IE immediately freezes, can't get windows updates

[fifanatic82]

Hi all,
I'm running XP SP3 through Bootcamp on a Macbook Pro. I've been having a few problems all of a sudden:

1. Microsoft Update will not work. When I open the security center and click on the link that says "Install updates from the Windows Update Web site" an instance of wupdmgr.exe appears in the task manager appears but nothing happens besides that. More instances of this will appear if I click the link again.

2. So I figure I will just update by navigating to the Microsoft site on IE7. But when I try to open IE7, nothing happens. An entry for iexplore.exe will appear in the windows task manager but no window will open. If I try to open IE7 again, it slows down my computer dramatically. Each instance takes up 50 CPU in the task manager, but no window is displayed...

3. I then downloaded and installed IE8 from Firefox. When I try to open IE8, a window does appear on the screen, but it immediately freezes. Also, two instances of iexplore.exe appear in the task manager, when I only opened it once... and when I try to open another IE8 window, only one more instance appears in the task manager, go figure.

4. AVG free is not working correctly. When I right-click the AVG tray icon, both "Open AVG User Interface" and "Update Now" are grayed out. When I double-click this icon, the AVG interface appears, but the Overview page indicates that "There are no active components." When I click on "Update now" nothing happens. When I try to update from Tools>Update, nothing happens. Another issue I'm having is that a bubble sometimes pops up indicating that a 1 kb file, "C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\Icons\click_here_gray.gif" is corrupt and cannot be read.

5. I occasionally get a bubble stating "Exception processing message c0000102 parameters 75b6bf7c 75b6bf7c 75b6bf7c"

I recently must've picked up Conficker from someone's computer because last time inserted my USB flash drive, AVG notified me that Conficker was detected and placed in the "Virus Vault" or something like that. Hopefully, that hasn't caused any problems.

Spybot S&D hasn't detected anything, neither has Malwarebyte's Anti-Malware. Here's my HijackThis log, maybe that will help...

-----------------------------

Logfile of Trend Micro HijackThis v2.0.2
Scan saved at 2:21:39 PM, on 2/20/2010
Platform: Windows XP SP3 (WinNT 5.01.2600)
MSIE: Internet Explorer v8.00 (8.00.6001.18702)
Boot mode: Normal

Running processes:
C:\WINDOWS\System32\smss.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\winlogon.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\services.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\lsass.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\nvsvc32.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe
C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe
C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\avgchsvx.exe
C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\avgrsx.exe
C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\avgcsrvx.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\spoolsv.exe
C:\WINDOWS\Explorer.EXE
C:\WINDOWS\system32\RUNDLL32.EXE
C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe
C:\Program Files\Boot Camp\Bootcamp.exe
C:\PROGRA~1\AVG\AVG9\avgtray.exe
C:\Program Files\Java\jre6\bin\jusched.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\ctfmon.exe
C:\Program Files\Logitech\SetPoint\SetPoint.exe
C:\Program Files\Common Files\Logishrd\KHAL2\KHALMNPR.EXE
C:\WINDOWS\system32\AppleOSSMgr.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\AppleTimeSrv.exe
C:\Program Files\Java\jre6\bin\jqs.exe
C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\wscntfy.exe
C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe
C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\avgui.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\taskmgr.exe
C:\Program Files\Trend Micro\HijackThis\HijackThis.exe

