media apps launch on their own, ANY ideas?

[samajm]

i have been having a problem for about 2 months with what i thought was just Winamp.
the program would just spontaneously launch itself and start running the last file or open the last folder it had accessed. i had updated to the latest version of winamp and it did not help.

but it now seems it is not just a winamp problem, i finally got fed up with it this morning and uninstalled winamp completely. not 15 minutes later MS media player launched itself and started playing the last file we had used in it.

it only seems to happen when i am using other applications: it's done it on everything from internet explorer, eudora email, ms word, and all of my online games. it has also launched when the system is just sitting w/o anything running. it does this without rhyme or reason - whether i am using or running any kind of audio or not.

any information is appreciated...
please help...this is really putting a crimp in my online gaming

 

[gopunk]

virus, or some kind of automation program running in the background.

 

[AncientMariner]

Dang strangest thing i've ever heard! Yes it's prob/ a virus or a trojan worm. Time to FORMAT!!!

 

[CodeJockey]

So it's not a Winamp problem...it looks like it is the OS launching the file (or being asked by a process to launch the file), using whatever application is associated with the file's extension. What OS are you using?

I assume you have done a thorough Virus Scan, to rule out the obvious.
Make sure you apply any OS updates, this might be a weird result of a bug.

See what happens if you go into the Control Panel, select Folder Options, then File Types, and delete the association for whatever extension it is launching (e.g. delete the association for WAV files, if it keeps launching a WAV file). Then reboot and wait to see if the problem persists, or if some sort of error message appears...

If you are using W2K, check the Event Log to see if there is anything suspicious in there to indicate the cause of the problem.

 

[samajm]

got it! what a pain in the azz!!
ended up being an app related to my logitech wireless mouse - Em_exec .
don't know how or why it was causing this, but taking it out of startup (after MUCH experimentation )
seems to have fixed the problem.
thanks for all who helped.