Computer help needed!

[s_bussotti]

Hi; I've worked briefly both in electronics and computer repair/build, and I've got a problem I have never encountered or even heard of o.O  I was hoping some of the more tech-savy guys here could help me out and tell me what might be going on.  Discount hardware problems, cause it's definitely not that, btw.


I'm running Windows XP Home Edition with service pack 2 and all available microsoft updates.  A few days ago I finally got around to relinquishing use of my computer for a few hours to defragment it, and since then three problems have simultaneously arisen, and while they are seemingly unrelated they happened at the exact same time, so I guess I should mention both.  The first and more easy-to-explain is that youtube videos, and only youtube videos have ceased working for me.  But... only in Mozilla (not firefox, which I don't use, but the oldschool Mozilla).  They still work in IE, randomly.  The second is that now, whenever I start up my computer, netgear prompts me trying to retake control of my network settings back from Windows even though I click "do not show me this again" every single time, which it has never done, and because the network I'm on is password-protected I need to use windows to configure my connection.

The third and both most-bizarre and most-worrying is that whenever I stay off the computer long enough for the screen-saver to take effect, as soon as I flick the screen-saver off the weirdest stuff starts to happen to my computer.  It's sort of difficult to explain.  My internet connection remains the same, and applications continue to work, but the task bar (you know, the gray bar at the bottom of your computer with "Start" etc. on it) just randomly takes over the entire screen and I can't get out of it.  I also can't get into the task management, or at least it doesn't show up, and there's no way to minimize the task bar.  Sometimes if I'm in a program I can enter text and it will OCCASIONALLY and sporadically momentarilly supersede the screen-covering task bar, but then messes up again.  When I hard-restart, it all works fine until the screensaver comes up again.



Anyone know what is going on?

[Bob]

I'm not a tech person.

But I know you're supposed to do an error check before a defrag so it doesn't put info into bigger pieces on bad sections of the hard drive.  You may have done that though.

Maybe it's a virus?

[meowmix]

[bench warmer]

Don't know if you solved your problems yet... If not have you tried running Microslop's Restore Wizard?

Run this to restore your Registry to the closest date it has Before you Defragged the Drive(s).

This has actually worked for me a few times when things got gnarly.

...wouldn't hurt to say a prayer when you do this either...good luck.