I'm asking for a friend, she has an Acer 5315. On turning on it says" Windows did not shut down properly press enter to start".
Windows vista sign comes up
"Magnify not responding" She hasn't a clue what this is.
uses x to close this, "application is not responding"
Black screen with white arrow appears.
On top of screen there is a flashing green "sandwich" (her words)
on the left hand side a "satelit dish" orange flasing
Message appears " failed to connect to windows service, Windows could not connect to the system, system event notification service service.

This problem prevents limited use from log onto system.
As an admin user you can review the system event log, details why the service did not respond. Acer event tray has stopped working. A problem caused a program to stop working correctly.
Norton is flashing, after checks it comes up with " E mail in not fixed
E mail out not fixed.
can't fix anything because it won't go any further.
Only way to turn off laptop is by on off button.
Question: Can she return to an earlier time, if so how, she does not have a disk with this laptop. She gets online through a dongle. Thanks in advance

Boot to the install disk, and carefully go to R for Repair to let the software reinstall without distructive removal. It would be wise to make up a backup of all valuable data, but there is usually no harm.

The problem can be caused by a failing hard drive, but the above repair will at least temporarily fix most of such related issues.

Both blondes

Sorry to appear so thick, but could you take us through step by step on how to boot to disk, both of us are definately not computer minded and any help with all of this is much appreciated.

Sorry, I do not have one in front of me...
But you use the Windows install disk, or the recovery disk that came with your computer.
Save all valuable files as a precaution.
Then cold boot to the Windows disk. Go through the various levels as it boots. You should get two different choices for selecting R for Recovery Console and R for Repair. The Recovery Console is usually first. Ignore that choice, and move on to the next screens where you will eventually find a choice for selecting R for Repair. Choose that repair mode.
The install disk will then fully examine and restore all the Windows files, without harming any of your installed files.
Do NOT leave the machine. Watch it every minute so that it doesn't make some choice for you during some quick changes.
At the end of this which could take as long as 30 to 45 minutes, all of Windows will be repaired or restored to its original settings.
Next you have to go to www.microsoft.com and download all your Windows update files... as repair mode overwrites them. There can be as many as 141 of these. Then if you do not have Service Pack 3, install that next, after a reboot.