So, presently there are two problems on my XP laptop that reinforce eachother so neither can be fixed. I'll present them as they've shown up.
1) First, I'm unable to run setup programs. This has been a problem for a while now, and I don't know why it has happened. It could possibly be spyware or malware, but I honestly haven't a clue. The warning tells me I don't have access to perform the operation, but it's the administrative as well as singular account on the computer, so this makes no sense. I'd check to see what exactly this is, but...
2) As of yesterday, I cannot connect to the internet. It will only go so far as to say that the connection is limited (with the triangular yellow symbol atop the familiar wireless network icon). The same will occur plugging it directly into the router, or even the modem. I know the network is fine because I tested it using my friend's laptop. The only notable actions I took that could be worth mentioning are upgrading the version of itunes on it and also, and more importantly, changing the startup programs on my computer using ms-config (go to 'run' and type in ms-config). I thought this might have been the root of the problem, but I've tried changing between normal startup, diagnostic, and the previous selective startup I'd been using previously, with various programs selected and unselected.
The problem this creates is that I can't effectively use a scanner to detect or delete whatever could be causing this. Why? Because I was unintelligent enough to not think to upgrade avg until this all started, and while I got as far as upgrading the core software, the virus scanner and malware/spyware scanner functions need to be updated, and require internet access to obtain said update. I, of course, can't do that because the internet won't work.
That said, if anybody out there is familiar with either/both problems, and help would be greatly appreciated. One idea I was thinking of would be to install the newest avg onto another person's computer, copy the program files and transfer them onto my computer. I don't know if that will even be useful, so I'll wait for some feedback. Please write soon.
