Blank desktop after logging in-explorer.exe not running

[MrRetro]

Hi all
I just finished a clean install of win2k pro and after applying the critical updates upon rebooting I am prompted to login but never get any farther (no desktop/icons).
The machine just sits there with a blue background.
A google returned MS KB Q256194, the symptoms are exaclty as described in the article but the fix does nothing.
Basically I can bring up task manager and I see that explorer.exe is not running, when I try to manually add it I get a brief flash of the desktop/taskbar then the pc goes back to its blue background.
Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

 

[bcastner]

. Did you use Windows Update to obtain the "critical updates' without an active firewall?

http://www.microsoft.com/security/incident/sasser.mspxn

 

[MrRetro]

This is a work machine and there is a firewall in place, I ran SFC and it appears to have fixed the problem.
I had installed all the OS updates without a problem, this situation appeared when I tried to patch office 2000 with SP3 the machine just hung up and I had to manually restart it.
When I finally got back into the pc the event log stated that there where quite a few files in the system32 directory that had bad signatures, all appears well but I'm scared to do an office update now.

Thanks for the quick reply.

 

[bcastner]

If your SFC was clean, go ahead and download the office update and apply it.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/officeupdate/default.aspx