I'm using LW 4.12 on XP. While Limewire was loading, I received an error message saying that my "save file" was either missing, I didn't have premission to write on it, or "something else is wrong." At first, I thought this referred to the folder in which I save my incoming files, so I used the provided "Browse" window to point to that folder. Afterward, Limewire continued to load, but now all my preferences and settings are gone, and I have to believe now that the "save file" referred to something else.

I've never seen this before, so what would cause this? Do I have to reset all my settings manually, or are my preferences just hiding somewhere in another folder? If so, how can I get Limewire to load them?

Had you changed the location of your saved folder from the default (C:\Documents and Settings\your name\Shared) to something else?
If you've somehow deleted your preferences folder that's ok...you'd probably have been told to do that anyway
You'll have to reset things within options manually.

If things don't get back to normal for you, try deleting the preferences folder again while LW is closed(see points 2 & 3 below, if you've only used recent versions then point 3 alone is probably enough)
Fixes for LimeWire

That will revert everything to default, including the saved folder location. But again, you'll have to go back through tools > options & reset your preferences.

Cool, many thanks =)