Resolved All personal desktop settings lost after rebooting from Safe Mode

Really annoying : After using Safe Mode in WinXP SP2 and rebooting back to normal mode, all my personalized desktop settings (in Display Settings / Appearance: style, fonts, title bar sizes, etc.) are lost and revert back to the Windows defaults, and I have to reset my personal settings from scratch. This happens every time I use Safe Mode, whether I do anything there or not.

Can anyone tell me: (1) why this happens, (2) where the personalized settings are stored, so I can save a copy for restoring after they're lost, (3) how to prevent this from happening in the first place.

Thanks!

Frank D

 

Steve,

In the present (latest) case, no. I looked at a lot of things with the intention to uninstall a program, but I decided against it, and just exited and rebooted normally.

But it's happened (at least) a dozen times in the past year, regardless of whether I made any changes or not. All I have to do is "visit" Safe Mode and I lose my desktop settings. Makes me cautious to use Safe Mode at all.

Frank D

 

Hello all

I am experiencing a similar problem. I dont usually shut down my machine but I did in this case. When I powered it up again my personal setting had gone. I was logged onto the domain as 'myself' but my desktop was as if I had never logged onto my machine before. I used system restored and my desktop settings were back to normal.

This morning, a week later and after I shut down my machine again, the same thing occurred. I have used system restore and I am back to normal again.

What I had noticed is that my documents and settings directory was accessible, however the system had now created a 'Temp' user and this is were my new home path was located.

Concerned!

 

I've searched on Google, and the only thing I can come up with is this tweak (below) from Kelly's Korner, but having been burned before with unintended consequences to "harmless" changes I've made, I'd rather not do it without some idea of what effect it will have on my PC.
>>
>> Save Settings on Exit (Line 54)
>> http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm

What doesn't make me too happy about this tweak is that there's no description of exactly what it'll do. Can anyone help? Thanks.

Frank D

 

Arie,

Thanks for checking. I was mistaken. I thought this registry change would save my desktop settings, not prevent them from being changed.

No, my "NoSaveSettings" value is set to 0 (zero).

So far it looks like there is no way to back up, or prevent the loss of, desktop settings in Windows, as has been happening to me. So, what I've done is to write down every setting I make to my desktop, so when it happens again I'll have a script to follow.

Any other suggestions would be appreciated.

Frank D

 

To "save" the settings, you can use the File and Settings Transfer wizard. Just get it to save the settings, not the the files.

Are you making any settings that might be hard for Windows to use. For example, non standard screensavers or fonts, power saving settings?

When you put the settings "back in ", you could try rebooting through Safe Mode for each one and find at what point they "pop out" again.

Matt

 

In response to Mattman,

The good news. At your suggestion, I've done that. Going into this, it sounds like a good idea!

None. All my choices are for fonts, screensavers, power settings, etc., that are immediately available in standard Windows XP. Nothing exotic.

Well, now for the bad news. After three tries of the F&ST Wizard (all of which were successfully created), three Safe Modes, six reboots, and four System Restores, I can say with conviction that it didn't work.

When running the Wizard in its restore mode, it hung, three times (reboots in between), taking Windows Explorer down first. I have no idea why. I had to open the Task Manager to get a command line to restore Windows Explorer so I could run System Restore.

I thank whoever dreamed up System Restore! Without it I think I'd have given up on computers (or maybe just PCs) years ago.

And in response to PeteC,

You may be right, Pete, but I think there's too much there for this user to try to accomplish without dropping the ball somewhere, and the cure may be worse than the complaint. At this point I think I'm going to hedge my bets/cut my losses, whatever you want to call it, and just do as I've been doing right along: just type in the settings from scratch, this time following my handwritten script.

Now, after all of the above, I'm going to propose a theory why this is happening in the first place. If this requires a new thread, please let me know and I'll follow through. I think my startup parameters may be faulty. Why? Because when I enter Safe Mode with Networking from the Windows startup screen and get to see the Windows interface, there's no networking available and I can't run Internet Explorer (v.6). In effect, nothing happens.

Here are my settings:

[boot loader]
timeout=10
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS= "Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptOut
C:\CMDCONS\BOOTSECT.DAT= "Microsoft Windows Recovery Console" /cmdcons
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS= "Microsoft Windows XP Safe Mode" /fastdetect=OptOut /safeboot:minimal /sos /bootlog
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS= "Microsoft Windows XP Safe Mode with Networking" /fastdetect=OptOut /safeboot:network /sos /bootlog

Again, if I need to start a new thread, just let me know. Thanks to all who helped!

Frank D

 

I just checked in Google by entering this as the search phrase: winxp modify boot-ini for safe mode and got a bunch of hits that show boot.ini's that look pretty much like mine. What I did learn is that none of the entries or parameters in my boot.ini is wrong. So I have to conclude that my boot.ini is not at fault here, and the cause lies somewhere else.

