Infected by ransomware - need help!

Hi,
I have one of the "police" style ransomware message screens locking me out of windows XP.
I am unable to boot in safe mode (reason unknown) and booting in normal mode ends up with the police message reappearing and icons disappearing.
Pressing Ctrl-O (dialogue box does open) then trying to open cmd.exe does nothing.
Following some advice elsewhere, I down loaded (from another PC) a copy of Kaspersky Rescue Disc. I am able to boot this disc from my infected PC and run the WindowsUnlocker utility and do a system scan. Unfortunately the scan runs to only 50% (after about 2 hours) then appears to do repeat checks (for many more hours) without any further progress so I have to stop the scan. I am still locked out of Windows XP (as perviously described).
So I am unable to carry out any of your Malware removal guide at this point although I can access the internet via the Kaspersky Rescue Disc.
Any help/suggestions to get back into Windows would be very much appreciated as I am running out of ideas.

I do have a system recovery disc for my system and files which are backed up using Easeus Todo on an external drive but I only want to try that as a last resort. (I've never had to actually use it before and if it fails my files are then completely lost).

Thanks in advance.

OS - Windows XP Home Edition 32-bit

 

Thank you very much Chaslang,

I have tried the steps in the link (except the scan which I have tried numerous times before). The steps were almost identical to what I did before but still no success with starting windows... just the same as before. I have, however, saved the log file which Windowsunlocker produced.

I shall again try an overnight scan and report back the results.

 

No change after scan, still hangs at 50% and still locked out of windows.

I am currently seeking help in Kaspersky forum and will report back here with any progress.

Thanks.

 

Hi,

Managed to get Windows running (not sure how!) and all appears OK. Have ran a scan with AVG with no issues but will work my way through recommended steps to be on the safe side.

Hope I don't have to post again and much thanks for reading my posts.