So confused, in need of lots of help!

[Shortass]

It started for me after a LAN party with a bunch of friends. I installed a bunch of games and such and everything worked fine, but once I brought it home it was having a problem. After a lengthy logging in screen (normally like 1 second) it would show my awesome background... and that's it. No start menu, icons, anything else.

Went to task manager, explorer.exe was running and things were slowly loading, but never showed up. Got rid of explorer.exe and reloaded it, everthing shows. But the main problem is I can't really use my start menu (flashes and then dissapears, same with my docked folders), and some programs won't load at all (namely iTunes, which is really bothering me).

I'm also having cd-rom problems, as even when I have my WC3 cd in the drive it tells me to make sure it's there and hit retry. I'm just using a fixed .exe until I can fix this, but this plethora of problems is really aggrevating me.

I got some anti-virus software and it found legions of infected files and a trojan, got rid of all of them, and my situation got worse. The virus or whatever had infected tons of drivers and so I figured it would solve the problem, but not it's gotten more severe; I can't get into normal XP at all (always in safe mode) and sometimes I can't even get into safe mode (freezes/restarts in bios or while listing harddrives). I've switched out my 2 different ram's and have underclocked from 2300 to 1666 ghz, and I got back into safe mode, but I really don't know what to do.

Is this a hardware problem? Is there a way I can find out? If so, what piece is faulty...cpu, psu, ram? I'll be reinstalling windows XP tomorrow or tonight to see if that helps, but the bios freezing has really gotten me worried. Any suggestions?

 

[mechBgon]

Ok...

#1 You had no antivirus software up 'til this happened?! :Q

#2 And then, you went to a LAN party and networked your computer to a bunch of other computers of unknown security levels, and to top yourself...

#3...you apparently went and loaded up on warez! Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

You took compound risks and got bit hard. Back up what you can't live without, unplug your network cable, and start from the top with a fresh Windows installation, taking precautions. And not just the wormproofing, but the Ongoing prevention stuff. Make sure you do a Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer 1.2.1 scan and correct any blank/weak passwords it may reveal. Get some good antivirus protection and go through all the configuration panels carefully to max out the options (heuristics, scanning within compressed files, etc). Get a firewall software such as Sygate, ZoneAlarm free, or at least the WindowsXP SP2 firewall.

 

[DetroitSportsFan]

Hey friend ....

Sorry to hear about your problems. This kind of thing really stings. Please take a full look at whats happened! Its certainly not hardware. When you did your virus scan and you found your multitude of problems, your AV really had only two choices .... clean the file, or delete it. AV software cannot clean everything. You've been left with an eaten up corrupted version of windows. This is whats causing your instability. Dump it ... do a reformat and reinstall. I'd even consider a low level format just to make sure you're starting clean. Follow mechBgon's suggestions and secure your machine during you're reinstall. His advice will save you much more time and headaches in the long run than the little extra time it takes to reset up your machine.

It seems almost daily in here we are trying to fix someone's computer from these kinds of problems. Please, take this advice .... the best offense against this kind of thing is to set up a multi layer of defenses. At the very least, a software firewall and AV software that will automatically update. After all, nothing is more frustrating to a computer enthusiast than a poorly running machine. Our suggestions will go along ways towards making sure these things don't happen .... and increase your computing pleasures because your system runs smoothly day after day.

 

[Shortass]

Heh, well I had norton anti-virus 2004 but the virus apparently went into it's drivers and wouldn't let me load it, thus rendering me open. I had the sp2 firewall on, but ehh. Yeah, i made some pretty dumb moves but hopefully with some reinstallation I can get my computer back up to normal. I seem to have gotten it to a point where I can get on now without safe mode, so I should have it fixed soon. Thanks for the pointers, doh! for my idiocy.

 

[DetroitSportsFan]

First off, Norton isn't the leading AV software for virus detection anymore. The last time they led was 2002. Its a different world out there too. Trend Micro gets Cnet's editor's choice award for 2004. Other sites rave about Kapersky. If you're running AV software and this still happens .... it gets really aggravating. After all, you're doing what the experts tell you.

However, virus and malware writers are increasingly getting more sophisticated. There are a whole new level of "nasties" out there that can disable AV software and software firewalls if they get that crack that they need to get its little foothold. Your best bet is a multi layered defense. A good AV software, a hardware firewall like a router or a software firewall .... or both. On top of that, a program like Java Cool's Spyware Blaster can prevent a lot of nasties from ever getting installed. Probably the weakest and most misunderstood link in many systems is protection from trojans. Many of them are not even detected by AV software .... they aren't viruses so they can skip by unnoticed. There is a trialware program out there called TDS3 by DiamondCS that is considered by many to be the best guard against trojans. Unfortunately, its interface isn't that simple. You can get it HERE if you want to take a look.

 

[Shortass]

Originally posted by: DetroitSportsFan
First off, Norton isn't the leading AV software for virus detection anymore. The last time they led was 2002. Its a different world out there too. Trend Micro gets Cnet's editor's choice award for 2004. Other sites rave about Kapersky. If you're running AV software and this still happens .... it gets really aggravating. After all, you're doing what the experts tell you.

However, virus and malware writers are increasingly getting more sophisticated. There are a whole new level of "nasties" out there that can disable AV software and software firewalls if they get that crack that they need to get its little foothold. Your best bet is a multi layered defense. A good AV software, a hardware firewall like a router or a software firewall .... or both. On top of that, a program like Java Cool's Spyware Blaster can prevent a lot of nasties from ever getting installed. Probably the weakest and most misunderstood link in many systems is protection from trojans. Many of them are not even detected by AV software .... they aren't viruses so they can skip by unnoticed. There is a trialware program out there called TDS3 by DiamondCS that is considered by many to be the best guard against trojans. Unfortunately, its interface isn't that simple. You can get it HERE if you want to take a look.

Thanks, I'll look into the anti-trojan deals.