Unicows.dll error on a Windows XP machine

CR
Posted By
Code_Robo
Feb 24, 2009
Views
430
Replies
4
Status
Closed
When I double click on a PSD file in Windows explorer on a Win XP Sp3 I get an error from Photoshop –

Adobe Dialog manager: "Unable to load required component Unicows.dll". Clicking Ok causes Photoshop (CS3) to hang and it has to be killed in Process Explorer.

The problem does not occur if the file is opened within Photoshop via the file open dialog.

Reading about Unicows.dll here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Layer_for_Unicode) seem to suggests that on XP
Microsoft Layer for Unicode (or MSLU) should be natively supported and I shouldn’t need a Unicows.dll.

Anybody has any idea on what’s going on ?

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P
Phosphor
Feb 24, 2009
Maybe it’s a re-naming problem?

Also from that Wikipedia page:

"A common problem encountered occurs when some updaters and uninstallers rename or delete the file oledlg.dll preventing the operating system from loading unicows.dll. This result in applications, such as OpenOffice.org reporting that "Application cannot start because one of the required libraries cannot be found." This occurs even if unicows.dll is installed in the system."
CR
Code_Robo
Feb 24, 2009
Yeah I looked at that. The file c:/WINDOWS/system32/oledlg.dll exists and has not been renamed or moved.

Still stumped by this error 🙁
M
Mylenium
Feb 24, 2009
Do any other applications open files with a double-click? If it was down to the DLLs, the error should be reproducible with other file types. If it’s not, then probably simply deleting the PSD association in your Folder Options –> File Types and creating a new one from scratch would provide a workaround.

Mylenium
LH
Lawrence_Hudetz
Feb 24, 2009
Cowabunga!

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