# Arggh! Lost Windows 2000 Desktop **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 27, 2007, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886 "2007-02-27T16:37:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![kelly5078](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6f9a4e/32.png) [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2007, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/1 "2007-02-27T16:37:39Z")
The problem: - Brought W2K out of hibernate. - Had a normal desktop, was getting email in brower, when I lost the desktop, and all ability to interact with computer. Had a blank background screen. - Had to power cycle, obviously. - Came back with blank background screen. Actually, I get a login screen, and after I’m logged in, the screen is blank (and yes, I tried logging in as different users). - I can interact by bringing up Task Manager and starting a process, but that’s all. - Rebooting and using F5 for last good profile didn’t help (didn’t try Safe Mode, as what’s the point?) How do I get my desktop back? Do I need to do a repair installation, or is there a trick here? ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2007, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/2 "2007-02-27T20:54:56Z")
What happens if you bring up Task Manager and start explorer.exe? ---
**Author:** ![kelly5078](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6f9a4e/32.png) [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2007, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/3 "2007-02-27T23:09:51Z")
I get explorer. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2007, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/4 "2007-02-27T23:49:27Z")
[QUOTE=kelly5078] I get explorer. [/QUOTE] Explorer is the desktop. Are you typing explorer.exe, or iexplore.exe? -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![kelly5078](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6f9a4e/32.png) [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2007, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/5 "2007-02-28T00:10:42Z")
Have to recheck after I get home. I think I did indeed do iexplore. I thought explorer.exe was the file manager, though. Anyway, I’ll know in an hour or so. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2007, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/6 "2007-02-28T01:22:14Z")
[QUOTE=kelly5078] Have to recheck after I get home. I think I did indeed do iexplore. I thought explorer.exe was the file manager, though. Anyway, I’ll know in an hour or so. [/QUOTE] Well, in windows XP explorer.exe is Windows’ GUI. Maybe different in windows 2000. -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![kelly5078](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6f9a4e/32.png) [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2007, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/7 "2007-02-28T02:00:38Z")
Okay, I must have done iexplore before. With explorer, I get an app error saying the instruction at blah blah could not access memory location 0x00000011. VStudio say the problem’s in ntdll.dll. Maybe just a repair install will handle the problem. I’ll try tomorrow if I can find a disk. Unless you know something further, that is. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2007, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/8 "2007-02-28T13:18:05Z")
Just to clarify a minor point, but for WinNT, 2000, and XP, explorer.exe is both the desktop and the file manager app. Normally it gets started in show-desktop mode during bootup & runs until shutdown. Additional copies are started in file manager mode by the user as needed. In a non-broken system occasionally the desktop can hang. Using task manager to kill the explorer process results in the screen going blank for a few seconds, then the OS auto-restarts the desktop explorer & you’re back in business. In a broken system …??? ---
**Author:** ![Number](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/number/32/242_2.png) [@Number](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Number)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2007, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arggh-lost-windows-2000-desktop/393886/9 "2007-02-28T13:51:51Z")
You could also try running **sfc /scannow** from Task Manager. It may prompt you to insert your Windows CD. It will then scan all protected system files and replace any that are corrupted. A repair install is probably the way to go though.