I have come across a situation with an XP Home machine that will not display anything in the Add or Remove Programs panel. I have gone through and removed as Ad-Aware finds. I have removed several items with HiJackThis.

When I attempt to use Windows Update, the screen will display Windows Installer pop up twice then IE will lock up.

I am hoping to find a fix rather than having to do a reload.

Thank you in advance for any help. I am away from this problem machine for the week but wanted to get something posted in hopes that I can get some ideas before I get back to it on Friday.

Did you have Professional advice in using HijackThis?

As to Add/Remove:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/266668

Sounds like some important files were removed.

I had the advice of previous posts here. I would consider that expert if not professional. Furthermore, this problem was present before I did anything with HiJackThis.

Thank you for the response.

Jephree,

Thanks again for your reply. While the link did not solve my problem, it gave me some other ideas. I found an article on Microsoft's web page about installer problems. I am going to post this so others can possibly use it.

I did a repair install using the XP installation cd. I went into Control Panel, Administrative tools, and then into Services. I disabled the Windows installer service. After which, I was able to start receiving Windows Updates. After SP 2 update, I was able to see the items in the Add or Remove programs window. I also started getting messages stating that a Microsoft Money 2002 installation was in process. I uninstalled the program.

Thanks again, you can marked this thread closed.

Nick

Thanks for the update and information!

Glad all is well.

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