Okay, its my turn. Yesterday on my second rig Online Armor free gave a warning about an executible wanting to load wanting to load. My son wanted to know what to do and so I said block because I did not recognize the process but before doing so uncheck the Remember My Decision box first which he did. Everything ran fine.

So, after my son finished his tasks and web browsing he shut down the computer. Came back today about a half hour ago and he booted up the computer and Windows loaded to the Desktop but Avast!, OA, and other items did not load. The internet is fully blocked. Other tasks are not accessible. The warning I get is the "files are either missing or moved."

Either I have gotten an infection of a biblical proportion or whatever I had OA block it has frozen anything beyond the desktop, failing to heed my directive. In fact, I cannot shut down the PC. It will allow to restart but that is all.

For those who understand Windows XP Pro w/SP2 what do you suggest? I can tell you that neither internet habits or new programs were changed/installed.

I am at a loss. Thanks.

By the way, I have both the paid and free OA and it has been a real pain. It fails to remember many things and is causing all kinds of issues. And I am not the only one. Their latest two builds, 130 and 131, are a nightmare. Check out their forums and see what I mean.

Edit: One additional thing. While I was gone, because my son couldn't turn it off normally he decided to unplugged the PC (!). So I turned it back on to see if I could boot into safe mode and now all I get is a blank screen even though the monitor is on. Thus I can't even see my BIOS. Plus, I can't shut down the PC at the power button.

Update: Okay, this is wierd. I shut down the PC from the PSU power switch and rebooted. Everything loads. I really have come to believe it is an Online Armor thing. Even under the paid version it won't recognize IE! I have to allow every time.

I would try getting service pack 3. There should be an option to automatically allow Ie or to always allow it. I would try going through the things you've blocked with online armor and make sure everything thats blocked you dont need. hope this helps.

don't install SP3 until you have control of what you already have! you just make a bigger mess of the soup!.

Have you tried booting Safe Mode with networking?

I am staying away from SP3. Everything is stable now since that glitch. It wasn't an infection. I really do think it was due to the full version of Online Armor because that is the only thing new that I installed during that period. Their 130 and 131update releases have some serious issues which only have been partially resolved with a beta release.

I got sp3 and had no problems before or after its running better with sp3.