Yes I do.

As to why I can't access the Web and why IE6 won't run in Safe Mode, should I start a new thread?

Thanks.

Frank D

 

Something you could try. Make a new User Profile, just the bare profile, then run the restore of the Files and Setting Transfer wizard there, then do your "boot through Safe Mode " test. If that failed, it would signify to me that the setting were hard for Windows to make. An example of some settings that I think would give Windows a headache would be to set the HDD/s and the monitor to shut down and the screen saver to start, all at the same time. If you set your favourite Batman or Spiderman theme, then changed the "appearances ".

It is not hard to change your profile if that seems to work. It would be good experience for you as well.

I suspect it's a registry problem. Do you have any "registry modifying programs" (cleaners?) running at startup? Maybe a program that does not does not like having it's registry settings changed, so it might try to manipulate them. Watch out for "junk" programs.

It wouldn't hurt to run Error Checking (CHKDSK) on your drive/s. Run the full scan, you may want to let it run overnight on a large drive.

Your networking problem in Safe Mode...it might be that the network adapter cannot run on standard drivers.

Having to run System Restore when you shouldn't need to, just watch that your system is not getting "sick ". If a system starts to annoy me with little things going wrong, I prepare for a reformat (it either shapes-up or ships-out ).

Look for updated drivers, particularly, chipset drivers.

Lots of "settings ", I like minimal settings. Look for any that might "clash ".

Matt

 

Success! Final post on this subject from me.

Matt, long report

The problem has disappeared, most likely due to running the chkdsk /r, and I can now connect to the Internet and run programs in Safe Mode. My conclusion: the problems were caused by some faulty sectors on the hard drive.

Details:

No, I don't have any registry modifying programs running at startup.

At your suggestion, I ran chkdsk /r, which on my 80-GB, half-full disc took about an hour. That "/r" switch doesn't tell you anything while it's running and I was elsewhere while it ran, so I don't know what it found/corrected.

I did an in-place reformat about a year ago and I'm not about to go through that again unless all else fails. And before the chkdsk, I ran sfc /scannow and it found nothing wrong (at least it didn't report anything wrong).

I had a very bad experience about two years ago, where I did just that, and as a result Windows wouldn't boot. After much agony, I had to restore from a backup. So as long as my machine is running and doing what I need, I'm not going to do that again. I do a full image backup every two weeks and System Restore every night, so I feel relatively secure there.

Well, the number of settings, whether you consider them a lot or a few, will depend on your point of view. I'm going to post the script of changes that I make to my desktop below, so you can judge for yourself. Here goes:

Theme: My Current Theme (Modified)
Desktop background: AutoWall
" position: Center
" Color: Dark blue
Screen Saver: My Pictures Slideshow
Appearance: Windows and buttons: Windows XP style
" Color Scheme: Default (blue)
" Font size: Large fonts
" [Advanced]: Desktop: Color 1: dark blue
" " 3D Objects: Color 1: tan / Color 2 (black)
" " Active Title Bar: Size: 27
" " " " " Color 1: medium blue
" " " " " Color 2: light blue
" " " Font: Franklin Gothic Medium (same font used throughout my settings -- I don't like Tahoma)
" " " " Size: 12 / Color: white, bold
" " Active Window Border: Size1 / Color: white bold
" " Application Background: Color 1: medium gray
" " Caption buttons: Size: 27
" " Icon: Size: 32 / Font: FGM / Size: 10
" " Icon spacing (hor): Size: 77
" " Icon spacing (ver): Size: 58
" " Inactive Title Bar: Size: 27 / Color 1: med blue / Color 2: light blue / Font: FGM / Size: 12 / Color pale blue bold
" " Inactive Window Border: Size: 1 / Color 1: light gray
" " Menu: Size: 23 / Color: pale yellow
" " " Font: FGM / Size: 10
" " Message Box: Font: FGM / Size: 10
" " Palette Title: Size: 23
" " " " / Font: FGM / Size: 10 bold
" " Scrollbar: Size: 24
" " Selected Items: Size: 23
" " " " Font: FGM Size 10 bold
" " Tooltip: Color 1: pale yellow
" " " Font: FGM / Size: 10 / Color: black
" " Window: Color 1: white / Color: black
Settings: Screen Resolution: 1024 x 768
Color quality: High (24 bit)
[Advanced] Display / DPI setting: Large size (120 dpi)
" Compatibility: Apply without restarting
Troubleshoot tab: Hardware acceleration: Full
" " Enable write combining (checked)

As you can see, these settings, where they depart from the default Windows settings, are pretty tame. Just adjustments to sizes, fonts, colors, etc. Nothing drastic. But they affect the appearance and usability of my desktop, Explorer windows, menus, dialog boxes, etc., and make it much easier for me to work in Windows.

At this point I think this case is closed due to your, Arie's and Pete's help in guiding me through it. Thanks very much to all!

Frank D