.
.
Well...it took me 2 days and several hours, but I finally figured out my issue.
One of my PC's, for no obvious reason would keep spring'in up the help screen whenever I opened an app...or when the system started an app on startup..like the AV or FW.
Then, a file called cthelper.exe would repetively flood the CPU until all physical RAM was used up and the system just finally seized up....
Now, it would only happen on my account (admin) not my wifes (user)...
I was able to work in "safe mode" w/o any symptoms...
Anyway....my first thought is VIRUS/Worm. I've never had one, and keep my system's pretty tight..so I had my doubts.
So I virus checked and spyware checked everything TWICE and never got anything....
I then Uninstalled and reinstalled both the AV and FW....
I really didn't want to re-install XP....but it looked like I was headed that way.
I thought maybe the problem was just in my admin account since it didn't happen in my wife's account. So I created a new admin account for myself and started to move everything from one Doc/Settings folder to another...then the problem started happening with the NEW account....that is, it would get blasted again with help screens and cthelper.exe....
Very mysterious.....
Well, I finally figured out the issue...
Any of you guru's wish to take a stab at the problem before I spill the beans.
Gutter Rat gave your computer worms?
Alright puke it's been acouple days and nobody else is guessing so what was it?
Something really simple?
Google-d
cthelper.exe and came up with
this.
cthelper.exe is a driver with your SoundBlaster that helps third-party programs work with SB. It can be removed from your startup folder, but should always be running. This should not be causing your problem, Squat.
Perhaps you had some sort of weird wav running when your admin account logged in that was causing your SoundBlaster to freak out?
.
.
Nice try Clay...explored that early on...
NO...I have a USB gaming pad...and the drivers for it went corrupt...the result was a consistant flood of F1 keystrokes, which of course is Help.
I uninstalled and reinstalled the drivers for the said pad, and everything is working normal again.