Machine was running fine until about 10 days ago. Then things started going wierd :(

1. The other user went to use it. They have a seperate account to me. On clicking their username it goes to log in and says it is loading their settings. It thens says that "Windows needs to be activated. Do you want to activate now?" If you click yes, it says it can't and drops you back to the front screen with the user names on it. If you say no, it goes to the front screen. This only affected their login not mine :confused: Reboot it 3 times and it will let you login, or login as me fist, log out and login as them and it works fine.

2. Two nights ago, it did the same to me. Hit the power button, switch back on and it's OK. :confused: Seems to be very random.

3. 4 days ago I did the windows key+L to pop it back to the front screen while I went out (it was running a virus check) and it went to what I'd call a win2k type login box rather than the front screen.

4. Last night went to switch users, it just brought up the screen saver login type box.

So, has my machine been compromised? It seems to be running a lot of processes at start up (about 50 IIRC) under my UID, log in as t'other user and it only has 45.

I run Kaspersky, Zone Alarm Pro, SSD, Spyware Blaster, Spyware Doctor, PP and Adaware - have done for the last 2 years.

Any ideas?

Just remembered another quirk it has just developed - ctrl alt del now just locks it with the screen lock - i used to use that to get to task manager. Now, the only way to get to tskmgr is to right click the toolbar :(

Have you tried rolling it back to a date before this started to happen?

Mo

Have you tried rolling it back to a date before this started to happen?

Mo

I agree, try 'system restore'.

My xp was playing up the other day, after login screen, my monitor wouldn't work, but picture was fine on TV. System restore cured it.

Is it regularly updated?, a recent windows update was found to be a cause of "freezing" windows, however there has now been a patch to cure this.... whether it does is another matter.

I however have usually found a system restore to a previous save point before the troubles to be the best policy with XP.

Fully patched and updated

Strange that it hasn't affected my other machine.

Looks like there is some shonky software oin there and I now reckon I know what it is.

One restore coming right up

Fully patched and updated

Strange that it hasn't affected my other machine.

Looks like there is some shonky software oin there and I now reckon I know what it is.

One restore coming right up

The XP update that caused the problem was an official update, so be sure you have got the even later update to cure the ****-up:)