Desktop refers to a location that is unavailable? Help please

chlple

Member
Hi all,

So I have had my custom PC for a few weeks now, everything running smoothly until this morning. I shut down the PC the night before, and it had some updates to install just before it turned off - okay, fine.
This morning I turned the PC on and upon arriving onto the desktop, I was greeted with a dialogue box saying:

"C:\Windows\system32\config\systemprofile\Desktop refers to a location that is unavailable. It could be on a hard drive on this computer, or on a network. Check to make sure that the disk is properly inserted, or that you are connected to the Internet or your network, and then try again. If it still cannot be located, the information might have been moved to a different location."


hmmm.png

I went to the location stated in the dialogue box and could not see a 'desktop' file located in the systemprofile file, soo, I'm not sure where it's been moved to? Just to add, I did not move this file myself, the only thing I can think of that might have done it is maybe the Windows updates I installed the night before?
Also, none of my programs that are normally attached to the taskbar were visible, my background had been removed and the Windows Aero theme seemed to have disappeared.

I rebooted the PC and then my desktop appeared and the PC seems to be running fine at the moment.

Just wondering if someone could advise me on what to do to stop this problem from happening in the future/fix this problem? Any help would be greatly appreciated, as I have never came across this problem before.

Kind regards,
Chloe
 
Last edited:

paul1224

Well-known member
Not an expert myself but an option is to do a system restore to before the updates were installed.
You can then make sure that the PC seems fine and then try the updates again just in case any files were corrupted in any way.
However if it all seems ok now it may just have been a glitch.
 

Corfate

Author Level
You could check that all connections to HDD's and mobo are secure, to rule out the chance of a loose cable :)

It may just be one of those things that windows fixed next boot, i wouldn't worry unless it starts happening frequent :) Probably just some teething problem :)
 

Xoil

Well-known member
Just a few questions to confirm my suspicions:

1) Are you running Vista?
2) Do you have any Symantec products installed
 

chlple

Member
1) Are you running Vista?
2) Do you have any Symantec products installed

Hi Xoil,
Nope, I'm running Windows 7. However, I do have one Symantec product installed, yeah! Do you think that was causing the problem?
 
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