!!!BEWARE OF A PALE-BLUE SCREEN (WHEN STARTING UP YOUR SYSTEM) WITH A LONG QUESTION; ONE ONLY...

[Guest Bruce_84]

Hi all,

 

 

Basically, several months ago, I noticed something strange on my computer - I know I should have acted immediately - my Task Manager was "disabled by [my] administrator". Yet, I am the administrator!?!

 

 

Secondly, I switched on my system yesterday and was immediately greeted with a pale-blue screen with lots of white writing, which said, "We strongly recommend you do not press 'ENTER'.......???? If you do, and wish to progress before the time expires........???????" However, by the time I had attempted to skim through what was before me (as I was unable to catch it all), a 10 second time limit had expired and lots more white text/numbers/symbols suddenly started flowing down my screen (for about 15-20 secs - from left to right)! Plus, my tower made an unusual sound - like a low-pitched alarm! Immediately afterwards, my system loaded up as normal!

 

So, I opened the Boot Menu (after restarting my computer in order to enable Safe Mode), and the arrow keys did/do not work - I cannot navigate up or down to select any of the options!?! Yet, they have worked perfectly fine any other time since - just not in the Boot Menu! So, I scanned with Windows Defender and nothing was found - my "system is secure".

 

 

Thirdly, since then, I have noticed that my (Windows XP) system has ran much more slowly too - keep being informed the script is busy, the plug-ins are unresponsive, etc. - and things were/have been dragging across the screen! Therefore, I searched on Firefox's help guide and forum for anything that seemed similar, and came across another person's instance of things "dragging" with a slow system, who also suspected a virus! So, I followed advice given to them - Reset Firefox and download a "10 day free Microsoft Virus Scanner" (saved as msert.exe); then left it to scan for over 9 hours, which found nothing/no infected files!

 

 

Finally, since all of this, I cannot use System Restore or Reset Firefox! I never pressed ENTER when the message appeared - do you think I should have?

 

 

I know my version of Windows is outdated and I am planning to update it very soon, but do not want to lose any vital files. So, I am currently making back-up copies.

 

 

Is all of this activity possibly connected? Or, could it be various things happening? And in addition, please could anyone possibly shed any light on what has happened or whether they can help in any way? I would be VERY grateful.

 

 

Many thanks

 

 

Bruce.

 

Continue reading...