Explorer.exe does not load at startup

[frog357]

I am working on a friends computer, it started off with a massive spyware / virus infection that I cleaned using Spybot, Hijack This, Ewido Micro Scanner, Super Anti-spyware and a few virus scanners.

The current problem is when the computer starts up and you select the user, explorer.exe does not appear to load.

I can use Task Manager to start it manually and everything "appears" to be fine. Upon reboot still no explorer.exe

I have checked Google and followed all the instructions I was able to find, but I am still having this problem.

(Shell is set properly in registry)

To help me solve this, I attempting to install SP3 to see if this helps anything and I am getting to the point of setup that says:

"Performing Inventory"

and then I get an error message of:

ntoskrnl.exe is in use by another application.

At this point I suspected a Rootkit, so I went and ran Rootkit Unhooker and found my suspicions were correct. I am fairly sure I have cleaned up the rootkit, as I no longer see hooks in RKUH.

I am now installing SP3 without any troubles.

I posted the information above to help out other people who get the error "ntoskrnl.exe is in use" as I searched for help on this and was not able to find anything.

I will post a follow-up if SP3 fixes my troubles.

[frog357]

Well sorry about the noise but this post might help someone in the future, I did a lot of searching and was unable to solve this with what Google showed me. If anyone has a problem with Explorer.exe not starting up, it is very possible it's malware related, and an install of XP SP3 seemed to fix whatever the removal of the malware broke. Also, errors about files in use while trying to install the SP3 was another sign something was up, as I had turned off every possible non-system startup program and still had the error.