Print an Expertek Tip: Corrupt Windows Profile

What to do when your MS Windows logon fails due to profile issues.

If you're attempting to log on and getting a message about a corrupt profile, and then no desktop shows up, but rather, windows takes you back to the login, usually you don't need to trash your system or re-install everything. The steps we're about to go over involve editing the registry, which is not for novice users. For the experienced or brave at heart, you need only follow the steps below and soon you will be back up and working properly. Be sure to read the entire tip before starting!!

The are many causes as to why this kind of thing happens, amongst them are power failure, hard disk (sector) failure, and malware or virus infection. Of these, Hard Disk Failure is the only one which might cause you to permanently lose your data.

Here are the steps to manually correct this issue:

1. Restart your PC in safe mode.

This will release the locks on the corrupt profile

2. Log on as Admin (if possible)

You'll need to have Admin privileges so you can delete some files and make registry changes. (If you cannot logon at all, then the only option is to back up data and re-install windows.)

3. Back up any needed files from the corrupt profile such as Docs, Faves, Pics, etc. to a new folder elsewhere on the drive (ie. c:\profile\)

The next step is to delete the profile, and you don't want to lose your data. move your data out of harms way before proceeding.

4. Delete Corrupt Username

Navigate to C:\Users and delete the corrupt folder (looking for the one with the users name.)

5. Now, we'll remove the problematic profile from the registry.

Next, Open a run command and type 'regedit', then press enter or click OK.

Find and delete THE (1) registry key from "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList". (Determine you are looking at the right one by checking the value for "ProfileImagePath" to ensure you're looking at the profile you want to remove, it should be the same path we deleted moments ago.)

6. After deleting the affected profile, close the registry editor and restart the machine.


7. Logging back in again as the user will automatically recreate the registry keys and the user folders in C:\users. You should arrive at the desktop shortly.


8. Lastly, Move the data back over to the new user profile and you should be done.

The aftermath of this should end up with the user being able to log back on and have minimal disruption to programs and other things. Email and Printers may need to be re-setup or configured in this new profile, spelling checkers and other things may be lost unless you had the foresight to grab them before removing the profile. a followup suggestion might be to move the entire profile to a different area of the drive, to retain all possible data, but then pulling back potential problems may arise from viruses or malware, that may have caused the problem in the first place.

If you are uncertain as to what you are doing with all this, be sure to make a snapshot of the current setup by running system restore and setting a Restore Point, OR, you could take it to a pro. Typically this procedure should cost about $60-90, due to time and specialty knowledge.