As it is 10 years old has the hard drive ever been wiped and the operating system re-installed? If not then I would choose that route personally using the recovery partition or Cds provided at time of purchase. A lot of work but worth the effort perhaps. Chasing down individual programs can be very time consuming and frustrating. I certainly would not be spending any money on this computer.

How do you get yourself into these problems? Because you have a problem and are trying to fix it rather than ignore it or dump your problem on someone else. I find that to be very admirable. The good thing about this is you will be learning a lot in the process of getting things back on track. The down side is it is going to take a little bit of time if we do it here. Your are very lucky because there is a lot of experience her and, super people willing to help. There should be no fear of what to do with what fix-it finds if you decide to go that route. They offer several bits of information as to what found information does, and a suggestion of what you should let fix-it do, to fix your computer. You can undo anything fix-it does, with the click of a button. If you go to do anything that will screw things up, fix-it will tell you. If anything in any of the steps does not agree with what you see on the screen, don't continue and get back to us and let us know what the discrepancy is. There are several reasons why you might not be getting to the desk top you are used to and rather than a bunch of mumbo jumbo and jargon, we'll start with the simplest reason first. From what I gather at this point, you have multiple issues that are not necessarily "Computer Problems". To best help you get on track using a forum like this, I suggest we take one issue at a time. There are several ways to skin a cat so I am going to use what I know will get you to where you want to be. Of course, if you know a faster way that works for you, no problem, as long as we both get to where we want to be. We don't know what you know so if we describe a step that you well know, it is not to insult your intelligence or belittle you, it's just to get you where you need to be in a step by step manner. 1....The folder that YOU created named "desk top", rename it to "My Icons" and do so without the start and end quotes. The folder you created, from what you indicated here, has a space between the words "desk" and "top". That's the one you want to rename. 2....Click on the START button at the bottom left of you computer screen. Look for "My Computer" and click on that. 3....RIGHT click Local Drive (C:) In the left column at the top, you should see "Desktop" with no space between desk and top. Looking down a little further, you should see C: with a plus next to it. Click on that plus. When it expands, look down the list and you should see the renamed directory "My Icons" that you did previously. Click on that and in the right column, everything you moved should be listed there. 4....At the top of this window click on EDIT and when the menu drops down, click on SELECT ALL. Everything in the right column should become highlighted, usually in blue. 5....Take your mouse pointer over to the highlighted column click down on the LEFT mouse button and HOLD IT DOWN. While holding it down, drag everything over to the left column and up to the "DESKTOP", at the top of the left column. You will see the DESKTOP change color when you are on it and at that point, let up on the mouse button. Make sure you are on the DESKTOP name and that it highlights because if you don't, you may move everything into another directory, compounding the issue!!! Everything should now be back the way it was before you moved your desk top. If everything is back to what you are used to, we'll take the next step. My particular next step is going to ask for a list of everything in the task manager under the tab "PROCESSES". Do a "Ctrl" "Alt" "Delete". When the task manager pops up, click on the "Processes" tab. After you enter this tab, hover your pointer over the words "User Name". This will be the name of one of the columns. You have to hover over the actual words. Left click that and you will see everything organize itself. If you could then get us a list as it appears on your screen, we can work on the next steps. I have to go on an errand so it might be some time before I get back to you, I live in a rural area. Someone else here may pick up where I left off, I have no problem with that. The beauty of this particular forum is many knowledgeable people willing to help.

You said you applied plumbers tape, but sight unseen I would bet you got the wrong tape. Those cheap little blue&white rolls of PTFE(teflon) tape commonly found in all the hardware and home supply stores are single density Teflon tape. Single density tape is only intended to by used on SAE & NPT threads up to 3/8". You angle stop valve is no doubt a 1/2" NPT thread. For 1/2" and greater threads you should use the red triple density tape and even with the triple density tape it still requires three full layers to insure a seal. You can find the red triple density tape in all Lowe's or HD stores in the section where they keep solders and soldering paste. You will find Yellow Rolls Double density tape (commonly labeled as "Gas Tape"), the tape is also yellow, and you will find RED rolls of Triple Density Tape. Although it is called Red, in reality the roll is red but the tape is a light pink color. When applying the tape you begin on the end of the pipe and make one complete turn around the threads even with the end of the pipe then continue wrapping so that each wrap overlaps the successive wrap by 2/3 the width so that by the time you get to the solid part of the pipe at the end of the thread section you will have 3 full layers at any given point. The tape must be pulled to tension while wrapping to insure it gets down into the thread grooves. Those cheap rolls of white single density tape are about $.99 a roll, expect to pay about $2.98 a roll for the triple density.

Ask your plaster applicator what they think. My understanding is if you spray down the plaster you may get streaks in the finish. I would not do that without asking first. We don't even plaster if rain is forecast in the next 24 hours. Once the pool has some water in it you should be able to safely turn the water up to increase flow. Ideally the pool should fill within 24 hours. You could use two hoses if your pressure is too low. We always duct tape a white cloth rag around the end of the hose to diffuse the water flow and reduce the chance of scratching. Do not turn the hose up so high that it is whipping around the floor of the pool.