[Error] - wininet.dll missing windows not starting up

[SShabaj]

Hello everyone,

I apologize if i am posting this topic in the wrong place however, Im a new user.

Ok heres the deal...

I am overseas serving with the US military and I started up my computer this morning and when I clicked on my user name in the startup a icon came up saying

"Explorer.exe - unable to locate component. This application has failed to start because WININET.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this program."

I click on OK and i come up to my desk top however, the only thing i see is my wallpaper. there are no icons no start menu no toolbar nothing.

can someone please tell me what to do step by step.

thank you in advance

SS

Title Edited - Please follow new forum rules from now on Also try to refrain from only using capitals in topic title!

-- Martin L

[nakira]

There is a copy of wininet.dll at www.dll-files.com.

[cluberti]

You should still be able to have network access, even though explorer crashed. Use CTRL-ALT-DEL to bring up the task manager, from which you can launch a command prompt (cmd.exe). Once the command prompt is up, pop in your Windows CD and type "sfc /scannow" and hit enter. When SFC finishes, reboot, and you should have your wininet.dll file back (and any other that are missing, if that is the case).

If you don't have your Windows CD handy, you can instead open iexplore.exe from the Task Manager (Internet Explorer) and download the file from the internet - it needs to be placed in your %windir%\system32 directory. Reboot, and hopefully you'll get a full boot without errors.