lost windows desktop

[rogerdee]

hi guys i am running windows xp home and got  a big problem
I was using xpgame launcher to close down excess things which worked fine untill last night.

Now i have lost my windows desktop i cannot get any taskbar or icons up is basicly just the background picture.

How can i get the system restore to run so i can restroe to a previous point>?
i know i can type it in to get it to run but the question is how?
i did have a book for these things but i lent it to some one and now i cant remeber things.
Failing that how can i get my desktop back with out reienstalling windowsxp?

or if i reeinstall it will it keep my old folders ect on that harddrive?

[Skuzzy]

rogerdee, you could always use the windows repair installation.  Not the recovery console, but the repair option Windows gives you when it detects a copy of Windows already installed.  If the registry is in good shape, you will not have to re-install your applications, but you will need to re-patch the operating system.

[rogerdee]

ok i am in dumb mode today must be too good a friday night lol.
what do you mean by repatch? do you like the program links and things ect ?

[SD67]

He means you will need to do all your updates again.

[rogerdee]

Ah ok thanks
i already had a headache be for i started this morning .
thanks for your help guys

[Denholm]

This doesn't sound like Explorer isn't started, since you're seeing your background. It doesn't hurt to try though. Press Ctrl + Alt + Del. It brings up the task manager. Make sure you're in the, "Processes" tab. Look for: Explorer.exe

If it's listed, select it and press, "End task/process." If it's not listed just follow this next step: Go to File>New Task(Run...)

Type in: explorer.exe

And press OK. If your desktop icons still don't appear. Do what Skuzzy mentioned.