Help..major problem after running Ccleaner

What happens in safe mode? You get the message, but can you do a control+alt+delete and get a task manager?

If you can get into safe mode: Search for Wininet.dll by clicking the Start button, Find (or Search), and Files Or Folders. In the dialog that appears, type wininet.dll in the name field and click Find (or Search) Now. If Windows finds the file in a folder other than the System32 folder, copy the file to this folder. If Windows can’t find the file or you think that you may in fact have an older version, download it at WinDrivers.com (www.windrivers.com).

 

You need to find your reinstall cd! If you know your installation key ..then you can borrow a cd from someone ( as long as it is the exact same version - home/pro/oem, etc.).
Did you have a restore partition on the drive? That should show when you boot up ...possible a prompt to hit F11.

If you can borrow one ...you can do a repair install to at least get you back up and hopefully run the tools.

 

One other thing to try .....see if you can bring the start menu up by hitting the "windows" key ( the one with the wavy flag).

 

Can you boot into Safe Mode with Command Prompt ? Use the account named administrator to login. Do not use your account.

And I assume you have access to another PC?

If the answer to both of the above is yes, then try the below.

• Download smitRem.exe written by noahdfear and save the file to the Desktop of your other PC.
• Double click smitrem.exe to extract the files. It will create a smitrem folder on the Desktop.
• Please copy the smitrem folder onto a removable device (USB drive, CD...etc).
• Insert the removable device into the problem computer.
• Boot in safe mode with command prompt, and exit/close the command prompt window.
• Then press CTRL+ALT+DEL to bring up the task manager.
• Click File > New Task (Run...).
• Use the Browse button to get to My Computer and then to the removable device you copied the smitrem folder to.
• Locate the RunThis.bat and select it to run it. Follow the prompts on screen. Wait for the tool to complete and disk cleanup to finish.
• SmitRem will create a log named smitfiles.txt in the root folder of your Windows boot drive. (Normally this is Local Disk C and the file would be C:\smitfiles.txt )
• Hopefully you may be able to boot into normal mode now if smitrem was able to find a local copy of your wininet.dll file and restore it.
• See if you can get this smitfiles.txt log posted here.

 

What version of Windows are you running?

Do you have a bootable CD for it? If not, can you borrow one from someone? It would be best if it was the same Service Pack level that you are running.

 

Look on the CD and see if there is a folder named i386

If so look inside the i386 folder. Do you see wininet.dll or is it wininet.dl_

 

Do you mean wininet.dl_

The underscore is significant!!

 

Now read thru the below to familiarize yourself with it and print it so you can refer to it while offline since you will not be able to browser once starting the below.

1. Put the Windows XP CD into the CD ROM tray and close the tray. You may get a popup window asking about installing Windows XP. If you do, just close that window.
2. Then restart your computer
3. This should cause your computer to boot from the CD instead of the hard drive..(if not your you'll need to enter the BIOS and set the boot order so the CD ROM is first in the list.)
4. You should get a "Press any key to boot from CD" message! Press a key to do that otherwise it will by pass the CD boot.
5. After it boots up, you will see it load a bunch of files (be patient it can take a little while) and eventually you will see a menu where you can select the "Recovery Console" by pressing R It is normally the middle item in the list. Press R
6. You will see a list of possible Windows partitions with numbers next to them. Select your Windows Installation (which is C:\Windows) by typing the number next to it (which should be 1) and press enter.
7. It will ask you for the Administrator password is next (so make sure you know it). It you never gave it a password it is probably blank. If it is blank, just press enter. If you have set one then type it in and hit enter. It will tell you if you enter the wrong password.
8. When you enter the correct password you will get a prompt that looks like this: C:\WINDOWS>

Now from this command prompt window, here are some things I want you to do. Enter the below commands (the commands are in bold black) in the order given. I will add comments in purple.

cd system32 <-- the prompt should change to C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32>

expand D:\i386\wininet.dl_ c:\windows\system32\wininet.dll

There are spaces after the word expand and after the .dl_
The above should uncompress the compress file from your CD drive and put a copy onto your hard disk in the C:\windows\system32 folder. If your CD drive is not drive D, then substitute in the correct drive letter above.

