Hi Scorpio-logic,

Thanks for replying. I do run registry monitoring software (Tenebril's SpyCatcher, Regdefend, and possibly both AVG 7 Pro and Webroot's SpySweeper) but I've gone through the very laborious process of disabling all of them from starting up AND disabling the services that they install. Hasn't made a difference. In the past, I've been able to install WB5, reboot and have wbconfig open up stating that all is well and skin until my ears bleed but upon subsequent reboot I'm back to windows classic and the reboot warning from the WB 5 installer.

After trying the above, though (ie disabling my security apps and their services) I am now experiencing the "normal" problem - WB 5 won't run at all. I no longer have the fleeting joy of skinning my Windows installation I am simply asked to restart my computer whenever I try to run WB. If I select "Reboot Now" the computer reboots, windows classic is the theme, and I have to manually start wbconfig, which won't open as I am informed that in order to complete installation I must reboot!

Thanks for anything that might occur to you from reading the above. It does bear noting that when I *was* able to run wbconfig, the system information tab indicated that all was rosy with my installation.

I have the same problem on Windows XP x64 edition.  I install and then of course I am asked to reboot.  When I reboot, wb attempts to load and I am presented with the reboot screen again, I reboot again, and nothing happens, I try to start wb5 manually through the start menu, and then i am prompted to restart a 3rd time.

This is happening on a freshly installed system with no anti-virus, security, anti-spyware, or anything else loaded onto the system.  I can however install it on the 32-bit edition on the same system, it is only doing this on the x64 edition of xp with wb5.  I don't have antiwpa or anything like that as this is a volume license copy of XP x64 for corporate use.

I am under the impression that WB5 is supposed to support XP 64.  here is my configuration:

Intel EM64T HT processor 3.4Ghz

Windows XP x64 edition with all updates

ATI Radeon X850 CrossFire Edition (single card configuration)

2 GB DDR2 RAM

Intel 82801FR SATA RAID currently at RAID-0 with two 250GB hdd

Please advise what would be causing this.

The same behaviour is occurring on machines running the 32-bit version of windows (mine included), so this is clearly not a problem exclusive to the 64-bit version. There *must* be something that everyone experiencing this problem has in common - be it a setting, specific software app (or type of software app), installation peculiarities, whatever.

I am running WinXP Pro Sp-2 with all latest updates on a Centrino notebook - 1.4Ghz, 1024MB Ram (PC2100), 80GB HD.

I also run (all latest builds/versions/releases):

Acronis TrueImage 9

GenieBackupManager Pro 6

GhostSecurity Suite RegDefend 2

AVG Pro 7.1

Webroot Spysweeper 4.5

Tenebril GhostSurf 2005 Platinum (includes SpyCatcher)

WinPatrol Plus 9.8

Admuncher

ZoneAlarms Pro (with anti-spyware active)

Executive Diskeeper 10

Webroot Window Washer 6

Directory Opus 8.2 Unicode

Sandboxie

CachemanXP

There's more but these are the apps that have the potential (I think) to block writes to the registry at startup... I am currently running WB5 with the SimpleAlpha skin. This after an initial reboot following uninstallation/reinstallation with SDC - I am running the latest beta build. I have a good feeling about this *taking* this time, but am not holding my breath. I'll know after a reboot but I can't bring myself to do it just yet as I am enjoying the skin Actually, I've a reboot to do as RegDefend has just updated itself so we'll see...

Anyone who has made it through my partial list of apps and is experiencing this problem - do you see any commonality? FWIW I am also running Office 2003, GPSoftware's DOpus 8.2 unicode, and browse the web with the latest build of Maxthon.

Just to close (and more a note to self) I haven't adjusted my display settings this time around - they're at 16 bit which rules out per pixel blending - I'll see if this changes anything over the next couple of reboots (assuming this one is successful).

Mike

Hi Scorpio-logic,

I come from old Yorkshire stock and having paid for CachemanXP back when I was running Win2k with 256 MB of RAM I'm darned well using it! Actually, I am constantly questioning my use of it myself but I've determined that it has no detrimental effect so am content to leave it for now. It is under constant review, though...

See my note above, which I must have been pecking out while you were writing yours re: RegDefend. I've gone so far as to completely uninstall RefDefend and do a clean install of WB but it hasn't made any difference, so it's back for now.

I'll look at those logs - I hadn't thought to do it before as I've been focused on looking at application settings and startup behaviour or services.

Thanks for your reply,

Mike

Well, I've been through the application settings for my security apps as well as any logs (that I can find) and cannot see anything in settings that could be blocking completing the installation. The only logs I can find are for RegDefend and SpySweeper and neither of them contain any reference to Stardock, WindowBlinds or SDC. I've confirmed that none of my anti-spyware apps are set to block writes to the registry so I'm back to square one and open to Reloader's suggestion that this may not be app related.

How has everyone experiencing this problem installed WB 5? I initially did so by downloading the installer and running it. I switched to the SDC method later in hopes that it might fix the problem (it hasn't). Just curious. I've used the ODNTzapper to completely remove WB 5 and have tried reinstalling under numerous scenarios (with security apps disabled, with them enabled, from within SDC, from the installer, and so on and so forth). After almost two weeks of this I am pretty much out of ideas.

Yes, this is what I was hoping to accomplish - get others experiencing this problem to post more information about how they have their computers set-up so that we can try to identify some sort of common "thread" that we can then look at more closely to try to troubleshoot this. I see this information as including apps and services that run at startup but also which version of XP they're running, how WB was installed and what hardware they are running it on.

I have also X64 running, no it's not a pirated version. And I noticed a few things. wb.ini is not where it is supposed to be. Well, to be honest, it doesn't exist at all after the installation. And the RegKey: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\WBSrv

is WB on my system  not WBSrv. Thinking of testing putting wb.ini from another system and changing the RegKey tonight if I have the time.

Does anyone else have similar problems with the Key and wb.ini?

Hi GoBlinMax,

I've got the WBsrv key issue (mine is that it is simply not present) under WinXP Pro 32 bit. My wb.ini file is located in the windows directory...