Problem with internet explorer in O/S Win ME

[truenorth]

My wife uses as one of her computers an O/S of Win ME with all the updates provided up to the support cessation in Sept. 2006. A problem has arisen in the past 2 weeks that is as follows.
1.When connecting to the internet via DSL her home page in IE does appear and remain so.
2.From the google link on her home page she can access a google search result.
3.however when she tries to access any link from the resultant page it almost immediately goes to the Microsoft warning that "IE has encountered an error and must close,etc,etc".
4.If she tries to access ANY URL address either directly or from one of her desktop short cuts it immediately displays the warning.
5. Therefore any attempt at research on that computer for solutions is impossible.
6.As is any attempt to install any other browser or anything for that matter.
Now what i have done to try and remedy the problem:
1.I attempted a repair (from add/remove programs on the IE version 6).No change.
2.I tried a "return to original configuration" from add/remove programs. Result removed IE 6 and returned to 5.5 .However problem remained.
3.Outlook Express is unaffected and continues to work as designed.
4.I was able to change her home page (to Google) and the same sequence of events occur from that page as well.
Any solution that requires the use of another computer to download and install something to correct this will need to be able to do so via a USB flash drive process.
We do have the original win ME operating system disk. So if something is suggested that involves that please be specific as she does NOT want to lose years of accumulated photos and data that are on that computer.
For those of you that may be tempted to use this post as a rant against Win Me please try to resist. She has been using this O/S for 9 years and this is her 1st ever problem. Half the marriages don't last that long. Thanks for any suggestions that you may offer. truenorth

[patio]

Is it possible to DLoad the latest Firefox on your machine and copy it to a flash drive /CD to install on her machine ? ?
This is only to test if this is a browser specific issue here...

[truenorth]

Patio,Good to see you on board on this one.I do not see a problem with downloading another browser to one of my computers (or even one of hers that is adjacent to the HP with the problem).Unless the browser to be downloaded has more than 32 GB. or that it does not permit a choice as to download location.Those are the only 2 possible problems i can see. Our son has been advocating the use of "Google Chrome" as a browser.I am always prepaired to try something new but a brief search on that browser seemed to indicate it is only useable with Vista. I will await your further comments prior to proceeding with anything.thank you,truenorth

[patio]

Personally to determine browser issues i would use Firefox over Google chrome...
FireFox has been in development a bit longer...
Tell your Son once the machine is up and running properly he can put Chrome on at that time.

The current file sixe for the latest version of FireFox is 7.1 Mg...

Hope this helps.

[truenorth]

patio,I will follow your suggestion and will advise of progress when able.thank's again,truenorth

[patio]

No Problem truenorth...i'll be here.

[soybean]

she does NOT want to lose years of accumulated photos and data that are on that computer.

Are those files backed up on any external media (CD/DVD, flash drive, external hard drive)?  If not, I think you know the risk.  Think about it.  You have a 9 years old computer.  Hard drives have mechanical parts and will not last forever.  Also, the older OS is no longer supported by Microsoft and finding anti-virus and other protection programs that will run on Win ME is getting harder with each passing day, making older systems more vulnerable.  To protect that data, the best thing to do is to get it backed up on external media.

[truenorth]

soybean, Man you must be physic.As a result of this event we have both decided that as you say we are potentially vulnerable on all our computers and  that this Sunday (tomorrow) i am going to create another external Hd from and internal and a case just for the purpose of creating a secure off-site backup device. I absolutely concur that this is a very often overlooked (ignored) part of computer use. A perusal through the CH forums will give evidence of the many sorry situations that have arisen because of a failure to "back up". No excuses time to get at it.We have dodged the bullet until now but it is bound to happen sooner or later.Fortunately she has over time burned a lot of the photos to CD/DVD but she is always way behind from doing them all. So thanks for the advice.truenorth

[truenorth]

patio, (and others) The results of the "download/installation of "Firefox" are as follows:
1. The "latest" version Of Firefox 3.xxx will Not work on ME. A search clearly indicates that (much to the consternation of pre Win 2000 users).
2.However continued research (it is so enlightening to encounter these problems as it is an opportunity for gaining additional knowledge) indicated that Ver.2.0 WOULD work.
3. While there are many issues of ver 2.xxx i chose to use the 1st issuance of it and it is now functioning perfectly without any of the problems of IE 6 that started all this.
  Some interesting side issues on this:
1.In order for my wife to access certain Web sites to their fullest it was stated by Firefox that an additional plug in was required.
2. That turned out to be "Adobe Flash Player"--no problem did it.
3. But what(in my opinion ) becomes interesting is that the message i received from IE 6 about the problem it was having was "IE has caused an error in flash.osx. IE will now close--etc.etc.
4.This smells like a "flash player" issue to me.
5.Just as an experiment i tried IE 6 again after the Firefox and flash player installation to see what would happen. No change from earlier issue. So even though the current ( i assume) flash player was installed to satisfy the Firefox requirements it did not resolve the IE 6 issue.
   Ah well she now has a fully functional web browser again so in my mind that is success. Thank you, truenorth
P.S. Now on to the "backup" issue.

[patio]

Good news indeed...nice work !
On the FireFox front the only real issue with ver.2 was that it did not release memory very efficiently...
Simple solution : If she is online for over an hour simply have her close FireFox and re-open it....worked fine for me.

Since IE is only needed for MS updates and she has them all already there's no need to go back to IE as it sounds like it is the culprit here.

[truenorth]

patio,thanks again,truenorth

[patio]

Anytime...

[soybean]

3. But what(in my opinion ) becomes interesting is that the message i received from IE 6 about the problem it was having was "IE has caused an error in flash.osx. IE will now close--etc.etc.
4.This smells like a "flash player" issue to me.
5.Just as an experiment i tried IE 6 again after the Firefox and flash player installation to see what would happen. No change from earlier issue. So even though the current ( i assume) flash player was installed to satisfy the Firefox requirements it did not resolve the IE 6 issue.

Just FYI: Keep in mind that IE and Firefox need to be updated separately for Flash Player.  Updating Flash Player in one browser does not update it in the other.

[truenorth]

soybean,Thank you for your FYI i had not expected that. Now not that i am tempted to go back to IE just as a matter of knowledge improvement i would be interested in the solution to the following conundrum. As you know i cannot get any version of IE (on the ME machine) to link to any external web sites (except for some strange reason the initial opening of a google search page and then the chosen URL from there). Never beyond that sequence. So how would i ever get IE open long enough to access an installation of a stable "flash player " to be associated with it?truenorth