I have Windows XP . When I go into " My Pictures " , the pictures no longer show up as " pictures " , but only a square with the title. This only happened a few days ago . Previously , when I clicked a picture ,it would come up in a larger format . Nothing happens now when I click the picture .

Only if I right click and then click on " open with " and then click " Internet Explorer will that one picture open . The other choice " Windows picture and fax viewer " does nothing . How do I restore my pictures the way they were ( i.e. all the pictures show up when I go into " My Pictures " ? Thank you . Don

It sounds like your file association for "Windows picture and fax viewer" is not working correctly. Your options are to either repair the "Windows picture and fax viewer" file associations or install a substitute program for viewing pictures.

If it were me, I would install the free graphics program called "IrfanView". If you need assistance with the download / Install procedure, Click Here. If you just want to download the program directly, Click Here.

Once the IrfanView program is downloaded and installed, in the IrfanView "Options" menu, click on "Set File Associations" and set the image file types you want to open automatically with IrfanView. (GIF, JPG, JPEG, etc.)

Restoring Windows Picture and Fax Viewer as the viewer for images:

Note what file extension you want to change the default for. That's the ".jpg", ".gif", and so on at the end of the filename. It indicates the type of picture, and more importantly, it's what Windows uses to decide what program to use to display it.
Open up Windows Explorer. (The Windows Key + E, on many keyboards.)
Find any file with that same extension.
Right-click on the filename, and select Open With ....
Select Choose Program at the bottom of the list that's displayed.
In the resulting dialog box, "Windows Picture and Fax Viewer" should already be listed. Click on it.
Check the box labeled "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file".
Press OK
If for some reason it's not already in the list, you can force the association by following these steps, still in Windows Explorer:

On the Tools menu, click Folder Options...
Click on the File Types tab.
Scroll down to the extension you care about, for example "JPG".
Press the Restore button, if it exists.
Press the Advanced button.
Click on the Open action.
Click on Edit...
In the Application used to perform action: enter C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe C:\WINDOWS\System32\shimgvw.dll,ImageView_Fullscreen %1. Where "C:\WINDOWS" is the directory containing your Windows installation.
Press OK
You'll want to repeat that for every extension (GIF, JPG, JPEG, etc.) for which you want to change the behavior.

I hope this will be helpful!

Dwight