Have you tried doing a Vista System Restore to latest date available before the problem started? There's a tutorial here.

Personal files will be ok, but you will have to reinstall any software or updates that were originally installed after the date used for the System Restore.

Ron

Hi Ron, Thanks for your post!  I have tried that - but unfortunately, it does allow me to restore to an earlier period just times within the last day.  I know there used to be a "restore within the past 5 days" option but I don't see that either.  Any suggestions?

Scanned for malware lately?

Roxmmtrayapp is software that puts the Roxio/Sonic icon in the system tray near the clock. You may need to uninstall and reinstall Roxio, but you'll need the installation disk to do that. If you don't need the icon in the system tray, you can run msconfig and uncheck Roxmmtrayapp. Then reboot and check the "don't show this again" box that appears. This won't fix the Roxio problem, it just works around it.

I don't use Vista, but using XP as an example, you can probably go to Add/Remove programs control panel and click the button on the left side "Windows Components". Find the entry for Windows Messenger, uncheck it and when it's done reboot. Then go back to that same screen and re-check Windows Messenger. You may need your Vista Reinstallation disk so have it handy.

You may want to try Vista's Repair to see if it can help, assuming the system is free of malware.

Ron

Thanks Ron. To get my skype to start working - I downloaded a previous version - I think something with the new update is causing problems with Vista.  Now I just have to try to get Windows Messenger and my video cam to start working again...