I foolishly agreed to try out a program a friend couldn’t get to work. I now suspect malware. The end result is that I can’t get XP to boot (in ANY configuration). The culprit seems to be a file called SPTD.sys. I’ve had a look on the web and my symptoms seem to be typical. In safe mode, drivers load up to this one, then a prompt appears to load it. Whichever way I choose, the reboot cycle begins.
What I’ve done so far is to rename to SPTD.sys.old and to set every one of its Start keys in the registry to (DWord) 4. No current control set shows (since I’m now running off a PE boot CD) but I’ve disabled in control sets 1 through 3. Even then, the reboot starts at the same point, without (apparently) trying to load the offender. I also can’t use the recovery console, since my admin password (which I know is correct) is not being accepted.
I’ve run anti-virus/ malware scans from the boot CD, with current sig files, but nothing shows up. Suggestions on where to go from here (desperately) appreciated.
Alan
Sorry.
. I do now have 3 options to boot into. Only the first (default) is relevant. I’ll check on how to knock out the redundant ones.
