This started 3 days ago after a reboot. The first sign that I had a problem was that the Avast icon in my system tray had the red X over it. And None of the shields were on, nor could I turn them on manually. Other than that, many of my background services are turned off and cannot be turned back on manually. Because of that, I have no sound, system restore service is cut off, Windows installer service is off, and many others. Many of my applications will not start. A flag that hints this is a virus is that programs that won’t start are malware cleaners. Malwarebytes is among those. Some of my downloaded system cleaners (junk files etc.) will not start. I’ve tried every option from the Black boot screen with Safe Mode, etc. None of that works. My Avast UI says UNSECURED and Avast Service Has Been Stopped. The FIX NOW and START PROGRAM buttons do not work. None of the options under the Scan Computer tab are even there. The Icons are, but the descriptions beside them for each type of scan are Blank. I hoped that the Boot Time scan would work, and it appeared that it would. But I clicked “Scedule Now,” then rebooted. Avast did not scan though. I can surf the web. My files and folders are there and working from the best I can tell. Boot up is strange, as when Windows reaches the Desktop, all thats there to begin with is my background picture. It strangely takes about 5 minutes to get a taskbar and shortcut icons. It seems as if something else might be loading itself before all other programs, and may be turning off those background services. I don’t know. I’m only guessing, and am by no means any expert. I’ve never had a virus like this. Please help. Thank you.
Also, when I open just one web page and am connected to nothing else online, I can open up command prompt and type in “netstat -ano” and 13 ports are “Established” causing me to wonder if I have a keylogger. BTW, all the IPs trace to Google in California. Strange.
I tried Safe Mode with Networking and every other option from that black boot screen. Malwarebytes just will not start. I do get an error for Malwarebytes. “Runtime error 372 - Failed to load control Vbalsgrid from vbalsgrid.ocx. Your version of vbalsgrid.ocx may be outdated. Make sure you are using the version of the control which was provided with your application.” I tried reinstalling Malwarebytes in Safe Mode. Still - No good. I so wish Malwarebytes would start. I have relied on it in the past to clean up stuff in safe mode. But no good this time :(. Thanks for taking the time to try to help. It is greatly apprectiated.