Regedit plus a couple of networking issues

[Ray Phillips]

Recently, my default internet connection on my notebook
has been changing from my selection to about:blank. I
read an article on how to fix it through the registry.
However when I try to run regedit, the screen only stays
up for less than 1 second. A similar thing happened on my
desktop when opening Internet Explorer, making it
impossible to open any web pages. I also had the same
thing with about:blank on the desktop which I resolved
through the registry fix. The only thing that I could
think of was that I had recently set up a network. I have
a home office which uses a laptop and a desktop (no 1),
and I have another desktop (no 2) which is my home
computer connected to the internet via a dialup. I have
connected the laptop and no 2 via a wireless LAN and I
have an ICS setup, enabling me to access the internet from
my laptop (sometimes). I then connected my laptop to the
other desktop (no 1) via a network hub. This setup
enables me to (sometimes) see all of the computers from
either of the others. However, the system seems very
unstable, as I cant seem to get the IP addresses correct.
I have the wireless set to 192.168.0.1 and 0.3 which gets
me the internet access. The hub connected machines use
169.254.212.229 and 230.

Can anyone set me straight about the configuration that I
have used, and is it likely that that could have affected
regedit.

Any assistance would be appreciated.

 

[Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]]

You possibly have a virus (and probably spyware/scumware).

Do you have good AV software? If not, get some ASAP....you can also run an
online scan here: http://housecall.antivirus.com . All your computers should
have current, updated antivirus installed -
Also see

Dealing with Unwanted Malware, Parasites, Toolbars and Search Engines:
http://mvps.org/winhelp2002/unwanted.htm