Why would one user not have permission to run explorer.exe until after a different user had?

Question

User profiles on a win7 box I have the displeasure of administrating all got corrupted (windows would create a default fallback profile on each login).

I created a new profile (an administer) and transfered exiting profile files into it following this:

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-CA/windows-vista/fix-a-corrupted-user-profile

Something strange is happening. The new profile is unable to open explorer.exe

Windows cannot access the specified device, path, or file. You may not have the appropriate permissions to access the item. 

I tried a variety of things including confirming the permissions on C:\Windows\Registration:

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/5218-63-cant-explorer#t170268

What I've noticed is that if I log in as a different new administrator user and open explorer.exe and then log in as the administrator with the problem explorer will work just fine.

What is it about the permissions on explorer.exe that cause this behavior?

What I want to achieve is to have the problem account open explorer.exe without having to log in as the other user first.

Thanks in advance.

Edit:

Here are permissions and Owner Screens of the offending profile:

Here are permissions and Owner Screens of Windows dir:

Here are permissions of explorer.exe:

Solution 1

Try resetting all Windows file permissions to default.

In an elevated command prompt type the following command.

secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\inf\defltbase.inf /db defltbase.sdb /verbose

If that fails you can always try a system restore.

Solution 2

Make sure if the new account is correctly added to the administrator group; If it is indeed correctly added in administrator group, run a Malware scan, then run the following line on a elevated command prompt:

sfc /scannow

Your windows cd will be asked to be inserted if changes to your system are needed.

Comments

[Admin]

Checked for viruses, or Safe Mode, Sir? or have you accidently excluded all .exe files for that user in Group Policy, or is anything amiss at HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\‌​Explorer\User Shell Folders

[Guy Thomas]

Could you show us a screen shot of the permissions? I would take ownership and then re-assign permissions.

[SMTF]

@GuyThomas Not sure what you want to see permissions of. I've attached screens of the offending profile and the Windows dir

[SMTF]

@JamesYoung Safe mode looks good. Nothing looks obviously wrong with the Reg Keys

[Guy Thomas]

Thanks for the screen shots, sadly when compared with my user permissions, I cannot see any problems or faults. Maybe that in itself is a clue.

[SMTF]

"Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations."

[Lorenzo Von Matterhorn]

change the ownership of your %root%\windows folder and subfolders to your newly created account. that would solve the issue. (replace TrustedInstaller with your account name)

[Lorenzo Von Matterhorn]

none at all, since your newly created account is placed inside the admin group.

[Chris Dalley]

I recommend you read this post. techsupportforum.com/forums/f217/…

[SMTF]

Interestingly it does not seem to have solved this issue ...