Windows 7: Restoring my Windows.old file after reinstalling OS

Hi, everyone. I tried to make sure I was posting this in the correct forum. I am new to this and desperate at this point, so please bear with me.

I own a Dell Inspiron 1545 and run Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit on it. Recently, a rather nasty virus somehow got past my virus protection (when I finally got rid of it, it was labeled PDF.Exploit, if that helps). It completely shut down everything on my computer, and it was realistic enough that I actually believed the bogus messages stating that my hard drive had crashed due to the motor failing. I am not typically fooled by viruses, but this one looked real. As a result, I was not able to get to anything in my C Drive (which it said was unreadable), a million different bogus error messages kept appearing, and every single icon disappeared from my desktop.

I managed to get around it by reinstalling my operating system with the disc that came with my computer. After the re-installation, I was able to run my virus scan and get rid of the virus. However, nothing on my computer works correctly now. It is all messed up, and I am incredibly frustrated. It is usable, but not very practical. I wondered if there was any way for me to restore my operating system from the Windows.old file that remained after I reinstalled the OS completely.

I don't know if this is more an issue with the laptop or the OS, so if I am in the wrong place, please let me know. Otherwise, any advice would be an absolutely godsend.



Thanks very much.