Receiving BSOD when not in Safe Mode (driver issue?)

Hello,

Here is a brief history leading to where I am now (to the best of my recollection):

Computer got infected with viruses & rootkit. It disabled:

• Windows Firewall
• AVG 8
• Spybot S & D
• Malwarebytes

It also redirected my browser to random web sites.

With those disabled, I tried hijack this. It then became disabled too. Turned to Combofix. Was unfortunately unaware of how powerful it is. It "fixed" my computer. By "fixed" I mean it (supposedly) removed the viruses/rootkit & restored my computer to a somewhat usable state. However, AVG, Spybot, Hijackthis & Malwarebytes were still in shambles.

I tried to reinstall AVG, however I received an access error. I had the same issue when I tried to uninstall it. Eventually, with the help of inheritthis.exe I was able to delete AVG altogether (I think).

Ran CCleaner to clean things up a bit. Also ran its registry cleaner. (Mistake?)

Downloaded Bitdefender, however it failed to install properly & seems to refuse to. Now, my computer will not finish loading outside of Safe Mode (with or w/o networking). If I try to load normally I receive a STOP message with a 0x0... code. I can provide the exact code, if needed.

I can also attach the combofix log, if necessary. Ditto for event log.

Essentially, I think I got overzealous & jacked up my computer. This is beyond my experience. Reinstalling the OS is a last resort. I had to do that last year when my HD failed. I absolutely do not want to do that unless all else fails.

My OS harddrive is only a few months old, so (hopefully) it's not failing, however I am not ruling out the possibility.

Please let me know whatever info you need to help me fix my issue.

Thank you very much!

 

sounds to me you need to do all the steps, including super antispy and malwarebytes and the others in this thread

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=35407

try re-downloading the installers, and renaming them to trick the malware. I think you may still have a malware infection. post your results and logs in the malware forum.

 

Thank you for your reply. I was all prepared to do this, however now I am unable to even get my computer to load. I almost makes it to the login screen, then I receive the BSOD with the error message IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL and STOP codes referencing RAM locations. Note: I am unable to load in ANY mode, including safe mode. Does this sound like a hardware malfunction?

On a sidenote, when I receive the BSOD, I'm forced to do a hard reboot. Once I do this, the fan starts blasting at full force and won't stop unless I kill the circuit breaker. Perhaps my system is overheating (too)?

Thanks again!

 

if you have access to an xp cd, follow step 2 here:
booting the xp cd to get to recovery console
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314058
once at the prompt, type the command chkdsk /p
reboot and see what happens.

 

Thank you, everyone, for your suggestions. I appreciate it greatly.

Unfortunately I was unable to resolve this without removing the hard drive and replacing it with an existing hard drive that had Win XP already installed. This allowed me to completely wipe & reformat the "failing" hard drive. Now it works just fine.

It turned out that it indeed WAS a driver issue, which is what I initially thought from scouring the event logs. Actually, it was about 15 driver issues. The cause of this was the rootkit I mentioned that embedded itself in my system due to my stupid reliance upon the Windows firewall. (That'll never happen again). Now I'm running ZA for my software firewall along with a hardware firewall via wireless router, AVG, Spybot, Malwarebytes, & CCleaner for daily cleanup.

I also configured my system for "Normal Startup" via msconfig. I highly suggest anyone who uses msconfig to alter their startup items TO NOT DO IT. My computer is performing exponentially better now that I've gotten away from this erroneous practice.

Also, combofix deleted the rootkit, yes, but in the process it deleted critical files. I'm not sure if they were infected or not, but this rendered my system completely unstable, unable to boot, even in safe mode, unresponsive to the recovery console, unresponsive to the reinstallation of the corrupt/missing driver files, and also unresponsive reinstallation of Win XP. It basically rendered my drive FUBAR. I would not advise the use of this by anyone other than a pro.

Also, in my opinion Comodo Internet Security = TERRIBLE. I highly suggest nobody use this. It is everything BUT intuitive, and when it blocks one of your programs from running, it does NOT alert you. It requires you go into the interface and see what's going on. This wouldn't be so much of an issue if it allowed you to unblock it from there, but no, it requires you go into a separate section and "allow" it to run via an exception. Okay, not so bad, I guess, but then you "allow" it to run and it still doesn't work. Restart the computer to see if it requires that in order to take effect. NOPE. This firewall is just god-awful. That's my two cents on that.