The problem started with my internet disconnecting several times an hour shortly after I updated the Avast program.
While annoying, it was tolerable. I decided to do a full scan tonight and Avast found 4 high risk items, of which, only 3 would “move to the chest” Avast recommended a boot scan. Did the boot scan and system restarted.
Since then, none of my programs will open, even Avast. Booted from safe mode. No luck. Even tried a system restore, to no avail.
As it stands now, my laptop is worthless. There seems to be numerous problems, many similar, since the upgrade. I would hate to have to pay to have someone fix my laptop.
Note: sfc /scannow will only work w/o original Windows installation CD on WIN 7. I know for a fact for XP, you need the CD. That is unless you were smart enough to copy the i386 folder from the installation CD to your HDD and modify your registry to point to the location where the i386 folder is located.
Furthermore, if your CD is not the same SPx(softpac) as the SPx currently installed, sfc /scannow will not work. That is why people in the know always create “slipstreamed” installation CDs when they install a new SP.
Just so I understand this and hope that it doesn’t happen again, was the problem with the latest Avast update giving false positives or was there a virus?