IE8 stopped working, but Firefox works

Core,
Yes, I can access the Task Manager. I don't know what you mean by "Clean install --> smooth system. Upgrade option --> Chernobyl."

Hi Ed

That would be Core's signature area. That shows under all of his post.
If you look under the gray divider line on my post you will see my signature that shows on all my post.

Thanks. In the meantime, as I said I would do, I've been examining the Task Manager Processes. So far, I've found one likely Trojan running - csrss.exe. I tried to delete it, but got message that it could not be terminated. I may be on the right track, though.

Ed

Hi Ed

I have two instances of that file running on my PC.

Read more here - http://www.neuber.com/taskmanager/pr...csrss.exe.html

Thanks for the warning. I've already read that it's a necessary file that trojans sometimes take on as a disguise.

I'm about to look into proxy settings to see if I can discover something wrong there.

Ed

You're right, those things always manage to embed themselves within a important file. I had troubles with the page file sys. getting viruses on XP Pro. You can't delete the file to get rid of it, either. All that I could was reinstall the OS. Then I discovered Malwarebytes, and haven't had problems since.

You may be right, but I dread the thought of re-installing all my programs, get all the settings as I like them, etc. . . . The alternative may be to pay an exorbitant price to Norton to fix things up.

Ed

It may be hard to get rid of the infection if you boot into Windows before you scan for it. Often these trojans get loaded into memory during system startup.

Open Command Prompt with admin privs and run "sfc /scannow" to have the system check for corrupted system files.

Run your malware scanner in safe mode. Check boot configuration through Control Panel/System/Advanced/boot options, and try to boot with limited startup items...

Just things you can try, although a clean install is your safest bet.

That's the way it looks to me.

A clean install, then a couple of full scans with a malware scanner such as Malwarebytes, along with a full scan with the AV of your choice, just to be sure as Core mentioned, that nothing is left behind in your memory. If you ever noticed, your memory is the very first place your malware or AV scans. You need to do these scans as soon as you can after the first boot upon reinstalling your OS. Some scanners you can run from a thumb drive. But if you don't have that already, your best bet is to download a malware scanner as soon as you boot your OS. Once you get everything back in order, install your AV of choice, and have a second "on demand" malware scanner. Set all of your AV levels to max protection, schedule a short scan daily, do a through scan with both products at least once weekly, a few days apart. And scan every download before opening it, with both scanners. Windows 7 is a great OS, but you do have to maintain it regularly, and I do mean regularly, not once a month. I have four separate scanners, and run one of them every day. There's no such thing as too much maintenance, as far as virus/malware prevention goes. If you need anymore help after you get going, post back, someone will be glad to help.