Identity key in HKEY_CURRENT_USER suddenly disappeared!

[ychousa]

Hi. I'm using win 98 and outlook express 6. Outlook Express won't open and gives me a popup window to select an identity(but there is no identity to select) suddenly.

I check the registry and found Identity key is not there under HKEY_CURRENT_USER. But, when I open WINDOWS folder and go to identities where Outlook express folder resides, all of them are there!

How I can resolve this? I think I need to somehow recover Identity key in the registry.

thanks for your comments.

 

[compgirlfhredi]

Some users disable the default account setting so that the program always asks you to select an Identity whenever it is opened. To undo this, click on ‘File’ then ‘Identities’ and then click ‘Manage Identities’. Put a checkmark in the ‘Use this identity when starting a program’ check box and click on Close. Hope this helps.

 

[ychousa]

Thanks for your comment. But the thing is I can't even open the program, and there's no identity I can select on the identity-selecting popup window.

I checked some articles in Microsoft support pages. They offer some suggestions that I can play around with "Identiry" key in the windows registry. But "Identity" key is missing under HKEY_CURRENT_USER in my registry where it is suppose to be.

I need to somehow recover the "Identity" key in the registry under HKEY_CURRENT_USER.

Any other suggestions?

 

[compgirlfhredi]

THis behavior can occur under one of the following circumstances:
The Outlook Express installation procedure did not complete properly.
The Identities registry key in the HKEY_CURRENT_USER subtree does not exist.
There are no Outlook Express registry keys in the following subkeys:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft

-And-

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft

To check the registry, click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.

CAUTION: Do not change any registry settings. If you change the registry settings, you computer may not start.

If you do not have an Identities key but there are Outlook Express keys in the registry, you can correct the problem by extracting both the Msident.dll file and the Msidntld.dll file from the Ie_extra.cab file, or by using Microsoft Windows System File Checker (SFC) in Microsoft Windows 98 Second Edition with Microsoft Internet Explorer version 5.0. If you have Internet Explorer version 5.01 you must extract these files from the Ie_extra.cab file.
How to Extract the Files by Using System File Checker
Make sure that either you have the Windows 98 Second Edition CD-ROM in your CD-ROM drive, or that you have these files available on our computer. To extract both the Msident.dll file and the Msidntld.dll file by using SFC:
Click Start, click Run, type sfc.exe in the Open box, and then click OK.
In the Select an option and click Start box, click Extract one file from installation disk, type msident.dll, then click Start.
In the Restore from box; type the path to your CD-ROM. For example, if your CD-ROM is drive D, type d:\win98.
In the Save file in box, type c:\windows\system, and then click OK.
Click Extract one file from installation disk, type msidntld.dll, then click Start.
In the Restore from box, type the path to your CD-ROM. For example, if our CD-ROM is on drive D, type d:\win98.
In the Save file in box, type c:\windows\system, and then click OK.
After the files are restored, you must run Regsvr32.exe on the Msident.dll and Msidntld.dll files. To do this, click Start, click Run, type regsvr32 Msident.dll in the Open box, and then click OK. Repeat this process for the Msidntld.dll file. If you do not register the Msident.dll, and Msidntld.dll files correctly, you still receive the error messages.
How to Manually Extract the Files
To manually extract the Msident.dll and Msidntld.dll files, you need the Ie_extra.cab file that is available on either your hard drive or on an Internet Explorer CD-ROM. If you download Internet Explorer from the Internet, this file is in the Windows Update Setup Files folder. Extract this file to the Windows\System folder.

After you locate the Ie_extra.cab file, restart your computer in MS-DOS mode. To do this, click Start, click Shut Down, click Restart in MS-DOS mode, and then clicking OK. Then extract the files from Ie_extra.cab.

If you do not register the Msident.dll, Msidntld.dll files correctly; you still receive the error messages. After the files are extracted, you must run Regsvr32.exe on the Msident.dll, and Msidntld.dll files. To do this, click Start, click Run, type regsvr32 Msident.dll in the Open box, and then click OK. Repeat this process for the Msidntld.dll file. If you do not register the Msident.dll, and Msidntld.dll files correctly, you still receive the error messages.

No Outlook Express Registry Keys
If you do not have Outlook Express registry keys in the registry, rename both the Msident.dll file and the Msidntld.dll file, and then uninstall and reinstall Outlook Express. For more information about changing the name of a file, click Start, click Help, type change the name of a file or folder on the Search tab, and then click that topic in the list.