All Programs & Start Menu Empty After Windows 7 Recovery Virus
Jun 5, 2011
my entire sunday has been consumed by this virus....I followed instructions on another topic but have not been successful in restoring my programs menu.
here is my log:
SystemLook 04.09.10 by jpshortstuff
Log created at 20:37 on 05/06/2011 by owner
Administrator - Elevation successful
My antivirus software prompted me to do a virus scan and after rebooting, I was no longer able to view any of my program files nor documents. I looked up at some posts and found that I had to one by one uncheck the "hidden" tab on the folders in the system. I was able to retrieve most of the files and programs, but not all of them. I still have a few programs that appear as "empty" on the start menu (i.e. Microsoft Office programs). Any other steps I should take to be able to launch all my programs in the Start Menu?
A client of mine (I'm an IT summer temp in a production facility) recently contracted the Windows 7 Recovery virus and contacted me to fix it. Having encountered the XP version recently and resolved the issue, I was able to easily remove the virus and associated rootkit. The difference this time was that unhide.exe failed to restore the start>all programs menu shortcuts, although it did manage to restore the folder structure. I read through and followed the instructions of another thread here: [URL]. Which did not resolve the issue. The output given by SystemLook is as follows:
SystemLook 04.09.10 by jpshortstuff Log created at 09:14 on 09/06/2011 by debra Administrator - Elevation successful
I followed this thread [URL]to restore the items of the start menu. :thumbup2: However, I still have this isse of the folders in the All Programs section being empty.
I have windows 7 home premium 64bit this has to be one of the nastiest viruses i have ever gotten and it kept telling me my hard drive clusters were messed up(laptop is barely 3 weeks old) and after i rebooted it, a program called PC performance and stability analysis kept running. I removed it though(maybe!notsure) using mbam and sas in safe mode. and ran both programs twice. after this everything was missing in the start menu and programs list. as well as the desktop shorcuts and my wallpaper was gone just a black screen. after reading over other topics of people have the same problem, i found unhide.exe which helped somewhat it found all my documents and such but not much. another topic i found explained how to use systemlook.exe and it keeps saying file not found and i have no idea of what do next? also im not even sure this trojan is gone, beacuse some programs get errors when they open up.
After an update install from Vista everything seems to be working perfectly EXCEPT none of my existing program are listed in the Start-All Program--it is completely empty! I find I can pin programs to the menu and if I install a new program it does show up. I have no problems accessing my programs from the desktop icons. I want my All Programs back!!
I recently removed the Windows 7 Recovery virus, but now a bunch of my start menu shortcuts are just empty folders (no shortcut to Word/Excel for example).
Spent today cleaning up fake AV-scan virus which hid all files. ComboFix has restored all of the files.Programs also all appear to be working, although all of the "All Programs" listings are empty. I can find and run them from Start search.Does anyone know of a way to repopulate the All Programs list without having to Repair/Reinstall the Programs, since they all work fine?
I bought a new laptop recently, and probably about 4 days later, it got the System Check virus. A friend helped me get rid of the virus(I think), but a lot of my stuff still seems to be hidden. Unhide.exe got back my desktop icons, and some of my Start Menu, but I'm still missing almost all of the right side of said start menu. The Control Panel, Help and Support, Search, etc etc.I have Windows 7.
When I start up my computer, my Steam starts up, then I manually start Chrome. Chrome comes up fine, Steam does too, but when I try to right click on Steam and click friends, all it does is create another steam process running at 100-108 K. Then if I close Chrome and try to reopen it, it will do the same. This happens with EVERY program after I start up. There's a 5 second window where I can open programs without issue, then after that it will only start 108 K copies of them. It takes me around 30 restarts just to get it working properly, if not more.
so somehow I caught the malware program known as Windows 7 recovery. As per its standard operations it made my computer seem like it was having a bunch of issues, hid all the files on my hard drive, removed my background, etc. I followed a removal guide I found here on bleeping computer and it did rid of me of that annoying malware. A lingering problem I am still experiencing is that all my start menu items are missing. For example there is a folder for Microsoft office, but when you open it it shows as empty, but if I open a Microsoft office file like say a word file the program opens as normal. I have run the unhide.exe file a couple of times, and shutdown my firewall and maleware protection, but to no avail the start menu items still seem to remain hidden.
