Lena5

I have not had trouble opening documents created in ppt 2003 using ppt 2000. Some animations or graphics may be slightly off, but since they both save in the same file format (.ppt) there should not be any major issues. Do you have any extra extensions or something similar installed?

When zooming in and out on a picture just to see a detail (not to save the zoomed portion) in Microsoft Office picture manager (and similar programs), does the picture lose quality over time? Apologies if this should be obvious, I wanted to check with someone more knowledgeable. Thanks in advance!

Thanks for your thoughts on this! Apologies I worded my posted strangely now that I look at it. The icons that are available are: Norton Security Center, Program Updates, and Software Explorers The icons that are missing but still appear in classic view: BDE administrator, Broadcom control suite 2, internal NIC configuration, Java, Quicktime, SigmaTel Audio, and Symantec LiveUpdate. All the non 3rd-party icons are fine, showing up normally in both views. I didn't mean to imply I am not an admin. I am the only user of this system and there is only one user account (with administrator privileges). I created 2 additional accounts just for the purpose of checking the control panel. One of these accounts had admin privileges, the other did not. But both of them had the exact same control panel I see in my usual account. I have since closed the two and am back to just my first and only (admin) account. No, I do not have TweakUI installed. I did not find a need for its features as of yet. I agree that it is most likely something to do with Norton. For an example of Norton's strange influence: I have traced to Norton Internet Security 2005 (and other users have confirmed) that if you log off then back on, you can no longer check email with Thunderbird (connection is refused) until you restart. So it would be impossible to use Thunderbird if there were multiple users that log on and off.

I find both Turkish Q and F for the keyboard layout in the language bar settings (right-click on taskbar, point to toolbars, Language toolbar) on XP home, SP3. I'm not sure if that will help?

Thanks Charlotte, I did check the HKCU first (in my first post) but I'm beginning to doubt that it has something to do with any registry key since only one view of the control panel is affected. I wish I could find out if there are separate settings for what shows up in classic and what shows up in category view. So far, everything I found suggests that whatever changes are made to hide or show icons affects both views.

Hi Infiniti, thanks for the suggestion. I checked HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Control Panel\don't load, but there was nothing there either. I also went through as many keys as I could find pertaining to Control Panel and cpl, comparing each key to the computer on which the control panel works normally, and did not find any differences. The biggest difference between the two systems (both XP home, SP3; running nearly all the same software) is the version of Norton Internet Security. The problematic control panel is on the one that has NIS2005, which is the cause of other strange, unexplained, and seemingly unfixable behavior. I'm beginning to think it may have something to do with this issue as well but do not have solid evidence just yet. Will need to see how things look after an upgrade to a newer Norton.

I am using XP home edition, SP3. In Category View in the control panel, under "Other Control Panel Options" there are no icons for Java, QuickTime, BDE administrator and possibly some others. They are available only under Classic View. This has to be an error, because on another XP home SP3 system, these options are available under both "other control panel options" and in classic view. I have also noticed that when I click on "other control panel options" a message will flash very quickly in the window ("These Control Panel options are not available. The content of the Control Panel category has been made unavailbe by your system admininistrator." - I could not catch the rest). The message is quickly replaced by "Pick a Control Panel icon" and three icons (for Norton Security Center, Program Updates, and Software Explorers). I checked in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\don't load, but there is nothing related to java, quicktime, etc. Does anyone have any idea why the 3rd party icons are missing from just the category view? Thanks in advance!

I apologize that this screensaver is quite old and I'm bringing up questions about it now. Hopefully someone might know the solution to this... I downloaded the 3D Windows XP screen saver from Microsoft's site. The installer file was clean according to Norton and AVG anti-spyware. It installed without reporting any problems. But when it is activated (either through the preview button or after the set time) the screensaver appears for about 3-4 seconds then stops as if the mouse or keyboard have been touched (they were not). I'm hoping someone here might have an idea as to what might be causing this screen saver to reset. The other Direct3D screen savers (3D flowerbox, flying objects, pipes, text) all work normally for me. I run XP home edition, SP3. Video card has 128 MB; all the latest drivers, etc. Thanks in advance!