WWTBAM Bored

I'm not finding an answer online, so I hope I can get some (real) help from a fellow BB.

I have a new Dell computer that I bought last October, with 12 GB of RAM, running Windows 8.1.

I was playing Skyrim last night (with the online connection to Steam in the background) when the game crashed: after hitting some key combination, suddenly the keystrokes were being typed on screen instead of executing the appropriate game controls. This has happened before without being a big deal, although I had to shut down the game using the Task Manager.

Only this time, my PC was left running extremely slow. Opening/closing windows happens in slow motion. According to the system clock, about 15-20 seconds go by between every "second" tick of the clock.

I tried power cycling the computer and the cable modem, but the problem remains. I tried running the Windows Troubleshooter, but that was no help. The Resource Monitor show almost no CPU activity, but heavy Disk and Network activity, but that may be a false reading, based on the internal clock being so slow?

Help! Any ideas what happened and how to fix this?

It sounds like you may have somehow been infected by malware. Possibly through Skyrim.

Download and run Malwarebytes! http://www.malwarebytes.org/mwb-download/var3-nodl/

I did a full scan of the computer using Windows Defender. That found nothing.

I thought at first you said Skynet.

Never mind.

MarleysGh0st wrote:I did a full scan of the computer using Windows Defender. That found nothing.

Windows Defender is anti-virus only. Malwarebytes looks for different stuff (malware). It is free to use for scanning your system. If you choose to purchase the premium version, it offers real-time anti-malware protection. That means it should warn you when you click on something that is trying to load malware onto your machine.

Google something like "anti-virus vs. anti-malware", and you should see a lot of confirmation that these days, you need both.

#skyrimgate

Okay, I downloaded and ran Malwarebytes. That didn't find anything, either.

The problem is still here.

Estonut wrote:

MarleysGh0st wrote:I did a full scan of the computer using Windows Defender. That found nothing.

Windows Defender is anti-virus only. Malwarebytes looks for different stuff (malware). It is free to use for scanning your system. If you choose to purchase the premium version, it offers real-time anti-malware protection. That means it should warn you when you click on something that is trying to load malware onto your machine.

Google something like "anti-virus vs. anti-malware", and you should see a lot of confirmation that these days, you need both.

If Estonut and BobJ agree on something, it must be pretty awesome!

You may want to try a system restore to a restore point if you have restore points made. Or, Win 8.1 has an automatic repair option. If that does not work, you may want to restore your system to factory settings (you will lose all your data and programs because it will format your system).

Are you functioning well enough that you can ask the people at the game site if any of them has had this problem?

If Ed says something twice, he really really means it.

BackInTex wrote:If Ed says something twice, he really really means it.

Yep. Yep.

Estonut wrote:

MarleysGh0st wrote:I did a full scan of the computer using Windows Defender. That found nothing.

Windows Defender is anti-virus only. Malwarebytes looks for different stuff (malware). It is free to use for scanning your system. If you choose to purchase the premium version, it offers real-time anti-malware protection. That means it should warn you when you click on something that is trying to load malware onto your machine.

Google something like "anti-virus vs. anti-malware", and you should see a lot of confirmation that these days, you need both.

What he said.

Don't know what video card you're using, but it sounds like this guy had a similar problem. May need to uninstall/reinstall your video card driver.

TheConfessor wrote:

Estonut wrote:

MarleysGh0st wrote:I did a full scan of the computer using Windows Defender. That found nothing.

Windows Defender is anti-virus only. Malwarebytes looks for different stuff (malware). It is free to use for scanning your system. If you choose to purchase the premium version, it offers real-time anti-malware protection. That means it should warn you when you click on something that is trying to load malware onto your machine.

Google something like "anti-virus vs. anti-malware", and you should see a lot of confirmation that these days, you need both.

If Estonut and BobJ agree on something, it must be pretty awesome!

I did download and run Malwarebytes on the basis of their agreed suggestion. But, as I said earlier, that did not find any problems. While I do not totally dismiss the possibility of there being malware deeply hidden in my computer, the circumstances of the failure, coming so soon after the game crash, suggest to me that this is a bug of some sort and not a deliberate virus/spyware/malware exploit.

Ritterskoop wrote:Are you functioning well enough that you can ask the people at the game site if any of them has had this problem?

Well, after failing to resolve the problem on Friday, I've hooked up my netbook to the internet, so I have access with that. If the desktop is, indeed, infected by malware, I wouldn't want it hooked up to the internet until I've resolved the problem.

I have searched through both the Steam and Skyrim support forums looking for similar problem reports, without finding any. I haven't posted the problem myself, yet.

Incidentally, my mood had been terrible (irritable, cranky, grumbly) since this happened on Thursday evening. I suppose it's the downside of the old Dilbert saying*



*I am one with my computer. I have almost reached Nerdvana.

mrkelley23 wrote:Don't know what video card you're using, but it sounds like this guy had a similar problem. May need to uninstall/reinstall your video card driver.

Thanks for this link, Mikey! I have an NVIDIA GeForce GT 720 card. While my symptoms sound worse than those reported in that thread, I find it interesting that it is reported in many games and appears to be an "innocent" bug, rather than deliberate malware. This matches my sense of the problem.

I'll try the fix suggested there about disabling and re-enabling the GPU.

goongas wrote:You may want to try a system restore to a restore point if you have restore points made. Or, Win 8.1 has an automatic repair option. If that does not work, you may want to restore your system to factory settings (you will lose all your data and programs because it will format your system).

Yes, I think I have a recent restore point that Windows made automatically before installing an update. I'll try that, if the GPU fix doesn't help. Then, if that still doesn't help, I'll try the refresh option that will keep my data but lose all of the (non-Windows store) programs I've installed. And if that fails, I do have a set of Factory Backup DVDs that I made when I bought the computer.

I'm trying to avoid the pain of such scorched earth responses until I've tried less drastic fixes.

MarleysGh0st wrote:

goongas wrote:You may want to try a system restore to a restore point if you have restore points made. Or, Win 8.1 has an automatic repair option. If that does not work, you may want to restore your system to factory settings (you will lose all your data and programs because it will format your system).

Yes, I think I have a recent restore point that Windows made automatically before installing an update. I'll try that, if the GPU fix doesn't help. Then, if that still doesn't help, I'll try the refresh option that will keep my data but lose all of the (non-Windows store) programs I've installed. And if that fails, I do have a set of Factory Backup DVDs that I made when I bought the computer.

I'm trying to avoid the pain of such scorched earth responses until I've tried less drastic fixes.

Refresh does not touch the non-Store apps at all. It causes the Store apps to be reinstalled.

If that doesn't work try updating your NVIDIA BIOS. That might have been corrupted somehow. You have their slowest current GPU by the way.

System Restore (to a restore point made automatically, last Tuesday) worked! The slow-down is gone!

I'm running another scan with Windows Defender before reconnecting the desktop to the internet, but I am much relieved.

MarleysGh0st wrote:System Restore (to a restore point made automatically, last Tuesday) worked! The slow-down is gone!

I'm running another scan with Windows Defender before reconnecting the desktop to the internet, but I am much relieved.

Good news! Don't bother scanning with Windows Defender, use Malwarebytes.

I think in this case Windows files got damaged, I don't think Skyrim gives you spyware.

goongas wrote:I think in this case Windows files got damaged, I don't think Skyrim gives you spyware.

I agree.

I didn't get away completely unscathed by the system restore, though. A couple of programs that use Java (Eclipse and OpenRefine) aren't running now, so I've got to fix that.