Need help with this one.......

Zarek1 · Jan 12, 2009

I did go to the read first sticky. I cannot do any step outlined in the sticky. I need to know if my situation is fixable with out doing a clean install of windows. The PC in question is totally unuseable ATM. I am on a different PC posting this.

After booting the PC, I see a desktop with a white background and the following: "Active Desktop Recovery" then below that "Microsoft Windows has experienced an unexpected error. As a Active Desktop, use the following troubleshooting tips:" then below that "Did your browser stop working, or did you restart your" then below that a button "Restore my Active Desktop" and finally below that "Did you recently change your background to a web pag"

The icons on the desktop are not the normal icons. Most are a shield looking icon gold and black striped in color. Also, a system message window spams several times in different windows "A call to an OS function failed" then a system message "explorer.exe Application error the instruction at "0x030e4abd..........."

When I try to alt+tab+del I get system message "Task Manager has been disabled by administrator."

After a few minutes, the whole desktop changes to where only blocks of color fill the screen with red, blue and green. I cannot access anything with the PC in this condition. Start menu will not work, I cannot open programs nor can i install them. I am stumped!!! Any suggestions?

chaslang · Jan 15, 2009

Welcome to Major Geeks!

At this point we cannot be sure whether you are actually having malware problems. What you are stating could easily be problems within Windows. The only way to know is by having you do the below. Yes this does get back to the READ & RUN ME but there are addition tips/notes here to try and help you get further. You need to try everything as noted. Keep this in mind: Without logs we cannot help you since we do not really know what it wrong.

Please follow the instructions in the READ & RUN ME FIRST link given futher down and attach the requested logs when you finish these instructions.

If you have problems where no tools seem to run, please try following the steps given in the below and then continue on no matter what you find. You only need to try the TDSSserv steps if having problems getting scans in the Read & Run Me First.

TDSSserv Non-Plug & Play Driver Disable

If something does not run, write down the info to explain to us later but keep on going.

Do not assume that because one step does not work that they all will not.

READ & RUN ME FIRST. Malware Removal Guide

Helpful Notes:

If you run into problems trying to run the READ & RUN ME or any of the scans in normal boot mode, you can run the steps in safe boot mode but make sure you tell us what you did later when you post logs. See the below if you do not know how to boot in safe mode:

Starting your computer in Safe mode

If you have problems downloading on the problem PC, download the tools and the manual updates for SUPERAntiSpyware, Malwarebytes and Spybot ( links are given in the READ & RUN ME) onto another PC and then burn to a CD. Then copy them to the problem PC. You will have to skip getting updates if (and only if) your internet connection does not work. Yes you could use a flash drive too but flash drives are writeable and infections can spread to them.

To avoid additional delay in getting a response, it is strongly advised that after completing the READ & RUN ME you also read this sticky:

Don't Bump! It Only Hurts You!!!

Any additional post is a bump which will add more delay. Once you attach the logs, your thread will be in the work queue and as stated our system works the oldest threads FIRST.

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Need help with this one.......

Zarek1 Private E-2

chaslang MajorGeeks Admin - Master Malware Expert Staff Member