Error message when attempting to run program in Windows XP

[princetonsista]

Hi.

I have a Toshiba laptop that has been running Windows XP for several months now.

Several days ago I got a large amount of spyware, etc from a website I visited. So I used system restore to set my computer back a day and then I used Ad-aware to clean up the computer and installed ZoneAlarm.

Since that day, I have had problems with my browser not being able to access websites after leaving the computer idle for a few hours. My instant messengers would continue to work, but I was unable to load web pages without restarting first.

*My first question is what might have been causing that to occur?*

Last night I ran Panda ActiveScan. I went to bed before the scan was finished and when I woke up this morning I tried to view the report but it said that I was not connected to the Internet.

After that I tried to open Mozilla to check and see if it was the problem of my computer having been idle, but I got a message saying:

Windows cannot find 'C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe'. Make sure you typed the name correctly, and then try again. To search for a file, click the Start button, and then click Search.

I then tried to open up several other programs (Internet Explorer, Adobe Acrobat, etc) from shortcuts on my desktop and got similar errors. So I went directly into program files and tired to open the programs from there and still recieved the same error. Even after searching for the file, and having it show up, when I would click on it I recieved the error.

I also tried to open Window's Help and Support but I got the same message, this time listing "helpctr.exe" as the file that could not be found.

I restarted my computer and then tried the same things again, but nothing changed.

I went into the Control Panel to see if I could get to system restore through there. I clicked on Administrative Tools and that worked, but when I went to click on System I got the following error:

Windows cannot find 'rundll32.exe'. Make sure you typed the name correctly, and then try again. To search for a file, click the Start button, and then click Search.

I recieved the same error when I clicked on the other components of the Control Panel (except: Taskbar and Start Menu, Administrative Tools, Folder Options, Fonts, Network Connections, Printers and Faxes, Scanners and Cameras, and Scheduled Tasks)

I then tried to search for "rundll32.exe" and my computer found 11 files:

3 of them were the following:

rundll32 (original file name rundll.exe) (internal name rundll) in C:\XP\System32
rundll32 (original file name rundll.exe) (internal name rundll) in C:\WINDOWS\system32
rundll32 (original file name rundll.exe) (internal name rundll) in C:\WINDOWS\SoftwareDistribution\Download\...

The other 8 were listed as variations of:

RUNDLL32.EXE-########.pf in C:\WINDOWS\Prefetch

*######## being a varied combination of letters and numbers*

At that point I went to another computer in my house that is also running Windows XP and did a search for "rundll32.exe" and 15 files appeared:

2 of which were:

rundll32 (original file name rundll.exe) (internal name rundll) in C:\WINDOWS\system32
rundll32 (original file name rundll.exe) (internal name rundll) in C:\WINDOWS\SoftwareDistribution\Download\...

The other 13 were again listed as variations of:

RUNDLL32.EXE-########.pf in C:\WINDOWS\Prefetch

However, of the 8 .pf files found on my laptop and the 13 found on this desktop, only two of the files were found in both lists.

I had intended to try and download a new "rundll32.exe" file, but now I am really not sure what the problem is or what I would have to download or do in order to fix it.

I had the idea that Panda ActiveScan may have "fixed" something that wasn't actually a problem, but I again do not know what I need to do now.

I'd appreciate any advice or suggestions in regards to both the browser problem and the program problem. But, the program problem is much more pressing seeing as how I won't be using my browser again until I can run programs :-| .

Thanks

[pcpalct]

I'm going to leave the final decision to the staff here, but I get a feeling that your hard drive is on its way out.

I have witnessed many hard drives that are damaged go through a phase where the sector which rundll is located is shot and they cannot retrieve the necessary information to make things work. I can safely say that's a speculation as to the problem.

:cool:

[princetonsista]

Thanks for replying so soon.

Could anything else potentially explain the problems other than a shot harddrive?

[Jeffry_Males]

I think the clue is NOT in hard drive error.

I used to have a similar problem. This windows cannot find rundll.exe solutions summary page helped me. Whiel its beginning contains some advettising fluff, skip it all and scroll to the bottom. The you'll find what htey call a manual slution methods and it worked for me.

Other possibility if that you have your real rundll.exe file corrupted. In suhc case I recommend you to run sfc.exe /scannow command from Start->Run dialog. It will search for corrupted files and recover them from your Windows CD. Good luck!

[Merlin33069]

ok, i would try scanning your drive for bad sectors

all the programs you listed generally run out of the system32 directory, so there may be a problem in there

i agree to the sfc.exe /scannow
that will verify all your windoes files and bring them back as needed, i would try these in the following order, each suggesting that the previous did not work

scandisk << checks for errors

sfc.exe /scannow << recover lost / corrupted windoes files.

repair xp << get a bootable xp disk, run it, and as its starting, at the bottom it should say something like
"press f6 to start automated system recovery"
that should fix it

if all these fixes dont work, and no one else comes up with anything, i would perform a clean install

thank you!