Super strange glitch!

P

psl

New Member
Ok, I know a medium amount about computers, but even my bud who's a genius is stumped with this one.

Im having serious and wierd issues with some of the graphics of programs and internet, especially letters and words. I dont even know where to begin so Ill just describe some problems that have come up

1. Winamp- the program works fine, except the playlist editor takes on the backround of whatever's behind it and won't change when you move it/add tracks, ect.

2. AIM- This opens and logs in fine, except for the fact that the aim window that should show all my buddies is has just one massive yellow block of nothing, like its highlighted, but there is no buddy names in the window!

3. ESPN gamecast- comes up fine, looks good, BUT there are no numbers in the live boxscore or ptching lines! Nothing at all! But the player's names are there though! WIERD!

4. Other websites- Now this is where its started to really affect my life. Im in medical school, I was supposed to take an online exam, but when I went to the website to take the exams, the little part to click "TAKE ONLINE EXAM" has disappeared in internet explorer. Tried Firefox, was able to access the password/login page, but typing in the spaces produced no visible letters! I typed my login and pass anyway even though I couldn see anything, and clicked submit. It worked! BUT in the test area, there was just a sliver of white at the top and nothing else, super ****ed up to say the least.

There are other random graphics issues going on, too many to name and too random to narrow down some exact cause. We can't figure out what the hell is going on! Downloaded anti-virus software now and other anti-spyware programs that my computer friend recommended, and actually for a while, the problem was fixed, but once again TONIGHT it came back!! and RANDOMLY no less! I just did a search in internet explorer on "left-shift" granulocyte, and the window froze, I did end task, then I noticed the problem arose once again. Restarting my computer fixes it temporarilly, but it always seems to come back after some time or performing some imperceptable actions.

WHooo, thats a long one, but we are STUMPED!!! Anyone have any ideas?? This is seriously unbelievably annoying now, and its started to affect my real life as I need to go to friend's places to take online exams. I appreciate all the help you can afford, whether you think its a virus or something else. Thanks!!
-PSL
 
What antispyware and antivirus programs did you try? It sounds like an I- worm of some type is on there. You may need a special remover if you can identify one being on your system. If your security setting in IE are maxed that will also block items at web sites but not explain other types of graphic problems. If you haven't tried a few of these removers here give them a run.

AVG by Grisoft is good for spotting various spywares at times as well various virus types. Even if it can't remove or quaranteen something it points out where and what files are infected. http://free.grisoft.com/doc/2/lng/us/tpl/v5
Ewido has a good name and was to no surprise bought out by Grisoft. http://free.grisoft.com/doc/ewido-anti-spyware-free/lng/us/tpl/v5

Besides viruses and malwares you may also be seeing a hardware fault such as memory or even bios problems where the bios programming information has been effected or the chip is failing. That along with a few trojan downloaders can make you pull your hair out at times.
 
Im not sure if you said, but do you have the latest drivers for your card? i dont know how that would solve all that, but they do have some strange problems sometimes. Get the latest drivers if you dont have them.
 
yes, i have the latest drivers for everything, my friend downloaded all the latest, ect. I'll try that grisoft thing. Hopefully this isn't anything hardware related, I cant afford to replace or buy anything new at the moment. Thanks again for the responses by the way.
 
AVG by Grisoft is a good one for finding things. Ewido combined with Lavasoft's AdAware SE Personal are great for finding other things that AVG would miss. You can grab AdAware free at http://www.lavasoft.com Hopefully it will be something software or malware related. But give these and a few other a good run.
 
well, I downloaded everything you said, and for a while the problem cleared itself up. It seems only randomly at times the problem resurfaces, and once it does, it remains until I reset my computer. I havnt determined what exactly triggers it, it seems to be completely random. Sometimes in searching in google, other times its doing on online quiz with pictures and (i think) java. Still others seem completely random, having nothing to do with the net. The programs took care of any other virus I had, now Im starting to think maybe theres a corrupt windows file or something? What are your thoughts?
 
Hopefully you are not running into a hardware problem like the memory or bios itself. A good utility for monitoring cpu and board temps is SpeedFan. You can download the free program at http://www.almico.com/sfdownload.php

Memory being a possible cause for some things while active x controls are another thing to look at. Memtest is a good free Linux hardware tester that can be put on either a 3 1/2" floppy or burned to a cd to boot from. That has to be run for several hours to see the best results as it stress tests the memory installed on the system. http://www.memtest86.com/ and http://www.memtest.org/

Besides the Windows utility called the system file checker where you type "sfc /scannow" at the Run prompt having the installation disk in the cd drive a links here provide a number of tweaks and fixes for XP.
http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/repair_xp.htm
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm
 
Ok, i tried the trend micro thing, but when i attempt to run it, an error window pops up that says "Windows- Drive Not Ready" "The drive is not ready for use; its door may be open. Please check drive and make sure that a disk is inserted and that the drive door is closed". Not a clue what the hell this is talking about, of course no drives that I know of are open. Am I attempting to run this program improperly?

Another interesting thing I have noticed. This is the 2nd time this has happened since Ive noticed the glitch, but it seems that its affecting the font of my internet browsers as well! The first time it changed everything to courier new. I changed it back. A few days later, its changed again, this time to something like impact (not sure exactly). Just another clue there in case any of you have any new ideas.

BTW, I probably should have said this before, this is a music production computer, very high end hardware wise (at least it was 2 years ago!). 3.4 ghz, 2GB RAM, 2 hard drives, ect. The video card is ok I think, its an ati radeon 9600 in case its important. Ive made sure the computer is adequately ventalated, the temps of everything are very low. Does everyone still think this is a virus? What in the world would give all these wierd symptoms?? Its weird being in medical school and trying to diagnose my computer, I feel like ive stumbled upon some novel disease. Wheres my Nobel?!:D
 
Heh. Im not sure exactly why its happening, but i know whats causing it. Its a GUI error. It could be that some data got corrupted, destroyed or altered. This could be because the file got corrupted(usually a hdd malfunction but happens occasionaly), a peice of malicious software, or maybe even a hardware problem. But i doubt its hardware. Have you tried repairing or reinstalling windows yet?

To check if its a hardware problem, you could try a live cd of linux. I would recommend slax popcorn linux.

I would try repairing windows first via the OS cd.
 
First things to look at now are possible problems with IE itself. A download and fresh install of IE 6 after removing it may see some of this cleaned up. Often IE glitches are mistaken for spyware, adware, malware, or some virus when it's a simple fix to simply reinstall IE.

The other tool mentioned before is the "sfc /scannow" command to start the MS utility. What this does besides scanning for errors is to repair or replace any essential system files found damaged or missing. Besides running this along with some removers a good registry tool may help. One of those will remove any clutter and often repair any crossover links made to system files.

For now try disabling several items in the startup group with a run of the msconfig utility. You will have to restart the system to have changes go into effect there. Then give the give these methods a second try. If you continue to still see the same problems you may have to perform a repair install to see this corrected. http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm
 
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