At the end of my wit with windows live messenger.. Constant problem!

Tekken179 said:

ok this is the error message now after your recommendations, thanks however I thought that option would work

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: msnmsgr.exe
Application Version: 14.0.8117.416
Application Timestamp: 4bc935af
Fault Module Name: UXCore.dll
Fault Module Version: 14.0.8117.416
Fault Module Timestamp: 4bc91115
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 00073cde
OS Version: 6.1.7600.2.0.0.256.1
Locale ID: 2057

It's good that we stripped it and reinstalled because it's now unlikely that messenger itself is the cause. Add that to the error info and I agree with Nem, it's probably a 3rd party application hooking the uxcore.dll.

Some other things we can look at to find the 3rd party program and/or get more info in the issue. Make aChane and test after, do one at a time in any order:

• Is a system restore back to a happy place possible or is the install to new for that?
• What 3rd party apps do you have installed and that are loaded in memory (see PROCMON below)
• Use MSCONFIG to turn off all but critical boot processes (I can post more info on this if required)
• Use the show hidden icon button, to close any non critical running apps
• Disable your antivirus (temporarily of course)
• A long shot, but lets just rule it out - Replace the uxcore.dll with one from your windows 7 installation media. I've also attached mine from my 64bit build (I suspect it's a 32bit driver anyway; but I could be wrong so use at your own risk).

Process Monitor (PROCMON)
Down load process monitor from Microsoft technet and run it. From the EDIT menu select find and type in uxcore. It will appear more than once (so f3 through all of them). Look in the PATH column for a non MS product and/or a NON windows live product hooked to this dll. Kill that process and try Messenger again.

EDIT: You can also try to open an elevated command prompt and Run tasklist -m uxcore.dll and see if this will tell you what processes are using uxcore.dll (I've never tested that this works on Windows 7 only server 2003, so please let me know).

PROCMON reads only windows live and windows explorer running off of UXcore

command prompt says nothing at all is running off of it...

I can't sys restore that long back i'm afraid and i certainly can't re-format too much to lose

i tried replacing the .dll with your file no changes

Tekken179 said:

PROCMON reads only windows live and windows explorer running off of UXcore

Can you please double check and screen print that, I wouldn't expect the path to show explorer (see my screen print).

Tekken179 said:

command prompt says nothing at all is running off of it...

Yeah same with my test, I guess there is a problem with tasklist in Windows 7

Tekken179 said:

I can't sys restore that long back i'm afraid and i certainly can't re-format too much to lose

i tried replacing the .dll with your file no changes

Ok, then look at disabling non critical programs and then testing MSN, we need to find out if one is hooking the DLL.

Can you please double check and screen print that, I wouldn't expect the path to show explorer (see my screen print).

oops your correct actually for some reason i was reading the wrong list but it was just windows live products.

I'm also afraid i have tried disabling all non-critical programs everything was off and not running except core system programs such as explorer. winlogon.exe and csrss.exe

Ok, Plan C

Although I think it's a 3rd party program issue. I just want to be thorough and cover you in case it's not. With that in mind....
- Open your firewall and erase all entries related to windows live. Lets rule out a process being blocked for some reason.
- Remove your messenger passport settings from the registry to fix any corruption here (this will rebuild when you start it next). you find it under HKEY_USERS\YOUR_S.I.D.\Software\Microsoft\MSNMessenger\PerPassportSettings. If you don't know your S.I.D. then a quick search for PerPassPortSettings will find the right spot for you. This key only exists here so you can delete it for every user profile no problem. Feel free to right click and export the key before you delete it so that you have a backup.
- Lastly run the batch attached. I had an old msn fix batch from long ago, I've quickly updated it and exported all of the names of the Dll's that my windows live messenger has hooks to. I've also added the added the services and path permissions for windows 7 32bit and 64bit. The batch will reregister the dll's, start the service and check your permissions.

What I haven't covered in the batch are registry entries and registry permissions.... but I can't see that it'd install if these were wrong.

EDIT: NOTE - Right click on it and run the batch as an admin user.

Some other thoughts:

Try creating a new user profile and log into live messenger there.
Try logging in via live mail

can't re-format too much to lose

Do you have a backup procedure in place? are you backing up this data to an external hard-drive. I know this is a little off topic, but I would advise backing up your data.

If you ever run into any more critical problems it would be "so much I would have lost" instead of "so much I lost".

Also if your data is backed up as a system image, if you reach a point where a re-install is necessary, you can reinstall an image instead of re-installing all of windows and all your programs etc.

I can log in through a browser etc. tried creating a new account the error is just the same i'm afraid. On your Option C there

I use windows firewall and all rules and entries of all Windows live products have been erased, however i'm not quite sure i understand the PerPassPortSettings search to find my SID , i know that each sid is unique to each account on every machine but that's about it really. I went into the registry editor to the correct location to find my SID but i couldn't find it