Explorer.exe wont start at startup! wants going wrong?

OK, my mates amd64 overheated the other day because he was doing some hard core 3d generation overnight with it, non stop. Its just got the new fan to keep it cool, but when it restarts it now gets to the desktop, and then stops, shows no icons or anything. so i diagnosed it was explorer because of this. I do ctrl alt del andtell it to start a new process called 'explorer.exe' and I get this message:
"This file does not have a program accossiation for performing this action/ Create an accossiation in the folder option pontrol panel"

So, whats going wrong?

 

Start>run> type cmd and click ok.

At the command prompt type assoc.exe=exefile and press enter.

 

start menu doesnt even come up. But i did it via ctrl alt del, and I just got he same message for cmd as well "This file does not have a program accossiation for performing this action/ Create an accossiation in the folder option pontrol panel". for a test I tryed solitare, and I got the same message again. Any ideas?

 

Does your friend have the original XP disk? If so I've found the quickest way to solve a corrupted explorer.exe problem is to do a repair install. There's more info on performing a repair of XP without losing any installed programs or data here:

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

 

cheers for that, hes getting the cd sent to him from back home, we'll try that when he gets it.

 

Let me know if it works, usually it does and beats doing a complete reformat.

 

Windows key+R will open the run box.

If that doesn't work, Cannot run EXE files [Programs don't open]