Will hard resetting my computer do this?

[justsomeperson]

So you have to read this text to understand the question. This question is actually a lot of questions at once, and as for the answers, I expect each question to be answered, meaning you must read the whole thing, not just the questions.

 

First, here's my problem. I've had my laptop for almost 5 years, I got it in December 2013. This laptop lived through 2 Operating Systems, Windows 8 & 8.1, and Windows 10. The entire time I've owned it, I've never hard reset it. I've only refreshed it once in 2014, but that's it. For the average person, they should hard reset their computer usually once a year; however, as you see in my case, I haven't reset mine at all. Is it true that you should hard reset your computer often for optimal performance? I believe so. Anyway, I know stuff when it comes to computers, I'm not an idiot nor ignorant when it comes to this kind of stuff, so I'm not the type of person to get a virus from a phishing scam or clicking a suspicious link. But I do not know everything. If you were to test me on everything related to computers I would pretty much be completely ignorant. Some people, including experts know things that other people or experts don't. That's why I'm asking for help on this forum. Anyway, I keep everything up to date, I know how viruses can get into people's devices, so me getting a virus or my computer being slow isn't something that really happens to me now. However, this wasn't always the case... I wasn't always smart when it came to using computers and computers in general. In the 2013-2015 era I've had this laptop, I've most certainly clicked on suspicious links, and downloaded all sorts of sketchy stuff. All without a single reset. No really, who knows what kind of stuff I had on this device, or if any of its still leftover somewhere in the device. As a matter of fact, I have gotten viruses before on this computer, there were times where I scanned for viruses and it found something, but it has been quarantined since. I haven't gotten a virus in years due to me no longer being ignorant.

 

 

A few months ago, I told myself I was going to reset it pretty soon, because I ultimately had to, it's been almost 5 years, and it showed some weird behaviors sometimes. But there's a reason I haven't reset it yet, it's because I'm confused if hard resetting is the answer to all my questions. That's where this forum topic comes in. A couple days ago, my computer started acting up, and it's even happening today. I got the BSOD multiple times (and I did today as well), and it said Critical Process Died; however, it didn't say "we are collecting some information and will restart for you", it just said "your PC ran into a problem and we will restart for you", and it did. The problem I am having is everything keeps freezing every once in a while, sometimes to the point where I cannot use my PC at all. One time, everything was working fine EXCEPT explorer.exe. I believe explorer.exe has this intention where if it's not working properly, and you click it, it restarts. I kept clicking on it and it kept restarting over and over each time I clicked it while it wasn't responding, meaning it could not work at all. It would attempt to start but then not fully load everything, and it would freeze entirely in the process of it loading, rendering it useless. Task Manager could not help me with any of this. At this time, everything worked fine, except explorer.exe. This was unusual because when explorer.exe wouldn't work, nothing would work. What I did was I decided to open Malwarebytes Premium (I have the trial), Windows Defender and Command Prompt with sfc /scannow. The sfc /scannow did not finish, and I couldn't get it to open again, command prompt died. A few hours later, task manager also died. The only programs that were even remotely working were Windows Defender and Malwarebytes, and they were scanning for several hours, and they weren't even close to finishing, then the computer blue screened. Critical Process Died once again. After it restarted everything seemed to be working fine again, meaning it's all on chance whether it works or whether it doesn't. Right now, it's technically working but it still starts freezing at times, just not where it renders it useless. While I was typing this, my Google Chrome started to not respond for a while. Why is this all happening? I don't need an answer to that question, although I am curious if anyone actually knows what might be wrong. As I said, I decided to fix this issue by using Malwarebytes and Windows Defender, but that would take a day or two without stop, and you never know when my computer could blue screen. I realized I could fix all of these problems by resetting my computer, because that's what I was going to do anyway even if this problem didn't happen. But I can't reset my computer yet because I need to know the answers to these questions. Which, again, this is where this topic comes in.

