Silly boy... The entire process (which doesn't appear to have been followed) maintains your existing store and data, the plugins, they add or modify functionality, but rarely would the absence of the plugins on a standard ZC site cause your site to not function...

Hate to say it, but don't try to be smarter than the tried and true process... The team that put this stuff together and offer to maintain it have had enough of their own lessons to share with us that they too want all users to be successful... There have been changes to the includes/configure.php files since when you last installed ZC... Using the same parameters may not work and could be a cause to your issue(s)... If you follow the below process, the ZC will create the files needed and perhaps something like a database name may need to be changed, or the name of the subdirectory in which the store is held, but each of those actions are also covered in a FAQ. (Like said, one step at a time), but an upgrade need not be a start from scratch and could be even worse for your online presence if you basically completely disappear and nothing maps to the correct product/place...

http://www.zen-cart.com/entry.php?3-...d-of-upgrading