Virus? Malware?

Do you have a large host file ? I.e. MSVP or spybot

I haven’t used Spybot in years and I don’t believe I have MSVP.

However, I have been using this as a hosts file:

http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/

OK stop sino, remove the tick from hosts and then re-run. it should take no more than 3 or 4 minutes

Okay, done!

Nothing untoward showing there, have you run a chkdsk on the windows drive

Okay, thanks.

I ran a chkdsk on the c:/ drive (with both check boxes ticked beforehand) and Windows claims that the volume is clean.

I must admit the symptoms described tend to suggest a hardware error of some sort, but as to what it is I cannot think at the moment. I will do some research

I’m beginning to think that as well. But thanks for your help.

Let me know if you find anything.

Will do