I have been having trouble with my computer for two or three weeks, and wanted to post this to see if anyone can help.

I have a Dell computer with Windows 95. Recently we got the W32.Badtrans.b@mm virus. We've removed it, and we deleted a few files which were infected.

Afterwards, we noticed some problems. Number 1 is something that recently started happening from time to time and is completely unexpected when it happens. Numbers 2-3 are problems that existed, but went away. Numbers 4-6 are problems that still exist, and are certain to happen if I open the program in question. We think these six may all be related to some larger problem (possibly related to that virus I mentioned)

1. When I went to shut it down the other night, I chose "Start" "Shut down" "Shut down" like I always do. However, this time, I got one of these "This application has performed an illegal operation" error messages. I chose the "close the program" option. The program mentioned in the message was called "explorer". After I closed it, I got a similar message, but the program mentioned was not "explorer". (It's a different program each time.) I closed that, and it brought me back to the desktop, where the "HP Scanjet Button Manager" (I had never heard of the Button Manager despite having the same HP scanner for years) came up. Trying to shut down again with the same method gave me no trouble. (This has happened three times so far since the problems started, and it had never happened before.)

2. My mother says when she had Microsoft Word open (the 1997 version) she went to close it, but as she did so, the screen started flashing. It has worked normally since.

3. When AOL (version 5.0) was opened the other day, we had mail. The program did its usual "Welcome! You've got mail!" message. However, that particular time, it said, "You've got mail mail mail mail mail mail...." We've opened it and had mail since then, but that incident hasn't happened again.

4. We have the Microsoft Best of Entertainment Pack, which has a card game called Golf. One thing you have to do is click on a face-down deck of cards. (I will describe the game further if requested.) When the problem developed, one symptom was that, if the deck of cards was clicked on, an error message came up saying "An error has occured in the Golf program". It's one of those old error messages that has a white background and has "Close" and "Ignore" buttons. Regardless of which I choose, the next thing that comes up is the standard "illegal operation" error message. It continues to behave like this. Another thing is that, if you select another window with the taskbar, and then use the taskbar to select the Golf window again, the error message comes up. (Sometimes, the 3 of clubs appears in the upper right corner - and is the only card on the screen - when that happens, but not always.)

5. I have a card game called Freecell on my computer. These days, when I open it, it looks the way it's supposed to look... Until I choose "New game" in which case, the cards appear strangely. They are shrunk horizontally, stretched vertically, and displaced a few inches downward from how they are supposed to be. The slots at the top are also shrunk horizontally. Also, title bars do not contain titles, and dialog boxes do not contain text. (All they have is the "Yes" and "No" buttons and the thing that looks like a question mark in a text balloon.) The "About" box looked the way it should have looked, except the Windows logo, not the Freecell logo, was in the corner, and the word "Freecell" did not appear anywhere. Also, if you choose another program *before* choosing "New Game" and then return to the Freecell program, something really weird appears... it's hard to describe, but all the clubs (yes, I can tell they're clubs) are in the slots at the top and the other cards are at the bottom.

6. When I open Character Map, the program appears normal at first, but when I try to select a character, it doesn't work. If I go to another program and then return to Character Map, some or all of the characters disappear from the screen. When I close it, I get the "Illegal operation" error message.

We have reinstalled Golf and are still having that problem. The files we deleted because of the virus, if it helps, were both in C:/windows/system. They were kern32.exe and kernel32.exe. (We're not sure if these deletions had anything to do with the problem.) I provide a link regarding the virus. No other virus has been found on our system (by either McAfee or the virus scanner manufactured by Symantec)

Lucky "Computers rule, except when they have bugs or viruses" Wizard