For a couple of months now I have been unable to sign on to AOL in nay way other than as "guest".   The AOL sign-on screen normally offer three fields:  

1. Name - offering a choice of your screen names, Guest and New User

2. Password

3. Location

After a crash a few months ago the sign-on screen looked the same but only offered two fields:

1. Name - offering a choice of nothing other than "Guest", "New User" or "Existing member".  No sign of registered screen names.

2. Location

N.B.: No Password field!

Trying to sign in as new user or registered member stopped  at the "checking password" step because, obviously, there was no password input for either of thes screen names(?).

Signing in as "Guest" worked with no problem and accepted existing screen names and passwords.

This gives normal access to e-mails, saved mails stored at AOL, address book (also stored at AOL) but denies access to anything held in the local "Personal Filing Cabinet".   Nor does it allow creation of a personal web-site.

AOL also has an "AOL Dialler" - this accepts the registered screen name and password - so the information is still being held on my computer as well as at AOL.

After lengthy discussions with AOL so-called technical experts (who can do no more than read from their book of answers), their only suggestion was: reformat your hard drive - as for then signing on they could give no guarantee that I wouldn't then have to open a new account with a lot of hassle trying to get unexpired subscription back.

So I just keep on signing in as guest.  I can also use AOL Dialler, connect to IE6 and go to http://www.aol.co.uk and then sign in, using my existing screen names and passwords.

I have repeatedly asked AOL where the corrupt identifier file is - but they won't tell me.

   Have you tried running RegVac?  In the past RegVac has been able to solve some AOL problems.
   Surely, you have tried uninstalling AOL and then reinstalling it.
   Reformatting the harddrive is just an easy way out for the tech people (that way they don't have to find the problem).

Thanks, Ray.  I've uninstalled and re-installed AOL repeatedly - no good.  I'm running Windows 98SE and, in the past several years on broadband, I've never had any serious AOL problem before.   Uninstalling AOL only removes the AOL files in the Programs folder - it leaves  most of AOL behind in Windows->All users and various other places.   If I delete all that lot of common files, I don't know where I'll end up!

Regards

   Like I said, try running RegVac.  You just need to run it in the Novice mode and hopefully, it will fix that.  The trial version is free and is fully functional.