mystery virus, can't even boot up now

[mushroom]

my computer running 2000 Pro was infected with BeagleW
even though I had Symantec Anti Virus running and did not
touch any attachments. However it did a lot more to my
computer than Beagle is supposed to do - I got continuous
Messenger Service popups directing me to various
websites, and the computer slowed down and froze while
trying to fix the problem and finally died. The Registry
value that the Symantec website said to remove to fix
Beagle did not exist on my computer. Downloads of
security updates took absolutely forever, and would stop
and drop the connection. Now I can't boot up, not even
in safe mode or with my emergency disk. It can't get
past "loading personal preferences" and then it stops.
My background loads, but no task tray or start menu or
desktop icons. Task Manager shows CPU usage by 'system'
at ~99% and there's just no getting around it.

I'm thinking there must have been some other worm
piggybacking on Beagle. Symantec Virus scan insisted
that my computer was clean, before it died. But 'death'
is a pretty good indication that it was infected with
something!

Any suggestions for getting it to boot? and once booted,
for finding and fixing whatever the problem is? It just
doesn't seem to be any of the viruses that I see being
described, and it got past Symantec even though I had it
updated regularly and again as soon as I realized I had a
problem.

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

my computer running 2000 Pro was infected with BeagleW
even though I had Symantec Anti Virus running and did not
touch any attachments. However it did a lot more to my
computer than Beagle is supposed to do - I got continuous
Messenger Service popups directing me to various
websites, and the computer slowed down and froze while
trying to fix the problem and finally died. The Registry
value that the Symantec website said to remove to fix
Beagle did not exist on my computer. Downloads of
security updates took absolutely forever, and would stop
and drop the connection. Now I can't boot up, not even
in safe mode or with my emergency disk. It can't get
past "loading personal preferences" and then it stops.
My background loads, but no task tray or start menu or
desktop icons. Task Manager shows CPU usage by 'system'
at ~99% and there's just no getting around it.

I'm thinking there must have been some other worm
piggybacking on Beagle. Symantec Virus scan insisted
that my computer was clean, before it died. But 'death'
is a pretty good indication that it was infected with
something!

Any suggestions for getting it to boot? and once booted,
for finding and fixing whatever the problem is? It just
doesn't seem to be any of the viruses that I see being
described, and it got past Symantec even though I had it
updated regularly and again as soon as I realized I had a
problem.

If this was my machine then I would rebuild it from scratch,
then install a good virus scanner and a firewall before
connecting it to the Internet. My preference is Trend Internet
Security, because it's never let me down.