Loosing Favourites? (XP SP2)

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I’ve don’t know what has caused it, but both my desktop and laptop are loosing the favourite list down the left hand site when I open a browser window – the favourites used to appear by default. Was it from the latest XP update? Who knows – but advice on how to get my favourites panel back would be appreciated.

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>> …when I open a browser window…

Which flavour of browser?

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Sorry, IE6

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Do you have the Standard Buttons toolbar enabled ?? If so, click on the Favorites button. If not, in IE go to View>Toolbars & put a check by Standard Buttons. Then click the Favorites button or right click on the toolbar and add it to the list. HTH

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G’day Doc. I understand that you can click on the favourites button to have them appear (see the panel on the left side of the attached screen grab). But it used to be that the favourites would appear be default when I opened a new browser window. Now I only get the browser window (panel on right side of grab) and I have to manually select the favourites option from my standard button bar. Not a big then, just very annoying and I don’t know why it has changed.

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Have you updated your Zone Alarm Recently?

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Can you explain your reasoning Jerry ??

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I looked at the screenshot and I immediately noticed that there was a Zone Alarm Toolbar. From past experience I know that ZA can be very “strict” about access and usage until the user educates it.

There are reports of ZA preventing Favourites showing in IE7 and having similar issues in IE6

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Thanks !!

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Phew!! I thought I was in trouble for something

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Nah…. my old eyes just aren’t as sharp as yours. I didn’t notice tha absence of ZA.

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Let alone the presence…

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There were presents ???

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ZA, AVG, SPYBOT are all up to date. I can select favourites without anything being blocked – it’s just that my favourites don’t automatically appear when I open an IE window.

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Great, no doubt they are up to date

I have a small theory that it may be the ZA Tool bar in the browser that is hijacking the Favourites being displayed on start up of IE. I was going to suggest that you switch off the ZA toolbar for the moment and see if this changes the problem…..just ideas at the moment but worth a try

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No, sorry Jezza – tried shutting down ZA, nil result. Still not getting the favourites appearing

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If you are up to doing some detective work you could use Process Monitor to see what registry entries get changed when you display Favorites. Then shutdown IE and check the entries to see if they remain set. Are you perhaps using a different user logon with fewer privileges?

Joe

--Joe

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Okay, I’ve un-installed and reinstalled IE6 (via the control panel). The situation is “better” – but no less frustrating. Sometimes my favourites appear, sometimes they don’t with no apparent reason as to why. (We have IE7 at work, and I don’t like it so I will stick with IE6 for now).
Thanks for the process monitor suggestion, but I might be getting out of my depth looking at it.
What I intend to do is a system format. I’m starting to get the feeling that there is too much unidentifiable crap in the system.
Even with XP, I like to do it every 12 months anyway to get that “totally clean” feeling. If that works on my laptop, then I’ll tackle the desk top.
Thanks all for your time
Willow

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I’d suggest that you do go to IE7 and get used to the changes especially if you plan on a complete re-install. It is more stable and much more secure than IE6.

Joe

--Joe

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Sorry for the slow reply…a reformat did the trick. Still don’t know what was going on!
Willow

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Have you tried toggling the ‘pin’ button?

Joe

--Joe

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Isn’t the “pin” button new in IE7? Willow has IE6 as stated in post 691,446.

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Oops!!! Yes, it is new with IE7. Sorry for the confusion.

Joe

--Joe

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I would be inclined to upgrade to IE7. By all accounts, it’s a better beastie and I understand that if you upgrade from IE6, you can go back to IE6 by uninstalling IE7.

(IE7 here with ZoneAlarm remembers the Favorites pane being on show between shutdowns.)

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I kina figured that if you were asking that you knew. But sometimes folks don’t know or recall how something got the way it did in the first place. My Favorites list is too long to be on the desktop all the time. I keep the shortcut on the Start menu and use the one at the top of the page for the sites I visit most frequently. So, beyond the suggestion I’ve already posted, I’m not going to be much help.

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