Laptop crashed after Redirect Virus/Trojan - please help!

Question

I have HP G72-B66US laptop purchased 10/2010.  I am running Windows 7 Home Premium.  I have McAfee Antivirus with current virus definitions and nothing was found but a month or so ago my McAfee firewall started turning off.  I would turn it back on and sometimes it would turn right back off again.  I’ve been concerned that I had some problem undetected by McAfee so I downloaded MalwareBytes.  I actually disconnected my laptop from our wireless internet connection and downloaded the MalwareBytes setup file onto a flash drive using our desktop PC and then installed MalwareBytes on my laptop without taking it back online.  MalwareBytes went all the way through a full scan and at the very end detected the Redirect Trojan.  When I attempted to remove this Trojan with Malwarebytes, my computer crashed.  When I rebooted, it was back connected to the wireless router and McAfee’s firewall was off again.  Now the laptop won’t even boot up. 
[A] When I reboot it I get the “Starting Windows” message followed by the HP logo.  Then I get a Windows Error Recovery screen with the following message: “Windows failed to start.  A recent hardware or software change might be the cause.  If Windows files have been damaged or configured incorrectly, Startup Repair can help diagnose and fix the problem.  If power was interrupted during startup, chose Start Windows Normally.”  When I chose Startup Repair, it says “Windows is loading files” and then displays a blue screen with something that looks like rays of light beaming from the top center.  Then it says “Startup Repair”.  Then it shows the Recovery Manager screen in the background with Startup Repair window on top.  This window displays the message “Startup Repair cannot repair this computer automatically”.  Closing that window brings me to the Recovery Manager screen with 3 sections: “I need help immediately”, “I’d like to identify any problems”, and “I’d like to take precautions”.  The first section contained 3 options: Microsoft System Restore, System Recovery, and Minimized Image Recovery. The second section had 1 option: Run Computer Checkup.  And the third section had 1 option: File Backup Program. 
[B] First I chose to back up my files.  I then tried to read the DVDs on my desktop PC and saw the whole thing is compressed, so I have not verified the integrity of the backup.  The Computer Checkup utility provides 3 options: Launch Check Disk for the Windows Partition, Launch Check Disk for the Recovery Partition, or Open a Command Prompt.
Running Check Disk for the Windows Partition, it went through the process of verifying files and then indexes and security descriptors.  I did not see anything that looked bad, though at the end the data flew rapidly up the screen so I couldn’t read it all.
[C] At this point, I clicked the X to close Recovery Manager.  It prompted: “Do you want to exit Recovery Manager and reboot?” and I clicked OK.  This brought me back to the stage described in [A] above.  This time I chose “Start Windows Normally.”  I got the “Starting Windows” message followed by the HP logo.  Then it went right back to the Windows Error Recovery screen with my two choices of “Startup Repair” or “Start Windows Normally”.
[D] I then went back into Recovery Manager and tried System Recovery.  Since I’d been having problems for a few weeks I chose to recover a few stages back, using 4/6/13.  That recover processed for a while but eventually failed.  The problem was identified as StartupRepairOffline.  I don’t know if I can even get my laptop back online since I can’t cleanly boot up, so if I need to be online to run the repair utility I’m stuck. 
Please advise how I should proceed from this point…

Answer 1

I am running Kaspersky antivirus and the same problem is coming up like antivirus is turned off..
sysem recovery is not working as well as the recovery discs..what to do??
hpmossii wrote:
I have HP G72-B66US laptop purchased 10/2010.  I am running Windows 7 Home Premium.  I have McAfee Antivirus with current virus definitions and nothing was found but a month or so ago my McAfee firewall started turning off.  I would turn it back on and sometimes it would turn right back off again.  I’ve been concerned that I had some problem undetected by McAfee so I downloaded MalwareBytes.  I actually disconnected my laptop from our wireless internet connection and downloaded the MalwareBytes setup file onto a flash drive using our desktop PC and then installed MalwareBytes on my laptop without taking it back online.  MalwareBytes went all the way through a full scan and at the very end detected the Redirect Trojan.  When I attempted to remove this Trojan with Malwarebytes, my computer crashed.  When I rebooted, it was back connected to the wireless router and McAfee’s firewall was off again.  Now the laptop won’t even boot up. 
[A] When I reboot it I get the “Starting Windows” message followed by the HP logo.  Then I get a Windows Error Recovery screen with the following message: “Windows failed to start.  A recent hardware or software change might be the cause.  If Windows files have been damaged or configured incorrectly, Startup Repair can help diagnose and fix the problem.  If power was interrupted during startup, chose Start Windows Normally.”  When I chose Startup Repair, it says “Windows is loading files” and then displays a blue screen with something that looks like rays of light beaming from the top center.  Then it says “Startup Repair”.  Then it shows the Recovery Manager screen in the background with Startup Repair window on top.  This window displays the message “Startup Repair cannot repair this computer automatically”.  Closing that window brings me to the Recovery Manager screen with 3 sections: “I need help immediately”, “I’d like to identify any problems”, and “I’d like to take precautions”.  The first section contained 3 options: Microsoft System Restore, System Recovery, and Minimized Image Recovery. The second section had 1 option: Run Computer Checkup.  And the third section had 1 option: File Backup Program. 
[B] First I chose to back up my files.  I then tried to read the DVDs on my desktop PC and saw the whole thing is compressed, so I have not verified the integrity of the backup.  The Computer Checkup utility provides 3 options: Launch Check Disk for the Windows Partition, Launch Check Disk for the Recovery Partition, or Open a Command Prompt.
Running Check Disk for the Windows Partition, it went through the process of verifying files and then indexes and security descriptors.  I did not see anything that looked bad, though at the end the data flew rapidly up the screen so I couldn’t read it all.
[C] At this point, I clicked the X to close Recovery Manager.  It prompted: “Do you want to exit Recovery Manager and reboot?” and I clicked OK.  This brought me back to the stage described in [A] above.  This time I chose “Start Windows Normally.”  I got the “Starting Windows” message followed by the HP logo.  Then it went right back to the Windows Error Recovery screen with my two choices of “Startup Repair” or “Start Windows Normally”.
[D] I then went back into Recovery Manager and tried System Recovery.  Since I’d been having problems for a few weeks I chose to recover a few stages back, using 4/6/13.  That recover processed for a while but eventually failed.  The problem was identified as StartupRepairOffline.  I don’t know if I can even get my laptop back online since I can’t cleanly boot up, so if I need to be online to run the repair utility I’m stuck. 
Please advise how I should proceed from this point…