[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

I can live with this, but it seems strange that it is happening only recently

Please try the following.

Right click on the Taskbar and choose Properties, next click Customize. Look for your Skype icon and click it and choose Always show, then click OK.

After doing the above please see if it helps any.

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Hi Jimmy,

Please try the following.

Right click on the Taskbar and choose Properties, next click Customize. Look for your Skype icon and click it and choose Always show, then click OK.

After doing the above please see if it helps any.

Well that was interesting! I did that and Skype does not appear in the list of current items, but as a folder in Previous Items. I checked the Skype Options again and Start with Widows is ticked as before. I then went through msconfig to see what was what in there and Skype is definitely enabled. Also Skype.exe and skypePM.exe are running in the list of processes in the Task Manager. So I tried rebooting and nothing changed. I started Skype from the Desk Top short cut, but no icon appeared in the tray.

Over to you sir,

Philip

[PhilipW97]

Hi Jimmy,

Please try the following.

Right click on the Taskbar and choose Properties, next click Customize. Look for your Skype icon and click it and choose Always show, then click OK.

After doing the above please see if it helps any.

Well that was interesting! I did that and Skype does not appear in the list of current items, but as a folder in Previous Items. I checked the Skype Options again and Start with Widows is ticked as before. I then went through msconfig to see what was what in there and Skype is definitely enabled. Also Skype.exe and skypePM.exe are running in the list of processes in the Task Manager. So I tried rebooting and nothing changed. I started Skype from the Desk Top short cut, but no icon appeared in the tray.

Over to you sir,

Philip

[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

I did that and Skype does not appear in the list of current items, but as a folder in Previous Items.

Did you change that to Always show and see if that fixed it?

[PhilipW97]

Hi Jimmy,

Did you change that to Always show and see if that fixed it?

Sorry, re reading my post I now realise that I didn't actually say this, but yes I did and it made no difference through two re-boots.

However, this morning everything has booted correctly and there are no icons missing from the tray. I checked properties etc. and there was the Skype icon marked as always show. Moreover the icon was working properly, reflecting the connection state of Skype. This has happened before, but the interval without the icon has been longer this time, so don't hold your breath!

I have no idea what is going on! I have to go out this morning, so will switch off and see what happens later when I boot up again later and will let you know.

Philip

[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

I have to go out this morning, so will switch off and see what happens later when I boot up again later and will let you know.

Please let me know if the icon is still working right before we try anything else.

Edited by Jimmy2012, 02 July 2009 - 12:38 AM.

[PhilipW97]

Hi Jimmy,

Please let me know if the icon is still working right before we try anything else. smile.gif

Sorry, got sidetracked and have been out at meetings all day. Skype opened normally yesterday; however, once I realised that it probably wasn't a malware issue with Skype I contacted their Tech Advice people and this is what they said:

Hello Philip,

Thank you for contacting Skype Support.

We are sorry to hear that you are having issues with Skype client. In
order to solve this problem please follow these steps:

1. Quit Skype. Right click on Skype icon on system tray and choose
"Quit".
2. Press "Windows key" + R on your keyboard in order to open Run window
and type in shortcut command:
%appdata%\skype
3. Once Skype folder is opened please delete "shared.xml" file.
4. Then open your account folder and delete also "config.xml" file.

After deleting shared.xml and config.xml files please uninstall Skype as
follows:
1. From Start menu, click on "Control Panel" and then choose "Add/Remove
Programs".
If you are using Vista then: Start > Control Panel > Programs >
"Programs and Features".
2. Select Skype from the list and click on "Remove".
3. Go to C:\Program Files and delete the "Skype" folder from there.
4. Go to C:\Documents and Settings\All users\ApplicationData and delete
the "Skype" folder from there.
For Vista: C:\ProgramData\
5. Open Start menu and select "Run". ("Windows key" + R)
6. Enter "regedit" in the text box and click "OK".
7. Open the "Edit" drop-down menu and click "Find".
8. Search for the keyword "Skype". Delete all search results.

After complete uninstallation please download and install the beta
version of Skype from:
http://www.skype.com/go/getskype-beta

If problem is not solved then please contact us again.

I did most of that, but installed the latest version of Skype, rather than the Beta Version, by accident really as the link started to open and then cut to the Welcome Back page and the obvious download was what I went for! Also, because I am not the sharpest knife in the box with computers I couldn't find the two folders they told me to delete at the second set of steps 3 & 4. I subsequently figured out that they were hidden and how to find them. However, as all seems to be well at the moment I am waiting to see if anything adverse happens. I think that if i lose the icon again I will got back and do this exercise properly, now that I have figured out the more technical bits! Perhaps the above will be of use to you.

All in all, everything seems to be OK now and I am truly most grateful for your patience and help. Are we done here? Should we now close this and I open another topic to tidy up my lap top, as discussed earlier?

Very best regards,

Philip

[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

Are we done here? Should we now close this and I open another topic to tidy up my lap top, as discussed earlier?

Before doing any of that, please make sure your icon is fixed. After you make sure it is fixed, then we can finish this up.

[PhilipW97]

Hi Jimmy,

Before doing any of that, please make sure your icon is fixed. After you make sure it is fixed, then we can finish this up. wink.gif

It is fine this morning, but I will check it out over the next couple of days and come back to you.

Philip

[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

It is fine this morning, but I will check it out over the next couple of days and come back to you.

Ok



Also, please give me a update on any problems you are still having.

[PhilipW97]

Hi Jimmy,

For the last several days, I have had no problem with the Skype icon, that seems to be fixed OK.

