Error: The application has failed to start because the side by side configuration is incorrect please see the application event log or use the command line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail

Hi n0fan,

·         May I know when do you get this error message?

·         Was it working fine earlier?

For details about it check the application event log using event viewer. Please see the link below for information about how to use event viewer to check for error message or information,

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/What-information-appears-in-event-logs-Event-Viewer

Please check the information in event viewer and let us know about the issue more briefly to provide you a better solution.

Regards

Yaaser - Microsoft Support Engineer

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I've experienced the exact same problem today.  It begins upon boot-up, several programs won't start up because of the same error (AVG, Logitech mouse software, etc).  Many programs I try to open, such a Firefox or my movie database app, Collectorz... DVD shrink, Total Media 3, everything gives me the same error as above.

I found my way to the event logs but I really have no idea to look for.  I've tried several reboots (haven't yet attempted a restore, trying to avoid it), same results every time.  I tried to look through the event logs for each reboot to see where it begins... but it seems like the main problem is cascading into several other problems.  I'm getting Errors, not warnings.  I  see the side-by-side errors listed, but in addition to DHCP errors and what not.  Everything was perfectly fine until today.  I have a task that reboots the PC every morning at 8am, so I can only assume my first instance of this started after today's reboot.  But last night, was working perfectly fine.

The only change I've made in the last few days was getting a new monitor and changing resolution settings, but thats all I've changed.

Also double checking the logs, looks like I got some PNP error going on.  I can browse around the desktop, but if I open explorer and try to click on some C:\ drive folders (such My Pictures and what not) I'm told the folder is no longer there and I have the option to remove it.  Could all this be the result of a hard drive problem?  I try to run an error check, bad sector check, etc and it keeps saying it can't run the check while the HD is in use??? I'm completely lost here.

Also, I thought maybe I should attempt to uninstall the programs that are having problems, such as AVG and DVD Shrink, but clicking on the Remove Programs option does nothing.  It doesn't freeze or anything, it just doesn't open the programs list at all.

Some more info I wanted to share... I went back through the logs and traced it as far back, looking to try to pinpoint when I started getting errors.  I noticed that at one point, the PC had reported 'unexpected shutdown' several times over.  I also noticed an error about a dll-file (I'm sorry, I'm writing this from memory... it was something like dllXXX. exe I believe).  There were some critical errors listed, and ultimately I found an early error which suggests a hardware failure.

But now I've run some diagnostics on the hard drive and everything comes back fine! could it be the hard drive had some failure, messed up the file structure, is ok now, but that's why I'm getting side-by-side errors?

All I know to do at this point is start over and re-install Win 7.  Its rather disappointing. I couldn't do a restore because the system in its current state doesn't show any restore points! (I am really good at keeping restore points... this probably burned me more than anything else! Where did my restore points go???!).  But I'm afraid for the hard drive, which is brand new and only about 5 months old.  Only one way to find out I guess.

I am getting the error " "WINDOWS 7 error The application has failed to start because the side by side configuration is incorrect please see the application event log or use the command line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail." for every application that i try to launch.

Please help with a fix.

This came up not with windows 7 but when I tried to run OnLineTV and I got this message