Windows xp and ICS confliction

[HYPERMAKKA]

 I seem to have lost Internet connection sharing because of something to do with Wins xp Firewall.

  I try to open firewall (in control panel),it saysWindows Firewall Settings cannot be displayed because the associated services is not running. Do you want to start theWindows Firewall/Internet Connection Sharing ( ICS) service ??

   I clik on YES and it then saysStarting the Windows Firewall/Internet Connection Sharing service ( ICS).

It then says Windows cannot start the Windows Firewall/Internet Connection Service ( ICS)............. This is so annoying cos i want to share files etc with my Laptop also do other things, can anyone help please ??

[PvtSniper]

ok i work as a broadband advisor, however we never deal with this sort of thing, personally i would advise you to get rid of the microsoft security stuff (imo it's crap) personally i can recommend a few pieces of free software if your interested, other than that it seems like a problem loading services on the machine, you'd have to check msconfig etc. but i've no idea what services it needs, you could try looking on the microsoft knowledge base if you get some kind of error message/number, hope this helps, sniper!