Problems Shutting Down Windows - both laptop and desktop

[Guest]

Hi Everyone,
I'm having what now seems to be a pretty serious issue with shutting down
Windows XP on my computers.
The reason I think its quite serious is due to the fact that the problem has
very recently started occuring on my laptop (was previously only on the
desktop) - thus making me think it might be a virus or spyware.

Basically what happens is that when i select either "turn off" or "restart",
my screen goes light blue and the "Microsoft XP" (with the little flag)
appears, but never any other words ("windows is shutting down" "windows is
saving your settings" etc etc).
I've left it sit for quite a few minutes and it never shuts down, thus
requiring me to push the button for a manual shutdown process.

Yesterday I shut down my laptop successfully in the afternoon, but then when
fired up again later that night I encountered this problem when trying to
shutdown - its continued ever since.

The only link between the two computers is my gmail (I access it via the
gmail notifier on both computers) account and a USB flash drive I use to
transfer data between them.

In the event that I can't find a virus or spyware (nothing so far), should I
just re-install Windows? Not even sure how to do that.


Any assistance or general advice would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks

B.

 

[Malke]

Hi Everyone,
I'm having what now seems to be a pretty serious issue with shutting down
Windows XP on my computers.
The reason I think its quite serious is due to the fact that the problem
has very recently started occuring on my laptop (was previously only on
the desktop) - thus making me think it might be a virus or spyware.

Basically what happens is that when i select either "turn off" or
"restart", my screen goes light blue and the "Microsoft XP" (with the
little flag) appears, but never any other words ("windows is shutting
down" "windows is saving your settings" etc etc).
I've left it sit for quite a few minutes and it never shuts down, thus
requiring me to push the button for a manual shutdown process.

Yesterday I shut down my laptop successfully in the afternoon, but then
when fired up again later that night I encountered this problem when
trying to shutdown - its continued ever since.

The only link between the two computers is my gmail (I access it via the
gmail notifier on both computers) account and a USB flash drive I use to
transfer data between them.

In the event that I can't find a virus or spyware (nothing so far), should
I just re-install Windows? Not even sure how to do that.

We don't have enough information to suggest that you reinstall Windows, but
that is normally a last resort. If you are sharing files on the two
computers over a home network and one computer got infected, there is
always a good chance the second computer also got infected. So disconnect
both computers from the network and clean them up, one at a time.

Go through these general malware removal steps systematically -
http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Removing_Malware

If the procedures look too complex - and there is no shame in admitting this
isn't your cup of tea - take the machine to a professional computer repair
shop (not your local version of BigStoreUSA).

Malke

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Basically what happens is that when i select either "turn off" or
"restart", my screen goes light blue and the "Microsoft XP" (with the
little flag) appears, but never any other words ("windows is shutting
down" "windows is saving your settings" etc etc).
I've left it sit for quite a few minutes and it never shuts down, thus
requiring me to push the button for a manual shutdown process.

Yesterday I shut down my laptop successfully in the afternoon, but
then when fired up again later that night I encountered this problem
when trying to shutdown - its continued ever since.

In the event that I can't find a virus or spyware (nothing so far),
should I just re-install Windows? Not even sure how to do that.

Reinstalling Windows is enormous overkill. There's good information on
shutdown problems here: http://www.aumha.org/win5/a/shtdwnxp.htm