I am having issues with searching for program shortcuts in Windows 7. When I type in a shortcut name in the search field on the start menu, nothing appears. Files and Control panel applets do appear though but no program shortcuts located under the C:ProgramdataMicrosoftWindowsStart Menu folder. The OS is Windows 7 Enterprise RTM 64 bit. I have confirmed that the user that is having the issue does have read and execute rights to these shortcuts because they appear in the start menu and in the appropriate folder. This is in a corporate environment so the local hard disk has restricted settings on it via group policy.
They include the following: - Hide these specified drives in My Computer Restrict C drive Only - Prevent access to drives from My Computer Restrict C Drive Only.
The tasks I have done. - Confirmed the index options settings and the start menu is listed. - Rebuilt the index and the same issue applies
Due to a windows crash, I had to reinstall windows 7 (64 bit). My windows files in on an SSD and most all of my programs are on another SATA drive. The windows install went through, but none of the programs from the other drive show up when I click on the start button/all programs (somewhat understandable). Is there any quick way to get all of the programs (office, photoshop, etc.) that are on my D drive to appear where you click on "all programs"? Also, can I just delete my windows.old folder from my C drive to free up space? Any reason it is needed? Do I just delete it?
I bought a recovery disc however I can not even log on to get to the start menu, the system acts like it is logging me on then logs me right back off. This all started when I got a virus. What can I do now?
The screenshot will show what I mean. When I click on All programs, a list appears (shortened) and when I click on a choice (i.e. Accessories/System Tools) it tells me it is empty.I don't know how to fix this, and all references I have found seem to relate to upgrades from Vista to windows7.I have windows home premium 64 bit.
I've installed Windows 7 on my laptop and want to customize the Start Menu's All Programs window. I normally consolidate like programs/folders into one common folder to minimize the number of items on the All Program window (i.e. all Microsoft related items in one folder called something like Microsoft Programs). I can't seem to figure out how to do that in Windows 7.
looked the most sensible place to put it. Second, I've tried scouring the internet for a similar problem, but as of yet have been unable to find one.The problem I'm experiencing occurred after some hardware problems, which meant the computer was periodically crashing. I think I've now fixed these, however a software problem with windows 7 seems to be occurring.Every time I go to the start menu and load a program, not one but two instances of these programs start up. This doesn't occur with all programs I've tested, but this may be because other programs only allow one instance to run at a time. Examples of ones I've tested include Speedfan, Handbrake, Calculator. If I start the programs from within explorer, only one instance starts.
Interestingly, not sure if this is related, if I go into explorer and double click on a folder, it does not open the folder, i have to right click and then use the open option.The computer generally feels a bit slow. I'm wondering if anyone has experienced anything similar, or whether I should try a repair install (which will be a bit of hassle as I'll have to try to uninstall SP1 first).
Maybe a week or two ago I was cleaning a junk from a system with revo uninstaller and have checked few more options then they are checked by default,and I erased some of the apps from start menu.That were apps which are in Accessories and System tools folders,and all Administrative tools folder.
After that I tried to approac them through Administrative tols in Control panel,but I was getting a message that a shortcut refers to a location which is unavailable,and that they are maybe moved to some other place on HD.Since I knew what have I done,and it was 3:00 AM,I decided to do a System restore,but some other day when I won't be sleepy.
Tomorrow and day after tomorrow I was kind a busy,and forgot to do a System Restore,but I was downloading some games and I was running out of a place on that partition.I was maybe a few hundreds megabytes short,and decided to delete all system restore points and turn off system protection,so I can get some extra place which was earlier dedicated to System restore.Off course,in that moment I forgot about the programs I deleted few days before but I remembered them in the same moment I turn off System protection and when restore points were gone,but a second or two too late.
So,my question is:
Is there any way so I can get back System tools and Administrative tools back?
Of course there is because I see some of them in System32 folder and in Windows folder(exe files) or maybe they are all there but I can't tell which one was where,and I don't know how I can get them back in Start menu,and reassociate Administrative tools with Control panel shortcut.
And of course,I don't have an image of a system.
I hope that you undersand what I was trying to tell.
This may have been reported earlier and has been happening on Vista and XP to some people (albeit not REALLY the same), but I'm seeing my entire programs list in "All Programs" disappear after every installation of any software. It seems adding to the list makes it disappear. The funny thing is that the actual files (shortcuts, etc.) are all in place in their proper folders and don't get removed. It's just the start menu which stops showing them. A way to fix this, for me, is to MOVE the entire contents of
contents) After this, it all comes back, but only until I install something new.
