Thanks very much for the additional follow-up info,
TZ!
I downloaded that program shown in
option #3 you referred to, and will run it either later this evening or first thing tomorrow morning.
(It's too close right now to when my regularly scheduled AV & anti-malware scans will run & I normally stay off-line until after they've finished).
On the
system imaging recommendation......ironically, I just happened to have purchased the latest stable release of
Macrium Reflect a few months ago, and make
full system backup images at least once a week. I'll also do a full backup any time there has been a significant update/upgrade/settings change(s) to any of the applications on my computer. I have
MR set to retain
10 full backups, and to perform the '
purge'
after the image backup has completed.
I do the backups
manually, rather than on a preset schedule...mainly because I tend to forget things.
I'd likely forget to connect the 1 TB external Western Digital
My Passport HDD that I use to store the full backups on, when it was time to do the image backup.
(Doing the full system images is easiest for me, as those incremental and differential image backups would necessitate having to leave the external HD connected all the time).
(I seem to recall seeing something in the sub-forums here, where it's recommended to not leave external drives always connected to the computer).
Also, I did create that '
Rescue/boot application' on a USB flash drive in case malware prevents this computer from being able to boot-up. Identical backups of all my
personal files/folders, etc on the internal HDD are stored on 2 separate USB flash drives.
Much obliged again for all your help! 
icnic:
