windows corrupted need to reinstall

[wayne]

Ok here we go. This on a small insignia pc (my girlfriends) 6 years old
running xp home SP2. This is what happened I was not there so not sure of
exact vergage. Got notice from virus software that a virus had been stopped.
Also got notice
that windows system files had been corrupted. Since then pc not running good.
Can not defrag except in safe mode, help and support center will not start.
In both cases says files not found but they are there. There is a whole
laundry list of issues. She lost all the discs that came with this machine
so I have nothing to work with. It has excel and word and I would like to
keep them if possible as I do not have the office disk to reinstall. I bought
a new XP home edition SP2. Not sure how to go about this. Treat as an upgrade
or new install. I am no pc genius but not completely ignorant either. Any
suggestions very much apreciated.

 

[Elmo]

OK, here we go. This on a small insignia PC (my girlfriend's) 6 years old
running XP Home SP2. This is what happened; I was not there so not sure of
exact verbiage. Got notice from virus software that a virus had been stopped.
Also got notice
that Windows system files had been corrupted. Since then pc not running well.
Can not defrag except in safe mode, help and support center will not start.
In both cases says "files not found" but they are there. There is a whole
laundry list of issues. She lost all the discs that came with this machine
so I have nothing to work with. It has Excel and Word and I would like to
keep them if possible as I do not have the office disk to reinstall. I bought
a new XP home edition SP2. Not sure how to go about this. Treat as an upgrade
or new install. I am no pc genius but not completely ignorant either. Any
suggestions very much appreciated.

The machine appears to still be infected. Try one of these free online
virus scans:

This one has a choice of a Quick or a Complete check
http://www.pcpitstop.com/

Symantec
http://security.symantec.com/default.asp?productid=ssr&langid=ie&venid=sym

<url:http://security2.norton.com/us/home.asp?j=1&venid=sym&langid=us&plfid=20&pkj=IHBEXIBVEMBQAUWZKTK>
then click the Security check link.

http://housecall.antivirus.com/ free online virus scan

http://www.ewido.net/en/

http://www.pandasoftware.com/products/activescan.htm

 

[GreenieLeBrun]

Ok here we go. This on a small insignia pc (my girlfriends) 6 years
old running xp home SP2. This is what happened I was not there so
not sure of exact vergage. Got notice from virus software that a
virus had been stopped. Also got notice
that windows system files had been corrupted. Since then pc not
running good. Can not defrag except in safe mode, help and support
center will not start. In both cases says files not found but they
are there. There is a whole laundry list of issues. She lost all the
discs that came with this machine so I have nothing to work with. It
has excel and word and I would like to keep them if possible as I do
not have the office disk to reinstall. I bought a new XP home edition
SP2. Not sure how to go about this. Treat as an upgrade or new
install. I am no pc genius but not completely ignorant either. Any
suggestions very much apreciated.

How to perform an in-place upgrade (reinstallation) of Windows
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;315341

How to Perform a Windows XP Repair Install
http://michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

You may also need to get drivers for the motherboard, video, sound etc.

 

[Kayman]

Ok here we go. This on a small insignia pc (my girlfriends) 6 years old
running xp home SP2. This is what happened I was not there so not sure of
exact vergage. Got notice from virus software that a virus had been stopped.
Also got notice
that windows system files had been corrupted. Since then pc not running good.
Can not defrag except in safe mode, help and support center will not start.
In both cases says files not found but they are there. There is a whole
laundry list of issues. She lost all the discs that came with this machine
so I have nothing to work with. It has excel and word and I would like to
keep them if possible as I do not have the office disk to reinstall. I bought
a new XP home edition SP2. Not sure how to go about this. Treat as an upgrade
or new install. I am no pc genius but not completely ignorant either. Any
suggestions very much apreciated.

On-line scanners are the most unsafe and next to useless. Because by the
time you've started your infected Windows and connected to the
Internet via this infected code base, and start to look for scanning sites
through infected DNS, you are almost certain to have the malware
perfectly positioned to overrule your attempts to clean it.
What happens if active malware is found? Don't expect that the on-line
scanner will do anything about it. Most of them are just just marketing
tools for selling you their products. Quite often, malware removal on the
NT based OS (Win 2K and XP) is far from easy. Sometimes a (good) resident
AV can deal with it in Safe Mode.

David H. Lipman's Multi-AV is *better and safer*, because you don't have to
be on-line to use it (it has no dependencies on using a web browser to
perform its function), and it can be used in Safe Mode.

Download David's MULTI_AV.EXE from the URL:
http://www.pctipp.ch/ds/28400/28470/Multi_AV.exe
http://www.pctipp.ch/downloads/dl/35905.asp
English:
http://www.raymond.cc/blog/archives/2008/01/09/scan-your-computer-with-multiple-anti-virus-for-free/
When the menu is displayed hitting 'H' or 'h' will bring up a more
comprehensive PDF help file.
Additional Instructions:
http://pcdid.com/Multi_AV.htm

 

[Patrick Keenan]

Ok here we go. This on a small insignia pc (my girlfriends) 6 years old
running xp home SP2. This is what happened I was not there so not sure of
exact vergage. Got notice from virus software that a virus had been
stopped.
Also got notice
that windows system files had been corrupted. Since then pc not running
good.
Can not defrag except in safe mode, help and support center will not
start.
In both cases says files not found but they are there. There is a whole
laundry list of issues. She lost all the discs that came with this machine
so I have nothing to work with. It has excel and word and I would like to
keep them if possible as I do not have the office disk to reinstall. I
bought
a new XP home edition SP2. Not sure how to go about this. Treat as an
upgrade
or new install. I am no pc genius but not completely ignorant either. Any
suggestions very much apreciated.

It would probably be fastest to start with removing the drive, attaching it
to another system (USB2 drive cases are inexpensive and work great for this)
and backing up all the data, including email and address files.

Before you attempt a clean install - which would start with at least
formatting the drive - you MUST be sure that you can get the drivers for
the system's hardware.

Repair installs will likely not help you, as they won't fix the registry
problems the system appears to have. If you can't replace Word and
Excel, Sun OpenOffice will create compatible documents and is free.

It is *possible*, though unlikely, that if there is a restore point going
back far enough, you may be able to recover some functionality and use the
Repair function. Do the backup *first*, try the upgrade, then if that
doesn't immediately appear to resolve the problem - a clean install is in
order.

You can spend a few hours doing a clean install and be sure that the system
is running properly, or you can spend days trying to track down an unknown
number of problems.

HTH
-pk