Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Thanks
 

My relative brought me their laptop to take a look at as she has been having problems with it.

it's a year old toshiba with vista home premium 64 bit. She said everything was working fine up until about a month ago.

It boots up just fine, but whenever you try to start almost any program you get this message:

The version of this file is not compatible with the version of Windows you’re running. Check your computer’s system information to see whether you need an x86 (32-bit) or x64 (64-bit) version of the program, and then contact the software publisher.

Some programs if you right click on them and run as an administrator they will run but others will not.

It's as if windows won't run programs because they are the wrong bit version.

She has norton 360 on there but it does not work and i can't start it up.

I was able to install the microsoft essentials security program. It will run if you right click on it and run as admin. It found these spyware: win32/remos.hs, win32/fakeScanti and said it cleaned them. I don't know if they were even part of the problem.

I enabled the main admin account and logged on with it but still got the same errors.

There are a lot of windows updates that have not been installed yet, which i will do, i did'nt have time to do it yet. I don't think though that this is the issue either.

Any suggestions on what to try next?

Thanks.

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

Make sure associated services like the compatibility agent (something like that) are enabled.

A friend recently had the same exact issue, turns out his son disabled a bunch of services trying to speed it up.

Use Black Vipers guide if needed, excellent resource.

http://www.blackviper.com/WinVista/servicecfg.htm

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

Thats promising. Is it the Program Compatibility Assistant Service

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

Yep, that's the one. Hope it works for you.

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

I'm going to try that. I'm just hoping i can even get to the services. I couldn't get into other system stuff.

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

You should be able to access them in safe mode too.

Not even system restore works? What model Toshiba is it?

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

It sounds like she has a virus that's attached itself to almost every .exe file on the drive. Take the drive out and virus scan it properly on another pc.

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

I couldn't get to system restore. I don't know the model off hand.

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

I think i'll try a few of the other suggestions and if that doesn't work then i'll just wipe the drive and start over. Luckily there isn't any data on there. it's just used for internet and email.

I was able to get the verizon evdo usb modem working and get online so they were happy with that, but i want to get it all working.

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

Update: After the microsoft live essentials ran and cleaned up the malware and all the windows updates were installed all seems to be well now. Thanks for the suggestions.

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

Glad you got it sorted!

Re: Problem with starting programs on 64 bit vista laptop. See if you can help me. Th
 

haha, i seen that so many times, when these computer 'experts" turn off much of important services and then reformat every month because their computer is not running correctly