Problems with my computer.

Hopefully this is the right place to put this. Anyways, my computer has been acting up a lot lately and I can't seem to find out why, there has been only one visible problem and it makes using the computer very difficult. The problem is that I can't browse folders regularly, instead, I now have to open them via the "Explore" command, otherwise browsing is extremely laggy, doesn't load all icons, looks bugged as all heck and is sometimes impossible to navigate (I'll probably put a couple of screencaps here once I take some). This problem started to occur about two or three days ago, it really became obvious and bothersome yesterday and has since then been very wonky. What is don't get is that nothing else seems to be affected by it, everything else has worked fine. I fear I might have to reinstall Windows, which I will do if it comes down to it, but I wish to try out any other method first.

Can anybody ASDF me at this time of need?

PS. I did a thorough scan the day before yesterday on my antivirus program (avast! 4.8), didn't seem like there was anything utterly demolishing that would devour my computer. It did move a file from C:\Windows\system32 called (msupd6.exe) to quarantine (or "Chest" as avast! calls it), it is apparently infected by a Trojan. This really bothers me because I can't find any descriptions about what the file does, although one would deduce that "ms" stands for "Microsoft" and "upd" stands for "Update".

Also, if you know any sites, forums or anything I could check to help in this, could you tell it/them?

Okay... Which version of Windows are you using? I'm very good with this sort of thing so I might be able to help.

I found some info on the file.

Spoiler:

It isn't important so that shouldn't be a problem... But it could mean that something else is infected.
This sort of thing sounds like a problem with the registry. (I know because it contains the information to run the commands such as "Open", "Explore", "Play", etc. and it has information on icons and other such things you mentioned.) The registry is VERY important so if that's the problem then you need to find a way to fix it. It might be fixable if you use the System Restore feature.

I use Windows XP Home Ed., SP 3.

Here are a couple of screencaps of what I'm dealing with.


1 & 3. This black thing appears on the side and it's ridiculously long.
2. Icons are missing.





1. The menu on the side disappears or turns black randomly.



This happened when I opened the Control Panel.



Those outlines are supposed to be the folder for Network Connections (also, I got some weird notice about having insufficient memory to take a snapshot).



This happened when I opened the "Properties" window in the Network Connections ("Avataan..." means "Opening...").

This really bugs me out and makes browsing folders a real chore. Even the "Search" is messed up, the assistant or helper or whatever (the computer animated dog and the other ones) doesn't show up and when sometimes it even tells me that the part needs to be reinstalled.

That's very odd... I've never seen that before. If I were you then I would try Safe Mode. Look it up if you need specific help but if you press F8 before Windows loads then you'll have a menu. One of the options is safe mode. Choose it and see if you still have the problems. If so then you may have to reinstall Windows. Since nothing else seems to be broken then you MIGHT be able to back up all your files. Here's a tip: Internet Explorer can allow you to browse your computer just like explorer.exe can. Just open IE and in the address bar type "C:" and press Enter. It should work but the problem could be universal... You can also do a similar thing with Firefox... You just can't copy files and such. Good luck.

Also make sure to scan anything you back up to make sure it's safe.

OH and one last thing! If when you restart, it tells you that explorer.exe is missing or can't load or something like that then press Ctrl + Alt + Delete and when the Task Manager opens then click New Task... The click Browse... It SHOULD be under C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe

Thanks, I used System Restore and so far it seems to work pretty swell. I reverted it back to the state it was on the 19th, I also rechecked on avast! to see if the msupd6.exe was brought back, which it was, but I moved it to the chest, so it shouldn't be able to infect anything. I'll post here again if any more troubles start brewing.

Here's something: It happened again! I don't think the thing had much to do with the virus after all. I noticed one thing though, the both times it happened was when I was renaming files (music files to be specific). Suddenly it started glitching out a bit (the same way it did before it got bad the last time), I used System Restore yet again and it worked like before, but I'm now trying to avoid renaming too many files at once (I usually have the needed word(s) copied, then I paste it/them on the name). I don't understand this though, what could possibly be the problem that messes up the system?

if all else fails you might just have to crash your computer... I recommend backing up what you can if you haven't already. just be careful about what you back up, if the trojan managed to embed itself in one of the programs you back up it could just start it all over again.

Merik2013 wrote:

if all else fails you might just have to crash your computer... I recommend backing up what you can if you haven't already. just be careful about what you back up, if the trojan managed to embed itself in one of the programs you back up it could just start it all over again.

Yea, as i recall, it was you Merik who had this problem with a torrent site or something. I remember i didn't see you for awhile because you had to fix it. That was also back when you and I were playing Kirby Super Star.

Okay, the problem hadn't occurred in a while and I had been very cautious about doing quick decisions and movements in the explorer to avoid it, I thought all was well, but it reappeared just today when I was moving files from folder to folder. The tricky thing is: due to my constant lack of hard drive space, no restore points for system restore exist, so I can't fix it like I did before. Is there any other way of saving my computer besides the drastic measures (e.g. reinstalling Windows or something like that) because I am really reluctant to do such procedures.