Strange IE6 problem & disappearing applications

Hello,
I've got something very odd going on with my PC and I am hoping somebody can help me figure it out.

About a week ago Internet Explorer stopped working. I started up my PC, clicked the IE icon and nothing. I get an hourglass for about 1 second then nothing. I immediately updated and ran Norton Antivirus & Ad-Aware thinking I got a bug, the scans came up clean. I went to Windows Update and checked that I had the latest updates, which I do. Still no IE6 - doesn't even show up in the task manager. I am now browsing with Mozilla 1.6 which works well.

But wait there's more: About the same time that IE6 stopped working I noticed that Notepad.exe is gone, along with Paint.exe and the Calculator. I found these apps in the I386 folder (huh?) and copied them to their appropriate directories (windows/system). Now Notepad, Paint, and Calc are working, but still no IE6.

Yesterday I went through the hassle of re-installing Windows XP, ugh....
Still no IE6.

Today I followed the Microsoft Knowledge Base Article - 318378 "How to reinstall Internet Explorer and Outlook Express in Windows XP"
Still no IE6!

I can't think of anything else I can do. I have begun making backups of all my files and such on disk just in case, preparing for the worse. Does anyone here have any suggestions? I am hoping someone else has had a similar problem and can help.

I would appreciate any suggestions!
Thank you, Roger

 

In article 318378 did you try Method 1 or Method 2 or both?

If you only tried one of them, try the other one.

 

I only tried method 1 so far. I am a bit hesitant going with method 2 until I finish backing up all my files. I have very little experience altering the registry, got any pointers?

 

Also - maybe this info will be helpful. I noticed my PC clock is now gaining roughly 5 minutes every day. This is new over the last week or so. I never had a problem with it before.

IE6, Notepad, Paint, Calculator, PC clock - are these things related somehow?

 

It's pretty straightforward, just follow the directions exactly and you'll be OK

 

virus
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.pinfi.html

 

Thanks AlanC and Kodo for your suggestions so far. The w32.pinfi was a good suggestion but turned up negative. I have tried both methods in MSKB article 318378 several times. A second re installation of Win XP and still IE6 refuses to start up.

Could this be related? My PC clock is now gaining roughly 20 minutes every day. A month ago it gained only 5 mins a day, now it is worse. Strange. I'll try changing the MB battery but I can't imagine that helping IE6.

I am getting really frustrated here! Does anyone have any last-resort suggestions before I decide to lobotomize my PC?

Thanks again,
Roger