I have a problem retrieving and/or sending email. Have Windows XP Home via Comcast and have my email filtered through MailWasher Pro. IncrediMail is my email client. The problem started this morning when I decided to do a Leak Test at Gibson Researh. I downloaded Leak Test to desktop tried to run it and Norton came up and warned of a Trojan Alert immediately- I just closed it out. Then WinPatrol popped up with a box that said, "A new startup program has been detected. This program is listed in your WIN.INI file and will run each time you restart your machine. Do you approve of the addition of this start up setting?".. I just said no and forgot it. Upon checking any incoming email I received just shortly after that, I hit "Mail Program" which opens up IncrediMail. I tried to open the message but when I did, the entire body of the message was light grey...no text, no nothing. I have the buttons at the top of the message...Previous, Next, Reply, , Forward, Delete, etc. but from there on down is grey. Any and all messages already received show the same thing.

I tried rebooting but, to no avail. I tried system restore and that didn't help. Any ideas where to go from here? I can't email IncrediMail with the problem needless to say.

I just found out IE won't work now as well.. I use Firefox but tried to open a window in IE and all I got was the familar, "IE has encounterd a problem and needs to close". What's going on? I get the same message when trying to open Norton Internet Security as well. It says "Symantec Integrator has encountered a problem and needs to close...." The anit virus portion of NIS does similar except a box come up but only the outline...nothing in the middle. I've run Spybot, AdAware, SpySweeper, HouseCall, Trojan Hunter, etc. All is clean.

Most people forget that... if you are using WinME or XP, just restore from a point before the mess...

Some online scanner programs installs activeX controls that does not harm your system, but changes some critical properties. (with your knowledge, but we like to click "yes" or "no" buttons without reading the MESSage box)

Chris

Doing a system restore doesn't help...tried that early on if you can read the post above I initially posted. Glad you find this all amusing..

Can you get to an online virus scan with firefox? See the Trendmicro Housecall link below.

Have you COMPLETELY uninstalled leak test (from the registry also)? That may not work, as we dont know what windows file is damaged. If you are lucky, you may get an error message that a particular file is missing or corrupt. If you get that, you can extract just the needed file.

If your system is clean and you never get a message indicating a specific file, you may need to run a repair install of Windows.

I did run House Call early on and another as well...all clean. I did delete Leak Test but, don't know if anything was left in the registry or not. I wrote Gibson Research about the problem and they tried to assure me that Leak Test was perfectly benign but, I'm not so sure about that because there was no problem until then.

QUOTE

If your system is clean and you never get a message indicating a specific file, you may need to run a repair install of Windows.

How do you do this? Install XP all over again?

With an XP CD you can choose the repair option rather than an install. Do you have a WindowsXP CD?

Dashwood95...yep, I still have it. You do mean the Reinstallation CD I presume?

If it is an actual Microsoft Windows XP cd, you can start with it in the drive (assuming it boots from cd first- you can set the boot order in the bios). Instead of new install, you choose repair install. This will reinstall windows on top of itself, replacing only the damaged files. All other files and settings should remain.

If you have an OEM recovery cd, it is not so simple. A recovery cd will erase everything and return the pc to the state it was in when you purchased it. You would need to back up all of your files first and make sure you have all your software cd's, cause you will need to reinstall all software.

Post back with the exact cd you do have if you need step by step instructions.

I think I'd just as soon drop this thing over a clift somewhere. I've been fooling with it since last Saturday and have gotten nowhere. I got hacked off at Norton and uninstalled NIS 2004 in favor of ZA Pro and Avast. That didn't help anything either. Nothing I've done helps...screaming, cursing, threatening, etc...nothing phases it. It just sits there and looks at me. I'm beginning to feel like Jack Nicholson looked in The Shining!!

I do have the Installation CD, however.

Hi Elijah,

If you can get things running again, but IncredMail doesn't work, maybe I can do something, as you knew I have IncredMail also. Maybe I can send them an e-mail, letting them know your problem, and maybe it's just a damaged file, and they can send it to me, and I can PM it to you.

I don't know how that all works, but maybe there is something I can do.

Lorraine

I wish I could attach a screenshot as to what I see when I try to open IncrediMail. There's just nothing there but a blank, grey area where text should be. Same thing when I attempt to send a new message. All the proper buttons and tabs appear at the top but from there down...nothing. No curser-nothing but grey. I did email them and they made a few suggestions but none of them worked. I was afraid of deleting IncrediMail as I have many email folders with things in those folders I don't want to loose. At any rate, I couldn't respond to them because even though I can receive the email, I can only view in in the preview pane of MailWasher Pro because whenever I click on it to process the mail, which normally takes lyou direct to IncrediMail, I'll only get that blank area where text should be when I open the message in IncrediMail making it impossible to reply or forward that email.See the dilemma? And, this has been going on for almost a week now. I can't communicate with anyone as a result of this. Can't get and try instructions because if I don't write it down quickly before MailWasher deletes it off the server....it's gone.

I think I stated earlier I can't open IE either. I get a message from them just like I get on several other programs that say,,,,,"......has encountered a problem and needs to close." In the case of IE (which I don't use but sometimes have to) you can fill in that blank with[/U]Internet Explorer[U]. I've even uninstalled NIS 2004 because I got that same message from them while trying to open and check for updates on the firewall part. It would say as I tried to open it, "Symantec Integrator has encountered a problem and needss to close." No less tha 8-10 times has this happened with vaious programs. So, that-coupled with the email problem, has been an ongong headache since last Saturday when all this started. I've been to no less that five different computer forums trying to resolve this issue thinkig someone would have a light go off in the head as to what the problem is but so far nothing. I may have to get an IT tech out here before long just to keep my sanity.

