When I boot up I'm getting a constant error message "The application failed to initialize properly (0xc0000142). Click on OK to terminate the application." When I click ok...another error message pops up immediately. And so on...and so on. I open my task manager and see that I have over 100 processes running simultaneously. And that varies. It's like something is opening and closing them constantly. There'll be 33 running one second and 90 the next...and then 113 the next second. My CPU usage is at 100%. I can't get these error messages to go away!!!! It's not affecting my other applications (that I know of). My virus software will not detect a virus either. Any suggestions??? PS...it doesn't matter what software I'm trying to use and the processes that are running the most are secure.exe and cmd.exe.

sound like a virus... most everything i get back on 0xc0000142 is a snap-in or mail error the fact that cmd.exe ( dos command prompt ) is also running gives me reason to think that it is something less than kosher try a google search for 0xc0000142 it may return something that more closely fits what you are describing

Since I went over to broadband this week I've been plagued with precisely the same problem. Hope someone can elucidate. Bill

not sure but i think that maybe this could help. there could be a virus called W32.Randex.C search for a file called msmonk.exe it should be found in the c:\winnt\system folder. if you find this file then you can go here to see hoe to remove it. http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.randex.c.html

Man my first help message above was a complete miss on the problem. i have since been working hard to find a cure i hope this will help. first i will say yes i did have a virus called W32.Randex.C however this problem goes beyond just getting rid of w32.Randex.C. "haven't remove that from the cause since it could have been the way i got the problem." just deleting cmd.exe,net.exe,net1.exe will not stop this problem. windows 2000 will replace those files AUTOMATIC. we need to look at copycat files files that look like the real system files. the file i had running on my computer was winmgnt.exe man that looks like winmgmt.exe you need to delete that file "winmgnt.exe" but be careful because it looks very much like the windows system file and your computer may not restart. to delete this file i used a program called TCPview from www.sysinternals.com free download. there was also a service running on my computer called PSEXESVC this i completely disable i beleive that this solved my problem.