Problem with Explorer/Internet Explorer restarting Windows

[Nebuchadnezzar]

Hi everyone,

Just over a week ago, seemingly random restarts of my computer started occuring. Upon experimentation, I realised that the problem was caused by Explorer or Internet Explorer. Every so often (I can't find any pattern) when I open Explorer or Internet Explorer, all processes will terminate and the computer will restart. No error messages, confirmation boxes, etc. I've scanned the hard drive with AVG and Ad-aware and that didn't help the problem. I'm not sure if this problem is caused by a missing or corrupt DLL or some such. When scanning with AVG, a virus was found in C:\Windows\System32\content.dll, but the file was cleaned and no further viruses have been found.

I'm using Windows XP Home Edition Version 5.1

Any help in this matter would be much appreciated.

Regards,

Nebuchadnezzar

[Play_The_0dds]

dont know if my story will help you at all. seen this on one machine, it only happens while using msn mail. the person who owns it only has the one account, they have msn dialup service. it happens through ie, outlook express, or msn 8 or 9 browser. it doesnt happen through netscape,opera, or mozilla. if i clean out all the temp files, cookies, internet temp, and the prefetch folder it stops for a while(about a week). the computer in question has windows xp pro, norton 2004 firewall and anti virus, spybot s&d, i have scanned it with other programs that never find anything. i have reinstalled the os on a clean drive, the problem always returns. i tried to pick it apart to find out why but have not found a cause yet. it could be a activeX control from msn, or someone embedding code in the emails the owner gets. all the mail they open is from trusted contacts, but doesnt mean they not sending it knowingly or not.