W7Pro:Suddenly RAA doesn't work, & no .MSC will run

[dmartinshorter]

About 10 days ago, I found that my usual account (member of admins group) couldn't do anything that required elevated privs. For instance, I can no longer create new admin users, nor run CMD.EXE as admin, nor run any .MSC snapin (Event Viewer, Disk Management, etc), nor run regedt32. Trying always results in Windows claiming that the program I requested cannot be found, despite showing up in file explorer. It would appear that something is being called in the process of loading and starting a requested program, and that called sub-program is not found, though the error message complains only about the originally requested program.
An example: I dbl-click on "C:\Program Files\Windows NT\Accessories\wordpad.exe", and it starts as expected. If, instead, I right-click that executable, and select "Run As Administrator", I get a popup containing the following text: <begin popup quote>
Windows cannot find 'C:\Program Files\Windows NT\Accessories\wordpad.exe'. Make sure you typed the name correctly, and then try again.<end of popup>

Perhaps AVG's new optimizations intercept somewhere in the loader (maybe when the elevation is requested?), and the intercept handler has disappeared? The error message, which wouldn't know about the hook, would only have the original filename to report...

This means I can't run backups, restores, event viewer, or any other administrative tool which might need elevation to fix things... Interestingly, while troubleshooting, I ran AVG's optimizer tool (PC Tune Up), and uninstalled the tool itself (that was the only way to uninstall ANYTHING), so it elevated just fine. Now, of course, with the tool uninstalled, I cannot uninstall anything else...

Any ideas where to go? This computer has a lot of valuable info, and paid-for programs which I'd like to continue using, so a disk-wipe and cold re-install is out... (and, of course, backups and restores [yes, I had formerly usable backups] don't run any more)

Oh, yes - my user profile is claimed to be 434+GB!!!

 

[COLGeek]

Can you log into any other profiles (assuming they exist)? If so, are they performing properly?

Also, have you scanned this system for malware/viruses lately?

Hate to say it, but you may very well likely have a corrupted profile. Can you successfully login to the admin account via Safer Mode?

 

[dmartinshorter]

Can you log into any other profiles (assuming they exist)? If so, are they performing properly?

Also, have you scanned this system for malware/viruses lately?

Hate to say it, but you may very well likely have a corrupted profile. Can you successfully login to the admin account via Safer Mode?

OK:
1. system has two other profiles, neither administrator-group, and at least one of them works as expected (I can, for instance, run .MSC snapins without problems)
2. the system was routinely scanned by AVG, manually scanned when I started having troubles, and then I removed the disk, attached it to another fresh Windows 7 installation, and scanned it for rootkits and other infections. Couldn't do the rootkit scan using that disk as the boot disk, in the original computer. All scans proved negative. Hmmmm - I wonder if I can get one of the other profiles to do the rootkit scan in the original box....? (will comment on that in a few minutes, after I try it)
3. Entering Safe Mode works only up to the profile selection in GINA. Once I select a profile to log in, the system reboots without ever showing the desktop. Doesn't seem to be able to log in as Administrator, but I'll try some more... it's not something I do often, and no longer familiar...