[OffByOne]

For a short period, I was using Earthlink for my ISP. When I found out I would have to move, I canceled the service and tried to uninstall the software. A power failure left the uninstallation incomplete. When I got power back, there was not enough of the software left to complete the uninstallation.

Now, whenever I open an explorer window (IE, Windows Explorer, Control Panel, etc.), it tries to open the Earthlink software (popup blocker, Accelerator, etc.), displaying Message Boxes saying "Preparing to install," or "Configuring," etc. (Please see attached screen shots.) The software is no longer there, of course, so the attempts (in some cases, up to three attempts to install or configure various programs) fail.

I felt like this was caused by something left over in the Registry, so I bought Max Registry Cleaner to fix it. It didn't. I downloaded a couple of other free Registry utilities, but so far, nothing has worked.

My OS is Windows 2000 Pro.

Can anyone offer any suggestions?

Thanks,

OffByOne

[new tech guy]

Firstly, all registry cleaners are bad, unless you have a fascination of reinstalling windows, i would not run any of them. In any case what you could do is load the earthlink software again from the cd and then try to remove them after the install.

[OffByOne]

I ditched the disk before I knew that I had a problem, so that's not an option.

Anyone else?

[Frank4d]

You want to get the Microsoft Installer Cleanup utility: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301. Running msicuu2.exe installes the utility.

Then run msicuu.exe from the C:\Program Files\Windows Installer Clean Up folder. Select ONLY the Earthlink related lines, then click Remove.