Vista isn't working anymore

[jc619]

I don't really know what happened because my brother was the last one on it and may have done some stuff (it did show a message that windows found a viruse). It starts off normally (although it does take a longer time to start up then normally) and then one minute into it my desktop icons and windows toolbar dissapear, leaving only my desktop background image visable. When I try to restore the system to an earlier date before Windows Vista starts running a message says it can't and when I try to look for the system restore with the one minute windows is running it says it can find the operation.

Will re-installing Windows help it.

[Boris]

Have a look at this "Repair Vista" tutorial ?

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial148.html

[jc619]

I tried all the trouble shooting tutorials about how to try and fix my problem but they all say Vista is working fine.

Start Up Repair- No problem found

System Restore- Only shows dates to return to that begin after the problem began (nothing far enough to when it was working fine.)

Still can't go to it from the normal start up Windows.

Windows Memory Diagnostic Tool- No problem found

Command Prompt- I searched for errors and through directories but no errors were found

Nortons Antivirus and Spyware can't find anything but Windows sometimes still shows a message saying that Windows found a sever virus.

Will re-installing Windows make everything right (I know it will earse all my data)

Have a look at this "Repair Vista" tutorial ?

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial148.html

[AlanHo]

You could easily spend many hours trying various things to solve the problem.

If you do not have a system back-up (and everyone really should) I suggest that you reformat the C: drive and reinstall Vista from scratch.

Make sure you install effective anti virus and anti malware programmes. You might also consider attaching an external USB hard drive, installing Acronis and taking a full back up of your system when it is OK again to be able to restore the computer easily the next time the computer gets corrupted.

[catgate]

As a final fling before reformatting etc. download Crapcleaner and let that clear out the rubbish and then let it run throughits registry check.

http://www.filehippo.com/download_ccleaner/

edit:- spellchockling

[froggystyle]

You could easily spend many hours trying various things to solve the problem.

If you do not have a system back-up (and everyone really should) I suggest that you reformat the C: drive and reinstall Vista from scratch.

Make sure you install effective anti virus and anti malware programmes. You might also consider attaching an external USB hard drive, installing Acronis and taking a full back up of your system when it is OK again to be able to restore the computer easily the next time the computer gets corrupted.

I would second that advice. We have just had the same issue on a pc within our domain, when we checked on the server for anti virus we saw the pc had a virus and had been deleted, the pc would only load the desktop background and would just sit in this state, we formatted the c drive and installed windows fresh, you really should back up all your data in some way, cheapest option is when you format, partition your hard drive into two sections, one for your OS and files and a small section for back ups, then download a simple free software that will back up any files/folders you select onto your second section, it will create one simple file.

Good luck