GameBanshee Forums

I had a major malfunction and had to use System Restore to recover. Unfortunatly most of my Oblivion files were dammaged or deleted. I couldn't uninstall Oblivion because there was no option to do so, I had to just delete the folders. I deleted everything I could find but when I go to reinstall it I get an error saying files were detected already in use. I'm using WinXP, Is there anyway to totally uninstall so I can do a successful reinstall? Help me please, I've only played for like 10-15 minutes and can't wait to get back in the game.

Have you checked in the add/remove programs?
Start > Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs
Then look for ESIV or Oblivion or something there. I don't play it on the PC, so I'm not sure.

Hope that helps.

Yes I did. That's the first place I looked.

Well.. you could go into the windows registery and delete all the Bethesda/Oblivion entries. That should prevent Windows from thinking Oblivion is already installed. That's no place to dabble in though, you can seriously mess up your computer. If you don't know anything about it, I suggest you do a few preliminary google/wikipedia searches on the windows registery and read this first: http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=kb%3 ... 6&x=6&y=11 . If you have any questions, just ask.

Also.. might be a not be a bad idea to email Bethesda about this. They might be right on the money if they made a tool available that will automatically delete the correct Oblivion entries. I'm saying this because I know Ubisoft/Crytek built the a similar tool for Farcry, another complex installation. Bethesda doesn't *have* to comply or anything, but this is simply one of those things they can easily do and will help a lot of people.

[url="http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=2048"]RegScrubXP.[/url]

Download the above: legitimate, reputable site and its an excellent piece of freeware that I've been using for a long time.

As others have said, the problem is likely to be residual registry entries. While you could attempt to edit the registry yourself (very risky), its a good idea to download the above program. Run it, have it fix your registry errors then see if that helps

That's probably a wiser idea. Ignore me please.

Thanks, I'm not really familiar with messing with the reg so I'll try the program first.

Well I got the scrubber and ran it. It seemed to help but when I tried to reinstall I still got the files in use error. I did have the uninstall option available after I tried to reinstall by get an error when I try to run it. This is really frustrating. I got just far enough to make me want to play and now I can't even reinstall a game I paid over $50 for. Stupid System Restore did a whole lot of dammage and fixed nothing and now I can't undo it.

Do a backup of your registry.

Bring up Regedit.

Do a Find on all instances of Bethesda and Oblivion. Delete these.

Save. Reboot. Try reinstalling.

I got it installed-YEA!!!

Thank you people for all your help and suggestions . I now have Oblivion reinstalled. WOW, what a pain that was . I still need a better Vid card cause it runs kinda jerky and it's hard to control the mouse pointer but At least I can play and I'm thrilled

Great, Drasar! Have fun!

I uninstalled and reinstalled Oblivion myself, but had none of your problems. But I made no attempt to uninstall the saved games, because I know what a bugger that can be with Bethesda Elder Scrolls games. Much safer to leave 'em be, and just use the Delete game function. Only thing with that is the save-count, but that is only a miniscule irritation, not a problem.

Oh - and adjusting the speed of your mouse (via Options) should help with pointer control.

The reason I had so many problems uninstalling/reinstalling is because I had to use system recovery for a problem with my browser crashing constantly and it deleted parts of Oblivion and a couple other programs that I had just installed a short time earlier. It took out the uninstall options and left stuff in the reg and made it darn near impossible to clean everything up and reinstall it. I wont use SR again unless it's a total emergency. I had simular problems with my Dungeon Siege 2 game too but they were not quite as bad.

As a rule of thumb, it's a good idea to completely uninstall new programs on your drive that came in after a system restore, before doing that restore. You learned it the hard way, but it's a lesson that usually sticks.

Oh, yeah I'm sure I won't forget That Lesson. Just now getting everything repaired/replaced.