Vista - Quick question

[Chesty Morgan]

Evening,

I have unfortunately misplaced my drop down menu on Vista, the one that defaults to the top of the screen and drops down when you move the mouse pointer to the top of the screen. I did remove a couple of shortcuts from it last night but don't think i did anything else intentional or otherwise.

Does anyone know where I might find it?

Thank you.

[Sprogget]

On which program? Firefox? Windows explorer? If Firefox, press F11 & see what happens.

[Chesty Morgan]

It's the jobby on the windows desk top, like the sidebar, but it held the short cuts to internet explorer and the recycling bin etc..

[Sprogget]

I think you mean the taskbar. Have a look here:

Show or hide the taskbar (http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-vista/Show-or-hide-the-taskbar)

[Chesty Morgan]

Thanks Sprogget but I've still got the task bar, that hasn't changed. This was similar to the task bar but at the top of the screen and would scroll down on top of any open windows.

I can't find any reference to it in Help either.

[Sprogget]

I don't know of anything native in Vista that does what you're describing - sounds 3rd party to me. I'm lost.

[Chesty Morgan]

Thanks Sprogget, it has definitely been on my desk top since delivery (I aint done nothing, honest).

It behaves kind of like the side bar and pops up (or down) when the mouse pointer is at the top of the screen but it's almost like the quick launch tool bar with the one click launching of IE and the other things that were on it. It's not a big deal but I found it useful.

[Sprogget]

Ah, just because it's been there from day one doesn't mean it's part of windows! I set up an HP lappy for a mate last week that had about 15 different apps pre installed. The obvious thing to do would be to go start>all programs & see what's in there.

As you say, you've probably just knocked the off switch so to speak & hid it accidentally. Tried right clicking on the desktop to see what's in the dialog box?

[Chesty Morgan]

Sprogget thanks for your time. It seems that there is something a bit more serious going on.

I've just tried to run iTunes (from the start menu as the shortcut for it has also disappeared) and it comes up with a "problem with shortcut" warning and that this action is only valid for products that are currently installed. Which it is.

I should definitely stop pressing buttons!

[Sprogget]

I don't use Itunes, so probably no help but...an error message like that I have only ever seen after uninstalling a program with shortcuts on the desktop remaining.

If it were my pc, I would just check in control panel>programs that Itunes is still installed. & if it was, then spend five minutes sucking my teeth & stroking my beard (if I had one).

One rather obvious thought - have you run a virus scan? you may have picked up a nasty that's messing around with things. That is probably a very good thing to do.

[Chesty Morgan]

Yup, virus scan threw up zero threats.

The first thing I did was to check the installed programs and it is still there. I am rather confused now!

[Sprogget]

Weeel, if you're absolutely stuck & can't live with it, the option that remains is to do a system restore to before the time that it went wrong. I would do that as a last resort, as sys restore is something of a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

It depends on how much you want it back the way it was - it's far better to fix the prob directly than restore the system, but it usually works ok, you're just none the wiser as to why!

Personally, my route would be to work out when the trouble started & look through the event viewer to see if that throws anything up around that time.

That or wait for someone brighter than me to come along - there's no shortage of them!

[Twitcher]

Is it a Dell pc and is it the Dell Dock that is missing?

[mad_jock]

Personally I would go and buy a external hard drive back up all your data before doing anything else.

Take a note of all the software that you really use and rebuild the machine with something other than vista.

once you have "a new machine" take an image of your hard drive and store it on the external and if your really smart burn a DVD of it.

Then either copy your data back or setup a sync between the two as a backup up solution.

It's a pain but any problems in the future you have an easy fix which will save days in the future. But sods law dictates that when you go to all this effort that nothing will go wrong. Its a bit like getting and briefing the divert plates in the cruise. If you do it you won't divert if you think nah we will scrap in sods law dictates you will be going like a one armed bandit on a 20min divert.

[Chesty Morgan]

Twitcher, a little light has just come on in my little brain, I think that's exactly what it is. I didn't realise it was a Dell thing and thought it was part of Vista. Me and 'puters:ugh:

Mad Jock, seriously? I wouldn't have a clue how, where, when or why!

[mad_jock]

Its up to you.

Vista is a cancer on your computer a slow death from the moment you install it.

Getting a backup external usb drive is just a case of buying one plugging it in and copying the data over.

Its a good idea even if you don't fancy rebuilding the system. It saves a heap of tears if anything goes wrong with the laptop or it gets stolen.