I have 2 minor problems at the moment one is related to icons in the system tray and has 2 manifestations:

a. The Commodo Firewall icon is intermittent, appearing sometimes and not others.

b. The 'Safely remove hardware' icon is, similarly intermittent and not apparently connected to the presence or otherwise of connected items as my headset, web cam, external HD are always connected. Connecting a data stick to a USB drive also does not produce the icon when it doesn't appear at start up, so I am using the My Computer, Eject disk route when I want to remove my Data Stick.

Both icons are set to 'Always show', but it doesn't seem to make any difference.

The second issue is mildly annoying and I have only recently noticed it. Some programmes other than Office usually access the Office dictionary for real time spell checking, but this facility has now become intermittent as well. For instance my e-mail provider is fastmail.co.uk, an option in fastmail.fm, and I usually get Word style red underlining if I make a typo, but occasionally now that doesn't happen so I need to use the embedded on line facility from FastMail. Similarly, I get the red underlining in this forum and it is working at the moment, but occasionally it doesn't work.

I'm not sure that this is worth a lot of time and effort on your part, unless you think this is indicative of something more serious than these intermittent symptoms.

I shall be away from my PC from Thursday morning to Monday night; I will have web access via my lap top, but will only be able to answer questions that I already know the answer to until Tuesday next. So, as ever, don't think I am ignoring you if I don't respond to anything that requires access to my PC.

Regards,

Philip

[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

. The Commodo Firewall icon is intermittent, appearing sometimes and not others

Do you have it set within the program to show the icon?

b. The 'Safely remove hardware' icon is, similarly intermittent and not apparently connected to the presence or otherwise of connected items as my headset, web cam, external HD are always connected.

Mine does not always show up as well, just click the little arrow by the icons and you should see it.

but this facility has now become intermittent as well.

Have you made sure all the settings are right for the program? If so, have you tryed to reinstall the program and see if that helps any?

[PhilipW97]

Hi Jimmy,

Apologies for long silence, when I got back from my trip work rather overtook me, followed by another visit to the UK. I have also been having more problems with my PC! So let me answer your questions first.

QUOTE
. The Commodo Firewall icon is intermittent, appearing sometimes and not others

Do you have it set within the program to show the icon?
QUOTE
b. The 'Safely remove hardware' icon is, similarly intermittent and not apparently connected to the presence or otherwise of connected items as my headset, web cam, external HD are always connected.

Mine does not always show up as well, just click the little arrow by the icons and you should see it.
QUOTE
but this facility has now become intermittent as well.

Have you made sure all the settings are right for the program? If so, have you tryed to reinstall the program and see if that helps any?

I have played with Comodo Firewall and it appears that there is nowhere in the program to set it to always show in the system tray. I does seem to pop up when there is any activity though.

The safely remove hardware icon has gone AWOL, I have checked the button that you referred to, but that is also intermittently missing and even when it is there it does not reveal the missing icon.

Reinstalling Word made no difference to the availability of the dictionary function in other programmes.

The other problems that I have been having are:

1. The machine has been reluctant to start, hanging in the BIOS. I recently installed an external D-Link 7 port USB hub to tidy up the cables in my office and that was the only change. The hub is being detected and removing it makes no difference. The Bios seemed to hang on Auto detecting USB Mass Storage devices Device #01. Sometimes I could get it to go through by entering the Bios Setup, changing nothing and exiting again, but that may have been coincidence. This morning, I set my lap top up in the office to work around the next problem, below, and tried to boot the PC to no avail. I tried several times, then I was so involved with the other task and didn't think to do anything with the PC until I noticed that it had booted, probably after about 5 mins or so from my last attempt. I mention this for information really, in case it links to anything else, as I now seem to have fixed it. I ran a driver checker that said my Intel G33/31 chipset driver was out of date, downloaded the revised one from Intel and installed it and that seems to have fixed the problem! Least ways it rebooted fine after the install and I have restarted, switched off and booted from scratch again with no problems this afternoon.

2. Firefox downloaded an update last week and advised me to move from 3.05 to 3.5, so I did. Then my web based e-mail system (Fastmail) started to malfunction, it had been fine first thing that morning, but started to refuse to let me into folders or open messages. I thought it might be a problem with the 3.5 version, so I removed it and reinstalled 3.05, but that made no difference. I tried my wife's PC and my laptop and there was no problem on either of those, which are stil on v3.05 for the moment, so I think the problem must lie in my machine. The symptoms are that when I click on a folder or a message I get a pop up message saying 'You have chosen to open...' then nothing in the next line, followed by 'which is a: application/octet-stream from https://www.fastmail.fm' it then asks me if I want to save this or open it with: the browse button of which gives me a list of programmes. I tried one or two without success. Sometimes hitting Cancel and then trying again to open the folder or message will work, but often not. I tried the Help Page and got gibberish, but going back a page from there seems to clear the blockage and I get the page that I last tried to open! Then again, I just discovered that that doesn't work every time! So, I am sending this from my laptop.

I should also say, that I downloaded the latest MBAM and Virus Database this morning and ran that and the machine comes up clean. So over to you sir,

Regards,

Philip

[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

Apologies for long silence

No problem.


This does not look like a malware issue, please post in the XP forum and tell them the problems you are having, someone there should be able to help.

[PhilipW97]

Hi Jimmy,

This does not look like a malware issue, please post in the XP forum and tell them the problems you are having, someone there should be able to help.

I had come to the same conclusion, but was happy to see it through with you.

Many thanks for your help, I have really appreciated it. At least I have some confidence in my efforts to keep malware out now!

All the best,

Philip

[Jimmy2012]

Hello PhilipW97,

Many thanks for your help, I have really appreciated it.

No problem, glad to be able to help out.


I will leave this topic opened for a few more days just in case we need to do anything else here.