Does anybody have any such or similar problems?
Also, I have a different user account on this computer (for my wife) and none of this happens there, even if I perform an installation from under that account!
I should also say that this window install (currently build 7077) has been upgraded from 7048 (i.e. 7048 -> 7057 -> 7068 - >7077). I have AVG antivirus + firewall installed (the problem happens with it disabled and has started long after AVG's been installed anyway).
This did not happen on any provious builds (and started relatively recently but for the life of me I can't remember when exactly since I don't really use the programs menu that much). The first time it happened I did a restore which brought back the contents but again, until the next install after which it all disappeared again.
It seems to have something to do with the way the start menu finds its contents...
My computer recently prompted me to do a virus scan and after rebooting, it erased all the files and programs on it. I read some posts stating to "unhide" all the folders in windows explorer to help the situation. That seemed to restore alot of programs, but I still can't launch certain programs off the Start Menu nor can I see their shortcut in Windows Explorer. I'm able to open files using those programs from Windows explorer, I just cant open the program itself from the Start Menu. The folders of those programs on the Start Menu say "empty" and no program is displayed.
How to permanently remove/ban programs from the Start Menu Recent List? (Since manually deleting them will only get them back on once the program is started again.) The sole answer gave a suggestion to "switch the feature off". This answer though useful to some is not to me. Those programs which are indeed often used are on the desktop via a shortcut. Those on the start menu, are programs not often used or perhaps only used this week, then not used for 2 months, then used again later once. Therefore, as the reader suggested, to then, after turning the feature off and"add links to the programs you do want there manually" doesn't do it since I may not want them there 'next week' nor do I like the idea of me having to manually add them and manually remove them all the time. In Windows XP there used to be a little Microsoft program called TweakUI (Power Toys) that would do exactly that--controlled which programs could go there and which could not. Considering that TweakUi was originally made for the 1st or 2nd Windows version (before Windows 95) I hesitate to use it again for Windows 7.
How to permanently remove/ban programs from the Start Menu Recent List? (Since manually deleting them will only get them back on once the program is started again.) The sole answer gave a suggestion to "switch the feature off". Those programs which are indeed often used are on the desktop via a shortcut. Those on the start menu, are programs not often used or perhaps only used this week, then not used for 2 months, then used again later once. Therefore, as the reader suggested, to then, after turning the feature off and "add links to the programs you do want there manually" doesn't do it since I may not want them there 'next week' nor do I like the idea of me having to manually add them and manually remove them all the time. In Windows XP there used to be a little Microsoft program called TweakUI (Power Toys) that would do exactly that--controlled which programs could go there and which could not. Considering that TweakUi was originally made for the 1st or 2nd Windows version (before Windows 95) I hesitate to use it again for Windows 7.
I would like to know if is possible to show All Programs in the start menu automatically when you click the orb. Because clicking every time to show the list of All Programs is not very nice since I don't use the recently programs open function.
I'm a Mac user and an avowed keyboard shortcut enthusiast. On a Mac we have a wonderful app (prog in Winspeak) called Quicksilver, which makes it possible (among other things) to switch between running programs using the keyboard (i.e., without the hunt and click mouse nonsense). All I have to do is invoke a hot-key, type one or two letters (it remembers the apps I use most!), press Enter and BAM! I'm there. I find this so much faster than hunting for the right icon on the taskbar, or alt-tabbing through 10-15 apps to get to where I want to go. Alas, in Windows (any flavor, be it 2K, XP, Vista or 7), if I do anything other than alt-tab to a running program, or click on its icon on the taskbar, I'm going to start another instance of that program, which means loading duplicates of all the resources that have already been loaded into memory! Using Excel as an example, all I want is to hit the Windows key, type e x, hit Enter (assuming Excel is the first choice) and switch to the one (and only) instance of Excel that is already running. Is that really too much to ask? For the record, I have tried a number of Windows based Quicksilver knockoffs, and they all suffer from the same limitation. So it seems that trapping which programs are already running is an impossible feat under Windows?
A while back I used a few different programs to tweak Windows 7. One of the programs I used caused the recently used programs to stop showing up in the star menu. Under properties now I can't even set the number of programs to show because it is grayed out and unselectable. Any body know how to get this function back? I have ran SFC to see if there was something corrupt in Windows 7 with no errors returned. I think there is something turned off in the registry but have no idea where to look.