Problems with IE 7

[artheim]

I have the following problems with IE on XP Home w/SP2 and would like to get them fixed:
1) Am unable to change the Home page - have even tried to change "Start Page" in registry for IE and it displays the changed page address in the right panel, but if I double click on the key again, the old value is back there.
2) I cannot get a Pogo game to start the play. Have tried multiple "fixes" from Pogo support with no help.

I have uninstalled IE 7, reverting to IE 6 without any change to the problems. I have disabled Norton, no change. I have run Spybot S&D and Microsoft Windows Defender - system is clean. I cannot find the Ad-Aware SE anymore, so have not run that one. System is current with all Windows updates. Firefox works okay on the system.

I have tried to do an inplace restore of XP using a slipstreamed SP2 CD, but during the device driver installs the system blue screens with a 0xC2 Bad_Pool_Caller error and will not continue beyond that point. I have a saved image of the system prior to the restore attempt, and have tried the update several times with the same result.

All suggestions welcome.. thanks,

 

[smah]

Spybot S&D has an option that prevents changes to the homepage by spyware [and by you]. Make sure that's turned off when you try to change it.

 

[artheim]

Yes, thanks for the tip smah, but this was the case before I installed SpyBot S&D so it is something else that is protecting it.. I just need to be able to find out what.

 

[PCmad]

From reading your post the first thing that shouted out at me was spyware. Couple of things to try, Download Hi-Jack This run it through and save the log file created. If you are confident and know what you are doing go through the entries and see if that brings up any spyware items. Its not something for the beginner though! Post the results here if you like and we it can be checked through for you. Also download Ad-aware its still out there and easy to download run through as well.

Run msconfig on the machine, check startup and maybe services see if that brings up any items that you are not aware of. You could also delete cookies and internet pages wouldn't hurt just incase.

You could if you haven't already reset IE 7 or 6 back to the default settings via tools, internet options, advanced.

When you run Pogo what exactly is the problem that you are getting? For example does it use Java or Quicktime, Flash and not display or does it give you an error message ?? Is it just the one game not working or any games not working? Is there a difference in the game that works against a game that does not, maybe go back to Pogo on ??

Hope that helps a bit

 

[artheim]

Thanks PCmad, I have not tried resetting IE to defaults - will try that. Also will play with msconfig startup to see if I can identify something there that may be causing these results. I had looked at what is there and did not see anything that was alarming. As to Ad-Aware, I got the beta and ran it along with the Ad-Watch. Ad-Watch alerts me to something trying to change the main setting for IE on every page. Also if I allow the change when I manually change the registry key, and disallow all other change attempts, it still remains the old value.

Pogo uses Java and I have un-installed the runtime and re-installed the current from the java site. It also verifies okay. Pogo fails on all games tried at the point where it is starting to display the first screen of the game that normally contains an ad - the ad sometimes displays, but usually does not. It appears like a popup is being blocked somewhere, but have all blocking that I am aware of turned off.

I also have found some info that indicates the 0xC2 blue screen on reload of XP may be due to a faulty device driver and there is an update on Dell's site for a modem that can cause this - not sure how I can get it encorporated into the slipstream CD tho, but can at least try the reload without the modem card installed.

I will post back with what I find in my trials today.. if no luck, will run Hijack This and post to the appropriate forums on that. Thanks again for the suggestions.

 

[artheim]

No further in finding the problem, but have tried several unsuccessful things:
1) did an inplace restore of XP w/SP2 - no change on the 2 problems.
2) ran with all startup programs unselected in msconfig and problem is still there on IE home page being sticky.
3) ran HijackThis and submitted the log after running several different AntiSpyware scans with different programs. Have not had any responses to the geekstogo.com post.

I suspect a registry setting that is protecting the home page and probably blocking something that Java runtime needs to signal the calling IE program, but do not know how to find such a setting. If this is the case, it is something that does not get reset/removed/initialized on a reload of IE or of XP.

I am to the point now where a complete wipe of the hard disk and full restore of XP and all programs, data, etc. I am not quite ready to do that at this point, but hope to do it within the next 6 weeks. Will watch for any other ideas in the meanwhile.

 

[smah]

You can find the specific registry info here or use this utility I was going to mention these earlier, but I wanted to make sure you checked for legitimate reasons before getting into the registry.