For some reason my **** start menu doesnt remember any of my settings, after restart it goes back to default settings (placement, autohide, show clock, etc)

any ideas how to fix this?

This might be it. I am not completely sure.

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer]
"NoSaveSettings"=dword:00000000

Copy into text editor and save as ".vbs" then double click.

'xp_save_settings.vbs - Allows user settings to be saved

'© Doug Knox - 4/10/2002

'Downloaded from www.dougknox.com

Option Explicit

On Error Resume Next

'Declare variables

Dim WSHShell, p1

'Set the Windows Script Host Shell and assign values to variables

Set WSHShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell")

p1 = "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\NoSaveSettings"

WSHShell.RegWrite p1, 0, "REG_DWORD"

MsgBox "Your Registry has been updated. Log off and" & vbCR & "Log on for the change to take effect.",4096,"Finished"