XP: Confusing and frustrating problem, programs/ports being blocked?

[givememyleg]

I feel a bit like this: Post is a bit long, and sorry if it is posted in the incorrect area. Not sure what the problem is, I'm running XP with SP2. Let's back track a bit.

On Wednesday of this week (10/10/07), everything was working 100% fine. I then did a standard reboot, because things started running kinda slow (comp had been on for quite a while). Then when I booted back up, it seemed as if certain programs/ports were blocked? (I know some computer knowledge/lingo, but this is above my head.) First and for most I noticed aim would not work. It won't even load. Strangely, AIM will boot up under processes, but will never actually show up on my desktop. I open it, then my mouse goes busy for a second, then nothing happens. This process repeats everytime I open it. Here is a quick screenshot of what I mean:

So moving along, I notice other things stopped working. I can also not use MSN. It tells me my username/password does not exist (it does, and is correct). Also, I can not check my gmail or hotmail accounts. If I try going to gmail.com or hotmail.com, it just instantly displays "Unable to connect. Firefox can't establish a connection to the server at login.live.com." Same thing with IE. When I say instantly, I mean it doesn't even TRY to load, right when I click sign-in, that pops up. Almost as if it is being blocked (like I said earlier). Strangely, other websites work 100% fine.

Also, I was curious to see how far this went. I tried downloading a simple torrent file, and it would not connect to it. I also can not connect to my PokerStars, or Full Tilt Poker applications. And like I said, other websites work fine (I'm on the computer right now.)

It isn't my router, I checked the admin panel and NOTHING is listed as blocked. Also I tried just removing the router and directly connected my cable modem to my computer, same problem. I should also mention that I have a laptop, and everything that doesn't work on my PC works on it.

SO, that must mean it's something on my computer. A virus perhaps? Some spyware? I have Norton, however "coincidentally" it isn't working correctly now (it was prior to Wednesday):

So, is there anything I can do? I tried running a full system scan with Norton and with Lavasoft Adaware and it did not detect anything. I really really really don't want to format, so any advice or anything that you can point me to is greatly appreciated! Thanks.

 

[arkamw]

I'll take a wild stab at it being some type of virus / spyware / malware that you picked up somewhere. There are viruses that manage to bypass the scanners and shut them down. At the same time, Norton may not be happy because it's not finding a network connection to call home with.

Probably what you're going to need is a working computer that can get to the net. Definitely try and connect with a different machine on your network to rule that out (come to think of it, the machine you're posting from?).

But you're going to need to use that machine to get something like SuperAntiSpyware just to make sure. That should help to take care of the spyware.

Your other problem sounds like a LSP problem (google). There are a number of programs out there that can repair the TCP stacks and settings (lspfix, WinSockXPFix, etc) that can help with this issue.

Read here for more info about resetting winsock (i.e. what some of the above programs do) and when it says to reset the computer, be sure to. If it gets down to it, reset TCP using the instructions there. You can also try to delete NIC from hardware manager and let it redetect on startup, but if LSP or TCP is messed up, they'll need to be repaired.

Sorry about coherency. I'm really tired. Funny enough, I had this same type of issue a few months back and did all of this to get it fixed (took a while). I was going to reference the thread but I can't seem to find it.

Luck.