on two hard drives were
apparently okay, but I could not fine the above lost
files to replace them. Not even on the original Windows
ME cd-rom.
I then decided to reinstall Windows ME. 65% through the
installation, I got another error message:
" SUWIN An error has occurred in your application. If
you choose Ignore, you should save your work in another
file. If you choose Close, your application will
terminate."
The first time, I chose Ignore, and the installation did
not proceed. I did another restart to again reinstall
Windows ME and got the same message 65% into the
installation. This time, I chose Close, and the
installation again ended.
Could anyone please advise me how to proceed?
Thanks,

Tom,

Reinstalling Win Me is I'm sorry to say not the way to replace a missing file
and this has probably caused you far more problems than simply replacing the
missing file from the Win Me cab set.

I'll start though with your SUWIN error where I believe you have not given us
the complete message as I think you will find that just prior to the SUWIN
error there was a reference to VERX.DLL I'll then explain how you should have
replaced your missing winspool.drv file.

SUWIN (VERX.DLL) error:
You appear to be attempting to reinstall Win Me over a system where a beta or
early version of Windows Media Player 9 had previously been installed without
having first removed it - not easy I know. Boot to DOS using a floppy and
delete or rename the file WMPLOC.DLL in the windows\system folder and then try
reinstalling Win Me. This should work and now allow you to reinstall Win Me
although you may later have some problems with WMP.

It is also possible that you had installed IE6 and this also needs to be
uninstalled before (re-)installing Win Me. If this is the case you might want
to have a look at MS KB 312451 - "How to Remove Internet Explorer 6 by
Reinstalling Windows" (http://support.microsoft.com?kbid=312451) and also KB
293907 - "How to Uninstall Internet Explorer 6"
(http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=293907).

If it is now too late to remove IE6 and after completing your re-install you
have problems due to the resulting version soup between the version of IE5.5
included in the Win Me setup and IE6 please post back and I or someone else
can give some guidance as to how best to

WINSPOOL.DRV
Winspool.drv is contained in WIN_16.CAB of the Win Me cab set and can be
replaced by booting to Safe Mode and using MSConfig | General | Extract File
and following the prompts. The "cab" files are in the Win9x folder on the Win
Me CD and normally also in either Windows\Options\Cabs or
Windows\Options\Install. See MS KB 265371 - "How to Extract and Replace a
Protected File in Windows Me" (http://support.microsoft.com?kbid=265371) for
details of how to extract files from the cab set.

Winspool.drv belongs in the windows\system folder.
--
Mike Maltby MS-MVP



Tom wrote:

I am currently communicating with my laptop trying to fix
a problem with my DESKTOP, that uses Windows M.E. At
startup, the Windows Welcome Screen appears, but then an
error message appears:
"Error loading Explorer.exe. You must reinstall windows."
Clicking OK, another message appears:
"A required DLL file: WINSPOOL.DRV was not found."
Clicking OK did nothing.
Using Ctrl-Alt-Del to bring up the close program box, I
was able to close the two programs shown there, but I
could still not shut down, so I just shut the main switch.
Rebooting using the Emergency Boot Disk, I was able to
see that all of my files on two hard drives were
apparently okay, but I could not fine the above lost
files to replace them. Not even on the original Windows
ME cd-rom.
I then decided to reinstall Windows ME. 65% through the
installation, I got another error message:
" SUWIN An error has occurred in your application. If
you choose Ignore, you should save your work in another
file. If you choose Close, your application will
terminate."
The first time, I chose Ignore, and the installation did
not proceed. I did another restart to again reinstall
Windows ME and got the same message 65% into the
installation. This time, I chose Close, and the
installation again ended.
Could anyone please advise me how to proceed?
Thanks,