Windows account randomly "resets"

[Zanduz]

Alright so, this has been going on for probably half a year. I have searched the web for hours and hours for a solution, but with no luck.

So the problem is that every now and then, when I turn on my pc and I log on my account, a number of things always seems to have reset themselves. All of my docked icons in the process line are gone. The list of most frequently used programs in the start menu is gone (note that i am not talking about the list 'All programs'). I have been logged off of dropbox and need to type in my user credentials again. When I open Word or any other office application, all of my recent documents or files and user preferences are gone and it would launch the 'Welcome to your new Office' window as if I had just installed office. My user wallpaper is gone and has been reset to the standard blue windows 7 wallpaper. And just basically nearly all my user preferences are gone. Let me point out that none of my files are missing. I have tried booting my computer in safe mode and then ending and restarting explorer.exe from the task manager. This only restored the system default icons in the process line (internet explorer, file explorer and windows media player) and the default icons in the most-frequent-programs list in the start menu, putting the 'Introduction' option at the top of the list as if I had just installed a fresh copy of windows.

I might have an idea of what could cause all this, though, but I am in no way sure. Around the time this started happening, I created a user account for my girlfriend on my pc. And I have noticed that some times my account would appear as described above, when I log on my account, after she had been logged on her account. This resetting is getting really annoying and i don't know what to do in order to fix it. Please help.
Thank you very much in advance!

 

[Taffu]

1. Although it seems unlikely, have you messed around with the "Local Group Policy"?

2. Assuming you haven't, you can try this:
-Type regedit in RUN dialog box and press Enter to open the registry editor.
-Doing a full backup of the registry is recommended.

In the following locations look for a REG_DWORD key named "NoSaveSettings"

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
HKEY_USERS\.Default\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
HKEY_USERS\.Default\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Program Manager\Restrictions

Once you find it, delete the key and restart Windows.

 

[Zanduz]

1. No, I have not messed with the Local Group Policy.

2. I have looked in all of the locations, and i cannot find a key named "NoSaveSettings". I found three keys named "ForceActiveDesktopOn", "NoActiveDesktop" and "NoActiveDesktopChanges" in the location HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer.
I found a key named "NoDriveTypeAutoRun" in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer. And I didn't find either of the locations you suggested under HKEY_USERS.

 

[Taffu]

Is your account the only account affected?
In which case, you could create yourself another account, and copy the old user settings onto it.

Also, the key that has "NoActiveDesktopChanges" is it set to 1?
Or even better, write down all the keys and how they're set in those registry locations.

for example:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
default
ForceActiveDesktopOn - 0
NoActiveDesktop - 1
NoActiveDesktopChanges - 1

 

[ex_bubblehead]

Sounds very much like a corrupted profile causing Windows to use a temporary one. First thing is to check the system event log for any errors referencing profiles.

 

[Zanduz]

Is your account the only account affected?
In which case, you could create yourself another account, and copy the old user settings onto it.

Also, the key that has "NoActiveDesktopChanges" is it set to 1?
Or even better, write down all the keys and how they're set in those registry locations.

for example:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
default
ForceActiveDesktopOn - 0
NoActiveDesktop - 1
NoActiveDesktopChanges - 1

I am not sure, as I do not use my girlfriends account, although she hasn't complained about it. So yes, I think my account is the only one affected.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
Default
ForceActiveDesktopOn - 0
NoActiveDesktop - 1
NoActiveDesktopChanges - 1

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
Default
NoDriveTypeAutoRun - 91

 

[Zanduz]

Sounds very much like a corrupted profile causing Windows to use a temporary one. First thing is to check the system event log for any errors referencing profiles.

How do I know if an error is referencing a profile?

 

[ex_bubblehead]

Sounds very much like a corrupted profile causing Windows to use a temporary one. First thing is to check the system event log for any errors referencing profiles.

How do I know if an error is referencing a profile?

You'll see the word "profile" in the error message. Typically "Could not load profile" or ""The User Profile Service failed the logon"

Here's a couple of links with instructions on how to fix a corrupted user profile (assuming that's the problem here)
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/fix-corrupted-user-profile#1TC=windows-7
http://resetwindows7passwords.blogspot.com/2014/01/fix-corrupt-user-profile-windows-7.html