Computer Repair Help

Name: Jeffery T.

My computer was working fine. Now all of a sudden I have duplicate programs running when the system starts up. Duplicate icons show up in the system tray. If I do an MSCONFIG and look at the startup tab, there are two of the same item listed, over and over (all checked). If I uncheck one of them, restart, then the program will not load.
At the moment I have two choices: Duplicate programs running or nothing. What happened, and how do I fix it?

Open the Registry Editor (Start->Run REGEDIT)and navigate to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ User Shell Folders

Open Common Startup and it to:

%ALLUSERSPROFILE%\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

Then head to:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ User Shell Folders

Open the Startup item and set it to:

%USERPROFILE%\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

Make sure the value type is REG_EXPAND_SZ and not REG_SZ!