Internet surfing is not problem at all. Most programs icons I have on the desktop work as always. I think the two problems I indicated must have a common thread and I just can't figure out what.I even tried a System Restore to go back a week before all this happened-didn't work.

You can attatch a screenshot.

When the problem occurs, press the Prt Scr key on your keyboard, go into paint and paste it. You have you be using the selection tool in paint in order to paste it though. Save that, and then create a photobucket account and upload it, then post it here.

You totally lost me...Photo Bucket? Never heard of that. What are the steps involved once I open Paint and save? Guess I missed something since I don't use paint...maybe once or twice in two years.

I heard PhotoBucket is a pretty good program, but just never gotten around in getting it..

Elijah, don't you have IrfanView? You can do a Print Screen and put it into IrfanView then save it to your 'My Pictures'. That's what I use all the time.

Lorraine

Lorraine...I have that image already in My Pictures as I use Screen Hunter and just outline what I want to copy. Just didn't kow how to get it here. Can't click on Attachment like we use to in the old forum...it's not here as an option.

Oh!! I see...You have to go to 'Off Topic' Click on 'Show 'n Tell' and at the top, there is a pinned topic called 'Pinned: SAF Photo linking topic'

Do a reply in there, then type ...image.. then go down and you will see the Browse button, now find the picture, click on 'Add Reply' then your picture should come up...Now right click on picture, and go to Properties and click on it, then 'Highlight' the URL on the left side, and copy it, and past it in a reply here, by going up and click on the IMG button, and past it in there.

Let me knew if you need help...don't forget, if the picture is too big, it won't come up, just go back and resize it.

The forum keeps asking me to loggin everytime I try to post a reply!! Don't know if this will get out or not. I loggin, click on a topic, and it asks me to loggin again. I do-click on Reply button to send message, then it ask me to loggin again! I don't think this problem will ever get fixed short of me just shooting it!! Been going on for a week and I can't even communicate with it now...just sporadically.

I'm going to try and post a HJT log... if possible.

Hi David,

Is this what you're trying to post? I hope you don't mind, I grabbed it for you.

That shot was exactly what I wanted to post, Lorraine. I've had once more time with this computer over the past few weeks. I wanted to come back and say, however, that 99% of the aforementioned problems have been resolved!! I finally decided to take it in to CompUSA because I had spent two weeks trying to find the problem myself, along with others and could not come up with a solution. Obviously, CompUSA had a hard time as well because they promised a diagnosis in 24 hours but, three days later I hadn't heard from them so, I decided to call. They wanted to do a complete formatting of the hard drive and asked me for the disks. To this I just told them if they couldn't find the problem without erasing everyting I had on the hard drive to notify me and I would pick it up and do it at home myself without charge. Doing what they initailly wanted to do would have turned my tower into a useless boat anchor as far as I was concerned. I wasn't going back to step one again if it meant putting it in the closet and getting myself a mac.

Finally after having it about a week, they called and said I could pick it up as it was doing good now. They told me they did a clean install and I was able to keep 99% of what I had on it as before...all programs, favorites, my music files, pictures, etc. All I lost was my updated versions of several programs like Spy Sweeper, Diskeeper and AdAware, etc. I made contact with those websites and told them the problem and they sent me my last update to download.

At any rate, it was not spyware, viruses, trojans-nothing like that as I am well protected...overgunned is more like it. They indicated I had some missing/corrupt files that was causing the problem and the clean install repaired it. Good thing it was a Windows program problem. If not, I may have had to start from scratch. Just wanted everyone to know so if this problem crops up with anyone else in the future, you'll know most likely it's not a security thing. Don't know how it happened or exactly what files were involved (probably some.dll files) but it's working again and that's all I wanted.

David, I'm so glad your computer is working, and almost everything was left intact. What a headache it was for you to try and find out what was wrong, not only that, not even knowing what was wrong.

I'm just happy for you, now you have your computer back.

I know this, Lorraine, if this thing had a mouth, I'd take it out to dinner tonight!! ...providing it behaves the rest of the weekend. I'm still have a couple of problem areas but nothing devastating. I have a problem staying logged in here as well as other forums I visit where I already have a user name and password. I never log out so, I should always stay logged in. When I come here for instance, it will show I'm logged in. But, whenever I click on one of the forums and maybe post a reply or start another thread, I can't until I log back in again. Don't know what this is all about but it happens to about all forums I go to...not just here.

Could it be a cookie problem?

I think so. There's a tab in Firefox that says in Tools>Options>Privacy>Cookies and as I scrolled and looked at them there were some that were set to expire after session but, I dont know how to change taht as I only saw two tabs-one said "Remove Cookies" and the other Said "Remove All Cookies. This must be the problem though. There weren't many options besides, Keep Cookies Until They Expire, Until I close Firefox, or Ask Me Everytime. These were the only options I saw.

...UPDATE...

This must be a FF problem because I just tried logging in IE and clicked all over the forum and didn't have that problem. Not sure where to fix it in FF though.

I have FF , but only used it for a couple days, I'm still not very comfortable with it. I still rather use IE, because I haven't had any problems with it.

I should have knocked on wood when I made that statement about not having that problem in IE...now I do. It just never ends. I think it's getting time for an imacG5!! Even though Norton is a resource hog, I'm kinda sorry I got rid of it(which was no easy task!) in favor of Zone Alarm and avast Pro. I didn't have that kind of loggin and stay problem when I had it. Gone now as I spent an hour in the registry deleting anything file that had "Norton" or "Symantec" tied to it. I guess I could run the setup disk again beut then I'd have all those tweaks to do again as I did from the start and I'm not up for that. May get the 2005 or 2006 version when it gets out as mine is 2004 version. The mac still looks good.