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I've been asked by my parent's to help them with their computer (windows 7) today, but I'm afraid I ran out of ideas. It could be a virus, but they had the latest Kaspersky AntyVirus installed on their computer, and I'm pretty sure they weren't browsing any suspicious russian webisites in their free time.

The PC boots without errors, but after that, basically everything stops working.

I cannot open any .exe file - not only Internet browser, AntiVirus and all the other "basic" programs, but also regedit or cmd, and even Task Manager. Also, in the bottom right part of the screen when you can usually see most of the programs running in the background, like AntiVirus, wi-fi printer etc. there is only 1 icon, some weird blue logo with chinese signs as a description (according to google, it's the logo of Tencent).

All the other programs that should be opened after launching the pc aren't there, and what's more - the internet is also turned off, even though the router is right next to the desk.

I'm sure the system isn't completely frozen - I can see the mouse and browse through directories, but besides that, nothing works.

Is there anything I can do, besides reinstalling the entire OS?

Verken
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  • There are stand-alone programs to try, run from their own bootable disk (like linux) some antiviruses at least used to have their own bootable ISOs. Trying to fix a broken Windows from inside the broken Windows is unlikely to succeed. But your safest bet may be to use an external bootable OS (like linux) to backup any wanted data (that's not already backed up - it really *should* be already) and then reinstall windows. – Xen2050 Jan 14 '16 at 01:55
  • You noted "I'm pretty sure they weren't browsing any suspicious russian webisites". They could browse to what they might regard as a "safe" site, but, unbeknownst to them and the site's owner that site may have been compromised with malware that redirects a browser to a site hosting malware, which could be in Russia, China, or somewhere else in the world. On a system I checked for malware this weekend, I found that the user had visited the website of a local business whose WordPress website had been compromised, which I could discern only by looking at the source code on the site's home page. – moonpoint Jan 14 '16 at 03:20

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Start by booting into Safe Mode ( F8 at beginning of Windows startup ), if it boots then try Malwarebytes or other anti-malware software, post logs, give more info ... You can also try hitting Ctrl+Shift+Esc or Ctrl+Alt+Del to run Task Manager and then start task : explorer.exe or kill any strange tasks then run explorer or cmd and try to get some anti-malware product to scan the pc. Anyway more info is needed, i can help you in chat or other means, so ... p.s. If another pc is available, download some standalone anti malware ( stinger, Kaspersky virus removal kit .. etc. ) use usb flash drive or better yet make an bootable antivirus cd and scan from there ( every major av company has one - search antivirus cd distro in google )

Setekh
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  • FYI - F8 doesn't always work on the latest versions of Windows, UEFI may be too "fast" for it. Other methods are needed – Xen2050 Jan 14 '16 at 01:52