topic Help! Errors caused by possible virus on laptop running XP in Operating System - Microsoft

Help! Errors caused by possible virus on laptop running XP

Scott Jensen_3 — Wed, 30 Oct 2002 08:47:19 GMT

I have recently upgraded from my Armada 1750 to a Presario 1500 series running Windows XP and am facing a crisis.

While online, I noticed unusual hard drive activity and my system locked up. I shut down and when trying to reboot, there was an error message: "Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt: \system32\ntoskrnl.exe. Please re-install a copy of the above file."

I have left my laptop on and have no idea what to do to avoid any additional data loss. I hope to be able to recover my files, but fear that this was a virus and they are lost. Any advise is much appreciated... thank you!

Scott
scott.m.jensen@verizon.net

Re: Help! Errors caused by possible virus on laptop running XP

Jon Finley — Wed, 06 Nov 2002 01:21:13 GMT

May not be a virus. Try using the recovery console (from the install CD's) to get to the boot drive.

Two causes for the error:
1. boot.ini has been damaged, or has been changed to point to an incorrect disk.

2. The ntoskrnl.exe file is damaged, and needs to be replaced by a good copy from your install CD.

It's possible that you received an automatic windows update patch, that didn't install well. :-(

Jon

Re: Help! Errors caused by possible virus on laptop running XP

Roger Faucher — Fri, 08 Nov 2002 04:08:34 GMT

Scott:

Go here and do a virus scan:

http://security2.norton.com/ssc/home.asp

Good luck!

Roger