I have been struggling, originally, with seeking to be able to run scan disk and find the program running in background that caused me to not be able to complete scan disk or degrag.. (even in safe mode).. About this same time and for months now.. my screen freezes up... sometimes.. ctrl, alt, del does not even work.. and I have to just turn off the power to reboot,, which of course brings up scan disk upon reboot.. which I have to cancel as it will never finish.. scanning.. In any event.. I have been terribly confused... sort of running back and forth between the issues fixing this n that (or trying).. and decided to list the issues, as I see them.. here.. (below) they may or may not be related.. but figured.. you guru's might know.. SO Issue #1 - Scan disk and defrag not work Program running in background.. BACKGROUND - I tackled this a few days ago.. coming to this forum and reading posts - go to safe mode, down load power defrag, etc.. here is what i did.. I DID download power defrag.. and ran it in regular mode.. I notice it turned off the screen saver.. but ,, scandisk, after 5 hours of continuous running did not complete even drive C: (have two drives C and D).. SO I initiated it again,, it asks for a reboot, rebooted,, decided to go into safe mode and did.. clicked system maintenance and let it run.. after bout 6 hrs.. it completed scandisk on both drives.. after bout 5 more hrs... defrag showed NO details when i clicked on view details.. so defrag did not run... yet and it has been since according to logs had not run since June 12, 2003... Scan disk on log shows last run 12/26/03.. Issue #2 Slow computer.. I realize being able to run defrag would help a LOT.. here.. BACKGROUND - again searching around the forum for answers brought me to ... start-up programs.. and msconfig and the how to's of that.. so i executed those instructions and moved available resources from 52% to 75% ... in searching the suggested sites (three of them) that tell you WHAT the programs are for and whether or not they can be removed from startup -- I still have not identifed the purpose or whether or not the following programs could be removed.. qvid1132 -- is in there twice.. same location... load32 -- command is load32.exe cmesys atiPTA --- ATIptaxx.exe ATIPOLAB Premeter AVG_CC Syncronization manager Avgserv9.exe WhenUsave tray temperature SchedulingAgent SSDPSRV ScriptBlocking Stillmagemonitor run= -- loaded from Win.ini command C:\windows\dllreg.exe *******end list************* perhaps even some of the above are a part of the other issues.. with freeze up and defrag not running.. etc.. gosh I do not know.. Issue #3 SCREEN FREEZE Seem to be several types of freezes.. There are those that I can ctrl, alt, del and reboot from and then there are those that I cannot ctrl,alt,del and have to shut off power to computer... Here is a recent one,, (this morning) I right clicked onto desk top to rearrange my icon's.. doing this brings a consistent error message Rundll32 caused error in 3DFXU2PS.dll rundll32 will now close When I click the "X" not Close button of the above message,, then, i get.. this message Co Create Instance failed and screen freezes HARD... at this point ctrl,alt,del do not work.. even the power off button on the front of my tower will not shut off the power,, I have to use a switch located on the back of the tower to cut the power and shut it down... upon reboot, of course i get the scan disk.. and not wanting to take another 8 hours to scan (see above) .. i just close it.. off... not the right thing to do,, i know.. Issue #4 New RWCD 52x high speed - a sony added and not detected.. it is a 2nd cd ,, and replaced a cd burner that had been there previously when we purchased the system (used) and we could never get to work.. I purchased the new cd for a christmas gift to myself so I could make back-ups.. of my files since I am haveing all this trouble. and a system crash could ruin my business.. I build treetables of oak, have thousands of pictures,, and i create my own web pages so html codes are stored on my system too and i would hat to lose all of this.. plus there are hundreds of email address' which i have no idea where they are stored.. but want to back up.. ANYWAY... this is such a long post.. but I wonder what all of my problem my system problems may be causing the others.. on this issue of not detecting the cd rw drive.. I am going to update my versi9on of ME first and see if that helps.. hope there is a guru out there that can untangle some of this.. thanks mike

In your list of programs, the ones that start AVG... are part of the AVG anti virus program. You could try uninstalling it and installing a newer version, or at least update the version you have online. The ssdpsrv is not needed and can cause problems. Go to Start - Settings - Control Panel - Add/Remove Programs - Widows Setup tab - select Communications - Details - and un-check "Universal Plug and Play". Click OK, OK and reboot system. SchedulingAgent is OK, required. Stillmagemonitor is required for most Scanners and some printers. And your Win.ini file entry shows that your number one problem is that your system is very infected with the W32/Dumaru.c@MM Virus/Worm. It is one of these advance virus that disables all of the different Virus scan program, such as AVG and Norton. I would recommend you OPEN and run Stinger first as it is designed to remove this and a few other virus. Then reboot and update your AVG virus program online and run a full AV scan with it. You may need to do the Disable System Restore to clean out copies of infected files. This will help ScanDisk and Defrag run in Safe Mode. Then enable system restore after the system is cleaned up. For other information on cleaning up your system, see Windows ME Fixes and do all steps suggested, even if you have done them before.

Thank you sooooo much... I am ON it .. will keep ya posted as to how it comes out.. Have disabled restore and am running Stinger right now... thank you again... kinda wondered about that run= in the start-up programs...

Update- Ok I have now downloaded and ran Stinger.. then updated my virus scanner (norton).. and ran it.. First, I disabled system restore.. Stinger showed that it scanned 32,000 and some odd files and norton 60,000 plus files. Stinger reported the files scanned and gave no report of virus'.. I assume that means it found none.. ??? I am wondering why stinger did not scan as many files as norton did?? and do i need to redo it?? Norton showed no infections.. eithere.. I am going on to "fixes" now... thanks Jack