Hi,

There are various reasons for- and various answers to this problem.
The Taskbar is run or started by Windows Explorer - explorer.exe and
is also part of your desktop theme.
Reasons why the corruption occurs,include power glitches,malware etc,
so an other advice is to run a malware scan.
Also using a non-default desktop theme can lead to this.

Quick fixes:

Open TaskManager (Ctrl-Alt-Del)
Check in process list for explorer.exe. If found,terminate it.
Then > File > New Task(Run) and type explorer.exe > OK
If not found,do the same as above.
*This may not hold on a reboot,which seems to be in your case.

Restore Taskbar and Start Menu & more!
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm
117. Restore Taskbar and Start Menu
164. Restore Taskbar to Default Functionality
195. Restore Desktop Icons and Taskbar
or for more choices:
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/taskbarplus!.htm 
<http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/taskbarplus%21.htm>

Somewhat longer:
Do a System Restore to before this trouble happened.

Run System File Checker sfc
Start > Run and type in:  sfc /scannow   >OK
This may start rightaway or otherwise ask you to run it at next reboot.
It may detect faults with explorer.exe.
Reboot after the check.

Repair or replace explorer.exe
The default location is under C:\WINDOWS  , but if you do a search in 
that folder
you'll find several locations of the exe. (I've got at least 10)
They are not all the same version,which you will see from the hint
 or under Properties of the file.
Check the existing one first and replace with the same version or later.
You may have to rename the old one first because security may not let 
you overwrite it.

Hope this helps.
Peter Ekkerman.


Chew Yoke Lim said the following on 27/11/2007 12:01 AM:
> Hi
>
> I run Windows XP SP2 as my sole OS on my computer.
>
> One morning last week, after I started up my computer, the taskbar at the 
> bottom did not appear.  Hence, when I minimize running programs, they cannot 
> be called up again for subsequent use.  I have to resort to <Alt> <Tab> to step 
> through to the program i want to resume using.
>
> I tried various things to recover the taskbar.
>
> Under Control Panel, I opened up the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties to lock 
> the taskbar and set it to be on top of all other windows.  That did not work.
>
> The only time I get a semblance of a taskbar is when I minimize the Language 
> bar, but it appears to take the height of the Language bar, and not the usual one 
> I used to have.
>
> I can set the Quick launch bar, and the clock and other icons on the right end of 
> this strange taskbar can be seen, as is the arrow for showing hidden icons, 
> which does work.
>
> However, the minimized programs are still not seen, and it appears as if the 
> whole taskbar is the Language bar, because when I right-clicked the bar, it gives 
> options for Language bar changes only.
>
> The few times when I shut down my computer, there was a message which had 
> never appeared before.  It says the svchost.exe is not able to read something in 
> some memory location.
>
> What does that mean, and could that be the reason for the missing taskbar?
>
> Anyone any clues?
>
> Thanks for any pointers.
>
>
> Yoke Lim
>
> ----------------------------
> Chew Yoke Lim
> Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
> E-mail: [log in to unmask]
> ----------------------------
>
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