I have just discovered that Jpegs are not opening on the desktop in win picture and fax viewer. When i try to "double click" to open them the desktop just flashes briefly. If i right click and select "open with" and useWin pic and fax viewer i am told that a preview is not available..They will open in paint or explorer with no problem.. Also if i copy the pics to / or make a new folder on the desktop and open them from within the folder the pics will open normally with Win pic fax viewer..
This has happened suddenly.. no viruses or trojans suspected... just an XP SNAFU. any help gratefully received... Thankyou..

Try a System Restore to a point prior to the problem.

start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > System restore

Thankyou..

Thanks for the thanks. Can we assume that all is well now?

I didnt use the system restore point because i had also installed several other applications that i didnt want to reinstall. But i feel that would have corrected the problem .I have since installed acdsee as a pic viewer and this works ok. Thankyou again

Thanks for the update and the thanks.

Let us know if we can help further in the future.