What the hell did I do to my computer?!? (RESOLVED!)

I certainly didn't do that by accident.:p
 
Start menu > control panel > folder options > Select "Show hidden files, folders and drives" then try and look in your users folder.
 
Roger999 said:
Start menu > control panel > folder options > Select "Show hidden files, folders and drives" then try and look in your users folder.
Click to expand...

That path doesn't exist in Windows 7...at least that I can see.
 
Peanut! Right click on your desktop, select View, then select Show Desktop Icons. Whatcha got?
 
Task Manager -> Applications Tab -> New Task Button -> Type in explorer.exe then <Enter>?
 
Two options for you - boot into safe mode and see if the files are there. 2nd and more desperate option, pull your drive and using a USB to Sata cable, hook it up as a slave drive to another PC, then look for your files. Actually first thing I would do before either of these is create another new Admin account, or at least try to - you'll find out real quick if you are indeed currently logged in as an Admin.
 
I'd recommend that you backup all your files through the "backdoor" first, in case it's a virus. Then try rebooting. If the problem persists, post your hijackthis log here and maybe we can see if anything looks funny. Also, what revdevil said.
 
Planterz said:
That path doesn't exist in Windows 7...at least that I can see.
Click to expand...
I had that problem previously, I had a virus that was located in my AppData folder which is only visible if you select "show hidden folders" and the virus added line to my registry that removed the show folder options.

Press start, and launch regedit, then go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer and delete the line that says "No folder options" with value set to 1.

Then restart and go try what I suggested before. Before all this you should try download "MalwareBytes' anti-malware" and use it to scan your computer, for me it found a lot of viruses that Mcafee had missed.
 
Finally, success!

All this talk about something being "hidden" got me to thinking. Somehow I set my entire user profile to "Hidden". That's how I could be logged in as the Admin, yet couldn't see anything in the User profile. And I couldn't find the setting for the folder because the folder was hidden.:rolleyes: I eventually got there by searching for the same file I originally was searching for, and working backwards up the folder trees from there.

I think I now know what originally happened:

For some reason uTorrent had placed some stuff into a folder I couldn't find. It was in a folder I couldn't find unless I did a search for a file I knew was in it.

C: -> Users -> Admin -> AppData -> Roaming -> uTorrent

That's the location, but trying to get there in that order wouldn't display the "Roaming" folder (only when I searched for a file in that folder, then went backwards).

I think the "Hidden" option in the Properties must have had a greyed checkmark in the box, which would mean that some files were hidden, some weren't. I must have checked the box, expecting all of the files to be not "Hidden", but instead I made them all "Hidden". And I must have done it on the "Admin" folder, and not one of the narrower folders.

Did I mention that I was 5/6ths the way through a 6-pack of Fat Tire when all this happened?:o Too many windows and folders open, and I clicked on the wrong one.

Everything's back now, just the way it used to be.

Good god what a PITA.:mad:



Thanks for your help, everybody.:thumbup:
 
Roger999 said:
I had that problem previously, I had a virus that was located in my AppData folder which is only visible if you select "show hidden folders" and the virus added line to my registry that removed the show folder options.
Click to expand...

Cross-posted while I was typing the above. This seems to be almost exactly what happened to me, the only difference that for me it wasn't a virus, it was my own dumb, drunk ass.
 
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