Windows xp immediately logs off when I try to log in

[franktaplin]

I have a customers computer that was running very slowly. Turns out they had
out of date antivirus and no spyware protection. I installed AVG and cleaned
it from viruses. I installed and ran Ccleaner, Spybot S&D, Spyware Blaster,
Spyware Doctor, Combofix, and MGtools. There was a major spyware infestation
and I ran the tools for removing CWSearch, Virtumonde, and smitfraud. I
removed all the spyware, Ran second checks with AVG and the antispyware
programs and the system came back clean. I had been restarting it after I ran
each check. Restarted it one last time and now I when I try to log on it says
it is loading settings and then immediately logs off. I have tried safe mode
and get the same results on the regular user accounts and the administrator
accounts. I searched through several forums on different sites and found
several related posts that gave solutions. Tried the fix of renaming
userinit.exe to wsaupdater.exe. Tried the fix in Micorosft knowledge base
article 307545. I've tried doing the repair installation from the XP CD. I've
tried doing chkdsk /r from recovery console but nothing seems to work.
What else can I do?

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

"franktaplin" <franktaplin@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:EBC66C5F-B6E6-4907-B8D1-14FB437656F9@microsoft.com...
>I have a customers computer that was running very slowly. Turns out they
>had
> out of date antivirus and no spyware protection. I installed AVG and
> cleaned
> it from viruses. I installed and ran Ccleaner, Spybot S&D, Spyware
> Blaster,
> Spyware Doctor, Combofix, and MGtools. There was a major spyware
> infestation
> and I ran the tools for removing CWSearch, Virtumonde, and smitfraud. I
> removed all the spyware, Ran second checks with AVG and the antispyware
> programs and the system came back clean. I had been restarting it after I
> ran
> each check. Restarted it one last time and now I when I try to log on it
> says
> it is loading settings and then immediately logs off. I have tried safe
> mode
> and get the same results on the regular user accounts and the
> administrator
> accounts. I searched through several forums on different sites and found
> several related posts that gave solutions. Tried the fix of renaming
> userinit.exe to wsaupdater.exe. Tried the fix in Micorosft knowledge base
> article 307545. I've tried doing the repair installation from the XP CD.
> I've
> tried doing chkdsk /r from recovery console but nothing seems to work.
> What else can I do?

You must make sure that the value
HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Windows NT/Current Version/Winlogon/Userinit
points to the correct location of userinit.exe. Either the drive letter is
wrong
(e.g. if the system drive letter is no longer C or else the file name is
incorrect.

IMHO you're doing yourself and the client a disservice by trying to
fix this machine. It is a myth that virus scanners can "clean" a machine -
they can repair some obvious damage but they are powerless in other
instances. Since this machine suffered a "major spyware infestation"
(your words), I would re-install Windows and all apps. It will hurt at
first but it will give you a guaranteed result.