Significant Issue. Desperately in need of assistance if possible

Viruses and worms
1

Due to whatever the problem is with my computer, I can no longer access windows in any capacity, including safe mode. This means I have no logs that I can post for assistance. For that I apologize.

A couple of days ago I got an error message alerting me that Windows had recovered from a serious error. I sent the error report and afterward the computer seemed to be functioning properly. The next morning I got the same error, but this time after sending the report the computer restarted itself. It got into some sort of cycle in which it would restart itself randomly. I had to leave for work, but I began an Avast boot-up scan before I left. I am using Avast 5 (the free version) and I believe my virus database was up to date at the time.

My girlfriend texted me later in the day saying the computer appeared normal. It was on the desktop, and the boot-up scan was no longer running. I initially figured the scan had completed normally and found no issues. When I got home and turned the computer back on it initially worked normally. After maybe 15 or 20 minutes it restarted itself again, and then entered into a cycle in which it would boot-up, get through the welcome screen, and then restart just about as soon as the desktop appeared. I was able to enter safe mode initially, but avast would not run in safe mode (I don’t really know if that’s supposed to be the case or not, I’m not incredibly computer savvy).

Eventually the computer began to restart itself while in safe mode as well. At this point I began to think I might have a hardware issue (and for all I know I still might, although I suspect some sort of infection). I attempted to use the PC diagnostic tool in PC Recovery, however this seemed to freeze or just run indefinitely and I finally stopped it. The computer did not restart during the diagnostic scanning process, I just manually turned it off after a while because it didn’t seem to actually be doing anything. After that I attempted a system restore from the PC Recovery menu. Shortly after beginning the system restore the computer restarted. I have since also attempted a total reformat, but again the computer restarted.

Before the computer totally crapped out I was able to disable automatic restart, however this seemed to have little effect. Yesterday I finally got the stop error screen. Below is the error code I received.

0x00000050 (0xF174EB30, 0x00000000, 0xF730B2E6, 0x00000000)

The message indicated that the problem seemed to originate from ntfs.sys.

Now the computer cannot access Windows in any capacity. If I try to turn it on it won’t even run safe mode and tells me that the file mentioned above, ntfs.sys, is damaged or corrupted. I looked this problem up and found an article stating that if this happened the only fix was to reformat and reinstall the OS. It was at this point that I attempted the full reformat, which failed when the computer restarted itself again.

I hope I’ve been able to provide as much information as possible about the nature of my problems. Like I said, I’m no computer genius, and I cannot provide any logs. I’m currently taking college courses online, and I have an e-textbook on that computer that I don’t want to have to pay for again if possible. One other item of note: (although this might simply be coincidence) my girlfriend works at the main library of the university in town and informed me that several of their computer had issues at the same time as mine. She told me that she suspected the online class system might have been the source of the infection. While my classes are located at a different address, they use the same program. I dealt with two infections earlier in the year, after which I changed my surfing habits in an attempt to avoid sites that might be more likely to infect my computer. The last two infections occurred in a short time span, both during my online classes. During the summer I had no classes, nor did I have any computer problems. This semester just started a week ago, and now I potentially have an infection again. Is there any chance that the two are related? I would certainly hope my school is not the problem, but I’ve become paranoid about malware and the netbook I’m posting this from also runs on Windows (the problem computer is Windows XP and this netbook is Windows 7 starter fwiw), so I’m leery of logging into my classes from this computer without knowing if that was the cause.

Thanks in advance for anyone who is willing to sift through this admittedly long post and can offer me any degree of assistance. I’ll be happy to answer any questions that I can to help provide additional information to help diagnose or hopefully fix my poor compy.

2

Someone with more know-how could maybe try helping with this, but something that catastrophic, I would look at the hardware first (HDD first among those), software second, especially if you cannot even reformat.

3

ntfs.sys is a necessary driver to load files from the disk.

But it could be a virus:
Read the instructions, download and burn (maybe from another computer), finally use one of this rescue CD’s:

  1. Dr. Web
  2. Avira
  3. BitDefender
  4. Kaspersky
  5. F-Secure

Some users use:
6. Vba32 Rescue
7. G Data BootCD

You can check also this comparison article.

Integrate Multiple Antivirus Rescue Disk into One Single Disc or USB Flash Drive with SARDU. The most compreensive cleaning CD.

4

Thanks. For a good while hardware was my primary suspect, and I still am not ruling it out. I began to lean more towards infection due to the rapid degeneration of the problem. Given my imperfect knowledge of computers I couldn’t think of a reason why a hardware issue would cause the computer to go from acting normally, to restarting, to becoming unable to access Windows. I thought the restarting could certainly be a hardware issue, maybe a power supply or overheating problem. I blasted my window fan directly into the side of the computer during most of the day yesterday, but it didn’t seem to have an impact. I guess it was the missing/corrupted file in windows that made me shift my suspicions.

That said, again, my knowledge is limited, and my paranoia about malware/infection certainly also factors into my suspicion.

My hardware knowledge is pretty minimal as well. I can crack open the computer and generally identify, replace or install basic components, but I wouldn’t know how to diagnose any sort of hardware issue beyond a card coming loose from its socket, or maybe other similarly basic issues. Any suggestions as to what hardware I should check and for what potential issues I should look?

5

The disk surface and drivers… That could be everything you’re facing.
If you could boot, well a command called chkdsk /F must be urgent run in your disk.

6

Thanks for the info. Unfortunately this brings up another problem. My CD/DVD player on the problem computer has been on the fritz for a while as well. Is it possible to put one of these onto a flash drive, or external hard drive and run it that way?

7

Just began inspection of harddrives. One was loose and I snapped it back into place. I’m going to feel like an idiot if that’s the only problem, in which case I apologize for wasting you folks’ time. I’m about to put the memory and whatnot back in (I took it out and was about to put it in my old decommissioned computer so I would have one running). I’ll try to start it up afterward and will report back. I hope that solves it, I’d rather feel like an idiot than have to fight off a major infection.

8

After messing around with the harddrive and trying various combinations of wires, I am now getting the message:

NTLDR is missing
Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart

Doing so just restarts and I get the same message. I’m honestly not really sure if I’ve got the harddrive installed correctly after messing with it.

After continued messing around with this crap there is now some sort of clicking sound coming from somewhere. I’m getting frustrated with this at the moment, and my lighting isn’t great so I can’t see what I’m doing fairly well, so I think I’m going to come back to this tomorrow evening.

So, thus far, still nothing. Thanks everyone who has offered advice thus far. Please keep it coming, I need to get this thing up and running as quickly as possible.

9

You need to overinstall Windows.
Overinstallation can solve the problem and you won’t lose your programs, settings, data, files, etc.
Just choose ‘Repair’ installation of Windows and install ‘over’ the old installation.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;315341
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q314058
http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=kb%3Ben-us%3B315341&x=15&y=0
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/helpandsupport/learnmore/tips/doug92.mspx

Most probably, you’ll need to do it using an USB drive due to your CD problem/absence. Maybe a savvy person will be needed.

10

Thanks Tech, I’m reading the links now. I’ve got to leave for work shortly, so I won’t be able to get started on this immediately, but I’ll update with results once I’ve started working on this again.