Xp problem as i connect any usb mass storage device I.e. pendrive, memory card the Task Manager gets disabled automaticaly. And folder option menu gets away from tools menu of the windows. i left with no option but to reinstall xp to get the same back. some kind of .exe files with the same name of the folder appear in the respective folder. they are of size 41 kb each. as i click on them My Documents folder window starts. what to do. pls help.

Click start>run and write msconfig. and autostart look at program that starts and if something suspect there

That's a very strange problem...

I guess I would first remove all the USB devices with Safe Remove, then go into Device Manager, and update or reinstall the drivers. You could also delete the USB drivers, reboot, and let Windows rediscover them.

But I wonder if you're running an archiving program somewhere along the way which takes a directory and builds an "SFX" or self extracting file. Essentially, it compresses a folder, then creates an exe which uncompresses it. Does that sound familiar? If the USB device is not installed, do you still have these exe files? That would point to this kind of problem.

When you insert the device, windows should beep, and tell you a new device was found. Then on My Computer, it should appear (may take a minute or so). Then you should doubleclick to open the device.

If you're doing something other than that, or you have installed some kind of data compression program, your problem might be related to those actions.

If that doesn't help, please post additional information about messages you're getting.