OK, so I searched high and low for a solution to this problem, but all the posted solutions failed. Here are the symptoms... I have a working account - no issues. I create a new account, the account is made, but I am unable to log into this account by switching users. I get the error above. I boot in safe mode and I am able to login, but it uses a "roaming" profile. When I check the user directory, there is no folder for this user at all. When I check the profile listings in regedt, there is no .bak nor any key associated with this new account. In my case it boiled down to a corrupt Default User folder. I probably deleted this folder in a cleanup effort and it was missing some key files. I went upstairs, did a "view all files" and copied an exisiting Default User folder and all it's files and whalla - no more problem