Got the same error this day. (I dont remember I had this before)
As the error message appears I heard the clicking from my floppy drive (no floppy inserted).
Next try with a blank floppy inserted ---and wow, no more error message.
And yes, I'm still using floppies
Maybe this helps troubleshooting...
Edit: This workaround does not work on another machine I own. Same OS Win XP SP3 all updates.
@ LUK: If you sent me the bugfixed version you mentioned above, I would really appreciate this.