Thanks for the advice.

After a bit of reading, the control panel fix is as follows;

The .cpl files for Windows 2000 are located in the %SystemRoot%\System32 folder. The default location for this folder is in the C:\Winnt\System32 folder.

  1. Create a new folder on your desktop called “temp” (without quotation marks). To do this, right click and empty area on your desktop, point to New, click Folder, and then type temp.
  2. Move all of the .cpl files out of the System32 folder and into the Temp folder that you created.
  3. Verify that Control Panel opens. Note that Control Panel does not contain icons after you move all of the .cpl files out of the System32 folder.
  4. Move the .cpl files back into the System32 folder, one at a time, and then open Control Panel after you move each file to verify that Control Panel opens.
  5. If you move a .cpl file back into the System32 folder, and Control Panel does not open, delete the file, or replace the file with a known, good .cpl file.

I only needed to move the cpl files, open the control panel, and the links automatically refreshed themselves (don’t know how it happened) but everything works now.