R0 - HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Start Page = about:blank
R1 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Default_Page_URL = http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=69157
R1 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Default_Search_URL = http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=54896
R1 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Search Page = http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=54896
R0 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Start Page = http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=69157
O2 - BHO: WormRadar.com IESiteBlocker.NavFilter - {3CA2F312-6F6E-4B53-A66E-4E65E497C8C0} - C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\avgssie.dll
O2 - BHO: Spybot-S&D IE Protection - {53707962-6F74-2D53-2644-206D7942484F} - C:\PROGRA~1\SPYBOT~1\SDHelper.dll
O2 - BHO: Java(tm) Plug-In 2 SSV Helper - {DBC80044-A445-435b-BC74-9C25C1C588A9} - C:\Program Files\Java\jre6\bin\jp2ssv.dll
O2 - BHO: JQSIEStartDetectorImpl - {E7E6F031-17CE-4C07-BC86-EABFE594F69C} - C:\Program Files\Java\jre6\lib\deploy\jqs\ie\jqs_plugin.dll
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [NvCplDaemon] RUNDLL32.EXE C:\WINDOWS\system32\NvCpl.dll,NvStartup
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [NvMediaCenter] RUNDLL32.EXE C:\WINDOWS\system32\NvMcTray.dll,NvTaskbarInit
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [nwiz] nwiz.exe /installquiet
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [BluetoothAuthenticationAgent] rundll32.exe bthprops.cpl,,BluetoothAuthenticationAgent
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [Apple_KbdMgr] C:\Program Files\Boot Camp\Bootcamp.exe
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [AVG9_TRAY] C:\PROGRA~1\AVG\AVG9\avgtray.exe
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [Kernel and Hardware Abstraction Layer] KHALMNPR.EXE
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [SunJavaUpdateSched] "C:\Program Files\Java\jre6\bin\jusched.exe"
O4 - HKCU\..\Run: [ctfmon.exe] C:\WINDOWS\system32\ctfmon.exe
O4 - Startup: ERUNT AutoBackup.lnk = C:\Program Files\ERUNT\AUTOBACK.EXE
O4 - Global Startup: Logitech SetPoint.lnk = C:\Program Files\Logitech\SetPoint\SetPoint.exe
O9 - Extra button: (no name) - {DFB852A3-47F8-48C4-A200-58CAB36FD2A2} - C:\PROGRA~1\SPYBOT~1\SDHelper.dll
O9 - Extra 'Tools' menuitem: Spybot - Search & Destroy Configuration - {DFB852A3-47F8-48C4-A200-58CAB36FD2A2} - C:\PROGRA~1\SPYBOT~1\SDHelper.dll
O9 - Extra button: (no name) - {e2e2dd38-d088-4134-82b7-f2ba38496583} - C:\WINDOWS\Network Diagnostic\xpnetdiag.exe
O9 - Extra 'Tools' menuitem: @xpsp3res.dll,-20001 - {e2e2dd38-d088-4134-82b7-f2ba38496583} - C:\WINDOWS\Network Diagnostic\xpnetdiag.exe
O9 - Extra button: Messenger - {FB5F1910-F110-11d2-BB9E-00C04F795683} - C:\Program Files\Messenger\msmsgs.exe
O9 - Extra 'Tools' menuitem: Windows Messenger - {FB5F1910-F110-11d2-BB9E-00C04F795683} - C:\Program Files\Messenger\msmsgs.exe
O18 - Protocol: linkscanner - {F274614C-63F8-47D5-A4D1-FBDDE494F8D1} - C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\avgpp.dll
O20 - Winlogon Notify: avgrsstarter - C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\avgrsstx.dll
O23 - Service: Apple OS Switch Manager (AppleOSSMgr) - Unknown owner - C:\WINDOWS\system32\AppleOSSMgr.exe
O23 - Service: Apple Time Service (AppleTimeSrv) - Apple Inc. - C:\WINDOWS\system32\AppleTimeSrv.exe
O23 - Service: AVG Free WatchDog (avg9wd) - AVG Technologies CZ, s.r.o. - C:\Program Files\AVG\AVG9\avgwdsvc.exe
O23 - Service: Java Quick Starter (JavaQuickStarterService) - Sun Microsystems, Inc. - C:\Program Files\Java\jre6\bin\jqs.exe
O23 - Service: Logitech Bluetooth Service (LBTServ) - Logitech, Inc. - C:\Program Files\Common Files\Logishrd\Bluetooth\LBTServ.exe
O23 - Service: NVIDIA Display Driver Service (nvsvc) - NVIDIA Corporation - C:\WINDOWS\system32\nvsvc32.exe

--

Thanks!!!

[fifanatic82]

Update:
I am able to run IE8 with add-ons disabled. When I attempted to update windows via update.microsoft.com, the "Installing Updates" dialog box appeared and the installation status displayed

"Initializing installation... done!
Installing Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 and .NET Framework 3.5 Family Update for .NET versions 2.0 through 3.5 (KB951847) x86 (update 1 of 1)... "

but the progress bar just remained empty for a long time. After about five minutes the update finally started and finished. Time to restart and see if any of the problems have been fixed.

[fifanatic82]

Before windows starts up, it tries to run chkdsk. I've canceled it the last few times because it appears to freeze on step 2 (indexing). I decided to let it run longer on the last startup and after about 20-30 min, it finished. I was wrong about it freezing, it just takes a while to resume.

Anyways, my problems seem to be solved! AVG works fine, IE8 is now working, and I haven't received any confusing error bubbles.

The odd thing is, I ran chkdsk from the "Run" prompt and it didn't solve anything, but when I allowed the chkdsk to run automatically upon start up, a lot of problems were fixed. Lesson learned: let windows do its thing.

Thanks for your attention!