Massive System Problems

[JustinSane]

My friend was downloading an episode off of a torrent site and it ended up being some kind of malware. He rebooted with a changed desktop background and a bunch of ads telling him he had spyware and needed to buy a program. He ran malwarebytes and after rebooting he keeps getting a bluescreen as soon as it tries to boot to desktop. Tried to start in safe mode with the same results. How can we fix this without having to reformat? Any ideas?

 

[heatlesssun]

It really sounds like at this point you might as well reformat because you really should have no confidence with anything on that drive.

 

[Arainach]

Correct. At this point, you should reformat.

 

[RedRenesis]

Maybe the OP can find out some additional details, like if the drives files are still accessible by putting the HD into another system? If so, was it scanned for any undesirable crap that could be on there? Ive seen several instances where these types of attacks only cripple windows system files and the rest of the data on the drive is fine.

 

[JustinSane]

Maybe the OP can find out some additional details, like if the drives files are still accessible by putting the HD into another system? If so, was it scanned for any undesirable crap that could be on there? Ive seen several instances where these types of attacks only cripple windows system files and the rest of the data on the drive is fine.

Yea he has the drive hooked up to an old system and is currently in the process of backing some of his stuff up. I'm wondering if there is a way to reinstall just the windows files off an XP disc without wiping everything to repair some of the stuff that is causing the blue screens?