If the above works without giving any errors, enter the below command:

exit <--- this will exit the Recovery Console and boot to Windows


Does your PC bootup properly now?

 

I assume you still have the Recovery Console opened??

If so, type D:\ and then hit the enter key.

Does that get you to the CD drive? If so, now type each of the below

CD i386
dir wininet.dl_

do you see a listing for the wininet.dl_ file?

 

Be careful. You don't want a reinstallation CD. You want a Windows XP bootable CD that is on par with your SP level. As long as you are getting to the Recovery Console on the CD, it is definitely a bootable Windows XP CD. Which SP level is the question. A reinstallation CD would more than likely be a CD that brings you back to the state your PC was shipped. You don't want that and they will not be bootable CDs with the recovery console.

 

Sorry for the confusion. It sounds like it is just a matter of what your PC vendor lableled the CD. I was thinking of a "Recovery CD". A reinstallation CD apparently has what you need to reinstall your OS from scratch to the same vintage of the OS that was installed on the PC when you got it. If it boots up and let's you get to the recovery console as I had given instructions for, then it is a bootable CD.

Don't worry about what the CD is right now. You were able to get to the Recovery Console which is all that is important. You now need to be able to copy a file off of the CD and onto your hard disk. And the file (wininet.dl_) needs to also be uncompressed which is what the expand command was trying to do. You need to determine what your CD drive letter is so that you can run the commands given.

 

Assuming that you are in the recovery console ...at the prompt type:
fixboot

see if that works.

 

This is not the problem. If the Recovery Console is booting up then the CD is obviously running.

BMCI, One of my previous instructions said this

Code:

If so, type[B] [COLOR=darkred]D:\[/COLOR] [/B]and then hit the enter key.

Does that get you to the CD drive? If so, now type each of the below

[B]CD i386[/B]
[B]dir wininet.dl_[/B]

do you see a listing for the wininet.dl_ file?

You need to determine which drive is your CD drive just by doing the D:\ or E:\ or F:\ until you find out which drive is your CD drive. The just do the CD i386 and the dir wininet.dl_ as requested. Do not keep trying to do the expand command? We are tyring to find out why you are not able to expand/copy the file so the first thing we need to do is make sure you are accessing the CD drive properly.

 

This has nothing to do with restoring the wininet.dll file. It is for writing a new partition boot sector to the system partition. The problem is not the boot partition. See message # 1:

 

Okay I believe the problem is that Windows will not allow you to do the D:\ from the Recovery Console. Sorry about that! I forgot about this since I have not needed to boot to it for quite some time.

Skip the D:\ and just use the below at the Recovery Console command line prompt (the C:\Windows> is your prompt)

dir D:\i386\wininet.dl_


If D is not your CD drive, then try another drive letter but it is probably D.

If the above command shows you information about the wininet.dl_ file then next run the below command.

copy d:\i386\wininet.dl_

Do you get confirmation that 1 file was copied? If yes, continue with the below.

copy wininet.dl_ system32\wininet.dll

Note there is a space after copy and a space before system32

Did you get a successful copy? Do the below command, to verify

dir system32\wininet.dll

Does it show you file information on the system32\wininet.dll file? If yes, remove your XP CD from the drive and type exit to reboot your PC.

Can you boot up now? Do you stil get the same error message about wininet.dll missing?

 

Okay but if you do start in normal mode, can Task Manager be brought up now? Or are you having the problem that Task Manager is disabled in Normal Boot mode?

 

Oh and one more question jus in case Task Manager does not work in normal boot mode.

Can you now get logged in when you boot in safe mode with command prompt or are there problems there too? If so, please describe them.

 

Okay then try the below.

Enter the below command exactly as given. Take your time to make sure you enter it correctly. Note the space after REG, after add, after System, after /v, after TaskMgr, after /t, after DWORD, after /d, and after 0

REG add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v DisableTaskMgr /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f

After you type the above hit the enter key and tell me what happens.

 

Okay see if Task Manager will open.

 

Leave it on selective startup for now just so we can see if you can boot up. If you can boot up. Just run the steps in the below and nothing else.

Using MGtools

Attach the requested C:\MGlogs.zip file if you could do the above.

 

From safe boot mode see if you can manage to complete the Using MGtools instructions and get me that C:\MGlogs.zip file.