Complete Meltdown After Hiding User Folder

Flippin marvelous, thank you Jonnya! :)

I don't believe this

I've now tried 5 times to run Vaio Care and it won't work. It wants to update every single time it is opened which I do. I can only assume that the updates are not registering because of the user file issues that caused this breakdown in the first place.

I absolutely cannot believe this, every single programme is completely trashed, I can't do anything.

Wooo!

Hey guys I'm back with a fresh and shiny laptop!

Thanks johnnya, I followed everyones posts especially yours with the links. I made the recovery DVD's and I also burnt the correct Windows ISO to DVD, then backed up all my data onto my external HDD and I did the repair install.

I am still getting a C++ runtime error which either shuts down Vaio Gate or Windows Explorer but that's the only "problem" so far and everytime the C++ error has come up Windows has fixed it anyway.

So, everything looks good after lots and lots of testing. I am sticking to IE9 for now as it was Firefox that created this mess which has really put me off it!

I have installed Avira Free. Do you recommend any other installs for me?

Thank you very very much to everyone that has been so welcoming and helped me with my laptop woes, it is very much appreciated! :)

OK.... WHY IS THIS HAPPENING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was told to use Windows Live Mail so I imported my accounts from yahoo, hotmail and gmail. When it was uploading messages or something I started hearing adverts despite not having an I.E page open!

I loaded up Task Manager and found 5 "web pages" open. But there weren't any web pages open. I clicked end task on them all (repeatedly) and they won't close down. I removed my email accounts from Windows Live Mail and logged out (won't be touching THAT again).

I ran Avira, full system scan and it picked up a couple of threats in AppData and a .tmp fle whic I moved to quarantine but on reboot and without opening anything the ads started appearing again in my task manager!!

I absolutely cannot believe this has happened IMMEDIATELY after a fresh repair install.

Any ideas of what type of Gremlin I am dealing with now and more importantly how to kill it before it kills my laptop?!!!!

Here's a screengrab;