Severe problem left over after a system crash

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Yesterday, my Win 7 computer crashed big time. I rebooted it, and I’ve had to do assorted cleaning up operations on it to get it to work properly. This included resetting the Winsock catalogue and resetting the TCP/IP stack (not to mention uninstalling and reinstalling Fences). Everything that I expect to work now works correctly (e.g. WS_FTP, Chrome/Firefox/IE, etc) – except Skype.

As soon as Skype goes online, my default browser (which happens to be Chrome) pops up and opens up a squillion and one tabs with long URLs consisiting solely of numbers. My DNS is through OpenDNS, and every one of those tabs comes back with a “blocked” message, and OpenDNS now thinks that I have a malware bot attack (which I don’t – I’ve checked!)

The system carries on opening up tabs in Chrome until (after many false starts since the browser window always comes to the front for each new tab) I quit Skype, when it all stops. So Skype is the problem application, but what I am not clear about is whether or not it is Skype or something still sitting in Windows somewhere. On the off-chance that it can be fixed by a simple reset like the winsock catalogue, I’m posting here (as well as on Skype forums!) in the hope that your combined wisdom can help!

I’ve uninstalled Skype. Then I’ve gone back and removed all the folders and registry keys that uninstalling Skype doesn’t remove (which annoys me – uninstallers should uninstall!), except for a small handful of “devices” e.g. #SkypeVoiceInTopo that I cannot delete, even in safe mode, and even with permissions set to “full control”. Then I’ve rebooted the system, ensured that no other applications are runnng, and then installed the latest version from a fresh download. And I get exactly the same problem, every time.

It’s not the router, because Skype behaves perfectly on other PCs, so it’s on the PC. As I said, I’ve reset most things that I could find out about along the way, but nothing helps. It’s driving me mad, and I’ve lost several hours already trying to fix it, so if anyone has any bright ideas please let me know!

Thanks

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Do you have the Skype addon installed in Chrome? If so, try disbling it.

Jerry

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Nope, don’t have the plugin.

I’ve also tried going back to a system restore point about a week ago. Some of the remaining problems (printer, mostly) are now fixed, but not this one.

FWIW, I also made Firefox the default browser, and when I did and started Skype, then FF fired up with all of the same rubbish. So it isn’t a browser issue – something in Win 7 (probably) or Skype is directing what ought to be a comms stream over whatever protocol Skype uses into something that is interpreted as an HTTP stream that needs a browser open (I think)!

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Have you tried the system file checker utility:

sfc /scannow
To See and Read the SFC /SCANNOW Scan Results
NOTE: When SFC runs, it logs it’s actions to the C:WINDOWSLOGSCBSCBS.LOG. This will show you how to see only the specific SFC entries with the [SR] tags in the CBS.log. This can be helpful to show you what files SFC could not fix automatically if you wanted to try and manually replace them.

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Thanks for the thought. I had run that earlier, and it had reported no system files that were in need of replacing. I looked in the logs just in case (and you need to run Notepad as an Administrator before you can do that) but there were no [SR] entries 🙁

I’m really hoping I don’t have to go for a total rebuild!

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What was the cause of the crash?
Maybe a Windows 7 – Repair Installwill set things right.

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I have no idea what caused it to crash. I was browsing a couple of windows in Chrome, doing some remote desktop work, and had various Excel and XML editing tools turned on. And I had slept/woken up a number of times in different locations/wireless environments (which I’ve noticed confuses it after a while and you have to shut down and restart!). Whole thing just locked up!

But the repair install sounds like a good option. I’ll try that and see what happens. Thanks.

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Fantastic! :fanfare: Solved the problem (interestingly, the repair installation decided that .NET 4 was corrupted, and fixed it). So apart from having to reinstall the printer (again – it goes AWOL more or less every Windows Update), I’m a very happy bunny! 😀

(Oops – edited to add “many many many thanks” which was my original intention but I forgot in the excitement of adding the smilies)

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