Date: 03/18/06 (Computer Help)    Keywords: browser, web

Here's my problem. Usually 1 to 5 minutes after signing on to the internet, all open windows and running programs on my computer shut themselves down leaving me with a view of my desktop. Then a few seconds later, all icons on my desktop and the bar at the bottom disappear leaving me with just the background image of my desktop.

At this point there is nothing I can do except manually turn the computer off. Even pressing ctrl-alt-del doesn't bring up the task manager or anything. I can still see and move the mouse arrow, but that's it.

The first time this happened I had recently played Quake 2, and had messed around with the video settings. So initially I thought that had something to do with it. I restored my computer to a checkpoint from last month so any changes resulting from that would be undone, yet it still shuts down every time I use the internet.

Then I noticed my computer was only doing this when I signed online. As long as I stay offline I'm fine. So this makes me suspect it's a problem with Internet Explorer. Now, recently I also pissed off the moderator of a certain website. He banned my specific IP address from his site last week, so I'm thinking maybe he also sent something to infect my web browser.

Regardless of why this is happening, I would like to try deleting Internet Explorer completely from my computer and either reinstalling it or another browser like Firefox. However there are two problems with this.

1. I can't download Firefox because before it finishes downloading my computer shuts down.

2. I can't figure out how to remove Internet Explorer from my computer. It seems to be integrated into the OS. (I use windows XP)

Does anyone have any ideas on why this problem is happening or what I need to do? I can't even stay online long enough to make a livejournal post. I had to use my dad's computer to post this.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/601618.html