Having Trouble Starting Messenger?
Looking at posts and doing a little research, I've come up with the following. I'm not saying this will help everyone, but some of the steps have fixed problems that people are having with dll errors, and messenger flashing, etc.
First and foremost, make sure that you do not have a program called
windows blind running, it does not work well with yahoo.
Second, make sure you're firewall is not blocking your connection to
the yahoo servers. Try turning off the firewall for a second, see if
you can connect, then you'll know if thats your problem.
Third, make sure you have the latest version of the following programs
installed on your computer. Many dll library errors and yahoo
flashing on and off occur because the Macromedia flash player is not
current. Download the current version here before trying to reinstall
a new version of messenger.
http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=Shockw\
aveFlash
Also make sure your Internet Exployer is updated, and Windows Media
Player.
NOW - TO UNINSTALL Yahoo Messenger COMPLETELY. Do not skip any of
these steps or it will not uninstall completely.
1. Go to add/remove programs and remove Yahoo Messenger from there.
2. Then go to c:/program files and delete the folder called Yahoo (you
will lose all saved archives).
3. Remove Yahoo from your registery either with a registery cleaner,
or manually by clicking the start menu, click Run, then type regedit.
Then go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER, then open Software and delete the Yahoo folder ONLY. Then go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE and click SOFTWARE and then delete the Yahoo folder ONLY. DO NOT REMOVE ANY OTHER FILES IN YOUR REGISTERY OR WINDOWS WILL NOT START. ONLY REMOVE THE YAHOO FOLDERS.
Then reboot the computer and download and install Yahoo. The best way
to install a new version is to save it to your computer, NOT to open it.
If none of these steps work for you, which could happen, and does
happen to some people, I suggest you go back to an older version of
messenger. 5.5, 5.6 and 6.0 still work.