Couple of 'small' XP Problems...

[TomWilko]

In the last couple of weeks i have had two worms get on the PC and have succesfully removed them both:

Welchia
Blaster

Since removing these viruses XP has thrown up a couple of little niggles i was hoping somebody might be able to throw light on! I have defragged, run system cleanup, re-installed firewall and put a new up-to-date virus checker on the system. As well as this i have ran Windows update and downloaded all critical and security updates.

Here are the problems:

When accessing Control Panel through Start > Settings > Control Panel I get the error message 'There was a problem sending a command to the program.' I now have to load my computer and select control panel through there...so its not like i can't access it at all

When loading any of my Office 97 applications, including Word, Access, Excel; i am unable to simply select the document from my hard-drive, double click, and there it is. Again, i receive the same message 'There was a problem sending a command to the program.' I can however, load my application and then go to File > Open.

These problems only occur with Control panel and Office, as i am able to double click on any other file and it will load with its corresponding program.

If these problems were unique to a PC i owned myself, i wouldn't be bothered. But my mum + dad + little brother use this computer and i am being bugged to try and sort it out!

All suggestions welcome Would it be worth re-installing Windows XP??

Wilko

[Big RICHARD]

It could be something to do with rundll. Rundll does exactly what it says on the tin, runs *.dll files. These are Dynamic Linked Libraries and basically look after system commands. There will be one for creating a window, one for a dialog box with 'OK' and 'Cancel' buttons, etc etc etc. I think you get the picture.

If there's a problem accessing rundll.exe or rundll32.exe then you'll get errors. If the dll's themselves are shagged then you'll also get errors.

Because both of the things you are describing are Microsoft applications (or parts of them) and you are describing what sounds like linked library errors.

[directhex]

could also be something to do with the RPC service, which blaster is designed to abuse.

try windowsupdate

--jo

[eldren]

Something has broken your file associations, by the sound of it.

With an error message that's so descriptive, it's hard to realise that, but being unable to launch an Office file from Explorer is a dead give-away. Being unable to open the Control Panel from the Start Menu implies that Microsoft were using some sort of special windows file (Not a shortcut), associated with Explorer, for opening the Control Panel. Evidently, this association is also broken.

Given that a Windows association has been mysteriously broken, I'd say it would probably be easiest to repair XP's install (Select Repair in the Windows setup). After you've done that, repair Office's install (Launching the uninstaller should allow the option of uninstalling, repairing or reinstalling. Failing that, re-run the original installer). This saves you from having to reinstall everything from scratch, and should fix these problems.

[Agent]

Goto start - > run -> cmd

Type in "sfc /scannow" without the quotes.
That will check all system files for alterations, but wont check if DLLs are registered.

[TomWilko]

...And what will that do?

[Agent]

Originally posted by TomWilko
...And what will that do?

if any critical DLL's have vanished, or been altered, it will restore and sort them out for you

[sparrow]

get rid of xp m8 i canna be bothered with it anymore


gave me all sorts of problems


windows 2000 pro is better in my opinion


regards


sparrow