Weird Issue Win7, cannot display certain characters anymore [SOLVED]

flexy

Diamond Member
Sep 28, 2001
8,464
155
106
WINDOWS 7

I have a very odd issue and was not able to track this down yet. I first thought it was a browser setting isue, but is not because the problem is in ANY browser (FF, IE, Chrome)..but also in text files in Word or notepad++ in Windows.

The issue is that firstly, many special chracters like "/" or HTML tags like "<" or ">" are not displayed anymore...resulting in ANY browser not being able to display some websites right. Also, when i look at the source in the browser (no matter what browser!) all tags and some characters are missing.

Here is an example:

http://www.ndchost.com/wiki/cpanel/extended-exim-logging

Where it says
You can now watch the exim log at /var/log/exim_mainlog for additional info!

Characters are skipped and the line comes out wrong since the special chartacters like / etc. are missing.
In the browser i only see varlogeximmainlog. In IE, the entire section where that inline code is is BLANK.

EVEN WORSE:

I load an entirely "normal" textfile either with Word or with notepad++ and the text is garbled and unreadable - or i download a logfile from my linux fileserver and want to look at it on my PC...and its all screwed up!

This is how some texts look in notepad++:

i1.jpg


i1.jpg


There is only ONE thing i did yesterday before all this appeared, letting Win7 update and i updated a whole bunch from windows update. I am certain it has to do with it. But i am lost because its a whole bunch (20 or 30) smaller kb updates...

I also reinstalled graphics drivers just to make sure and also did a quick test with OCCT for CPU/memory. This is all fine.

It is as if something installed a "filter" making it impossible to display certain texts right...and this issue affects most of my work, on the desktop but also in the browser.

*** SOLVED ***

I had a hosed NET 3.5 installation, fonts were corrupted as well as other system files, i did a repair install now. Problem likely appeared due to a power outage a few days ago.
 
Last edited:

AFurryReptile

Golden Member
Nov 5, 2006
1,998
1
76
Do a system restore to before you applied the updates.

or

Look at the Windows Update history, and find the most likely culprits. Manually remove those updates through Programs and Features.
 

flexy

Diamond Member
Sep 28, 2001
8,464
155
106
Now i remember i had an issue with some programs not running right anymore BEFORE the WU. It was something .NET related. Because of the issue i did WU in the first place, so i cannot restore to this point anymore. I am doing a system file verification now and will also see to reinstall .NET