I had a severe problem with my husband's machine, which runs Vista. He couldn't log on at all - he'd enter his password and it would give him some message about a group policy having been set, and bump him back to the logon screen. I'd noticed just before this happened that something was breaking the internet connection altogether. It only happened when I was using one specific application (First Class client). When I used network 'diagnose and repair' the reply said something called CBF (a group policy, apparently) might be responsible. I don't know if this was connected - at the time, an upgrade of the router's firmware seemed to solve the connection problem.I hadn't set any group policies on his machine, so I was at a loss as to where this was coming from.On further investigation, I discovered that it was impossible for me to inspect, let alone edit, the group policies, since there was no option to add snap-ins in the file menu of the mmc. I also noticed that all his user folders (and also those of our daughter, an infrequent user now, but she still has an account on the machine) had been deleted, except the top-level folder (this would perhaps explain why he could not log on - there was nothing to log on to?)I keep the machine current with all patches and updates, and have an av and firewall running (also fully up-to-date) plus Windows Defender, so I do not suspect malicious external action. (I've also done a full scan with both the onboard av and an online scanner - both say the machine is clean)Luckily, the user files were backed up to a removable drive, and I have managed to restore my husband's access by deleting his original profile and creating a fresh one, and then restoring the files from that backup, but I would like some advice ona) what could have happened to cause this in the first place andb) wtf can I not add snap-ins to the mmc? Is this some more of Microsoft's paranoid thinking to not let users have _any_ access to the workings of their own machines? (They seem to have completely hidden the underlying Administrator account, so I can't even reach it in safe mode!) I know from bitter experience that the admin account I set up for myself to use still has limits compared to the hidden account, so why make it inaccessible?Sorry about the length of this posting. Thanks for taking the time to read it. I hope you have the answers!regardsariadne

I'd just like to add that although I managed to restore all his normal user files and folders, Windows Mail now does not recognise him (since he's effectively a new user as far as it's concerned, which is fair enough). When I renewed his profile I was given the option to save his od files to my desktop, which I did - but a search for any .pst or .dbx files reveals nothing, either in those folders, or on the whole system. I presume this means that Windows Mail uses a different file format to save its settings in...anyone tell me what? And where I'm likely to find them? Or has he lost his emails forever?regardsariadne

Hello, Please understand that we mainly discuss Exchange issues in this forum. I suggest writing a post on the Vista forums: http://forums.microsoft.com/technet/default.aspx?forumgroupid=204&siteID=17 I hope your issue will be fixed soon. Thanks, Elvis

Hi Elvis- thanks for the reply, and apologies for posting to the wrong forum. I think it may be that the mmc snap-ins are not supported in the version of the product I have, anyway, but I'll try and find the appropriate forum to post toto confirm this Regards ariadne