 

Here's why I do not want to reset my computer just yet. These are the questions I currently have. I know resetting my computer will delete everything, but will it delete LITERALLY everything? Maybe everything besides the operating system itself, but instead of scanning for viruses and getting nowhere, would resetting the computer remove all viruses and pretty much everything remotely bad? I need to reset it anyway, it's been nearly 5 years, so I don't see why wouldn't this remove all viruses, but I just want to make sure. I've heard about undetectable viruses, I probably have plenty of those, considering all the stuff I downloaded years ago, but will it remove those as well? And what if the unlikely scenario my computer is hacked? Will resetting my computer get rid of any hackers? Will resetting my computer fix all my problems if nothing is caused by a hardware issue? Instead of plugging in some sort of boot drive that checks the hard drive for viruses or whatever, couldn't I just reset it? I have no problem with losing my files, as I said, I was going to reset it whether or not this problem happened. I need detailed answers on these questions. I know there is something wrong with my computer right now and I need to do something quick. By "resetting my computer", I mean going into settings and clicking reset. Not removing the hard drive or doing anything like that, this is a laptop. As for my personal files, I only plan to keep some, I don't have anything really I want to keep, just some stuff, and I plan on backing them up on a USB flash drive, and I don't know if those are infected in anyway at all, especially if my PC is hacked. It's extremely unlikely that it's hacked, but I'm putting all scenarios on the table. Please, I implore someone to answer these questions for me, and answer them well. Please, someone help me with this. I would really appreciate it.

 

Edit: Another thing I forgot to mention, is that now my computer is actually usable and is not freezing as much, hence me able to type this all out, I am know able to do /sfc scannow now in command prompt running it as an administrator. But when it gets to 47%, it stops there for a while and it says, "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation". I really don't know what's going on anymore.

[Onboard87]

4 minutes ago, justsomeperson said:

Here are the questions I want to know and why I do not want to reset my computer just yet. I know resetting my computer will delete everything, but will it delete LITERALLY everything? Maybe everything besides the operating system, but instead of scanning for viruses and getting nowhere, would resetting the computer remove all viruses and pretty much everything remotely bad? I need to reset it anyway, it's been nearly 5 years, so I don't see why wouldn't this remove all viruses, but I just want to make sure. I've heard about undetectable viruses, I probably have plenty of those, considering all the stuff I downloaded years ago, but will it remove those as well? And what if the unlikely scenario my computer is hacked? Will resetting my computer get rid of any hackers? Will resetting my computer fix all my problems if nothing is caused by a hardware issue? I need detailed answers on these questions. I know there is something wrong with my computer right now and I need to do something quick. By "resetting my computer", I mean going into settings and clicking reset. Not removing the hard drive or doing anything like that, this is an f'ing laptop. As for my personal files, I only plan to keep some, I don't have anything really I want to keep, just some stuff, and I plan on backing them up on a USB flash drive, and I don't know if those are infected in anyway at all, especially if my PC is hacked. It's extremely unlikely that it's hacked, but I'm putting all scenarios on the table. Please, I implore someone to answer these questions for me, and answer them well. Please, someone help me with this. I would really appreciate it.

a factory reset will bring it back to the day you bought it or when you upgraded to windows 10 on mine it was broke when i updated to windows 10. as for getting rid of a virus it really comes down to the type, as you stated that explore.exe is not working is bad and means that your operating system is at high risk!!! i wouldn't play around upload all files you want to keep to a cloud (google, onedrive, ect) and get a copy of Windows 10 and completely nuke your system a total clean install.   

[justsomeperson]

7 minutes ago, Onboard87 said:

"as for getting rid of a virus it really comes down to the type"

 

"as you stated that explore.exe is not working is bad and means that your operating system is at high risk!!! i wouldn't play around upload all files you want to keep to a cloud (google, onedrive, ect) and get a copy of Windows 10 and completely nuke your system a total clean install."

By what type of virus I mean all types. Should I reset my computer to remove all types of viruses, or do something else to make sure EVERY single type of virus, or anything bad, is removed?

 

As I said I plan on backing up some of my files to a USB drive, in fact I already did months ago. But what makes you think explorer.exe not working means my OS is at high risk? It works now, but it's not just explorer.exe, when that doesn't work then nothing works. So if resetting my computer won't do the job, will "getting a copy of Windows 10 and completely nuking my system and a total clean install" work? Also, just out of curiosity, did you even read the entire thing? I don't think you seemed to fully understand my problem.

[Onboard87]

1 minute ago, justsomeperson said:

Should I reset my computer to remove all types of viruses, or do something else to make sure EVERY single type of virus, or anything bad, is removed?

Me personally if i feel i have a virus i first turn to a anti-virus but as i use my computer for banking, gaming, and other personal info i 99 percent of the time nuke it and bring it back to stock. and explorer.exe is the Windows Program Manager or Windows Explorer. It manages the Windows Graphical Shell including the Start menu, taskbar, desktop, and File Manager. By removing this process the graphical interface for Windows will disappear. also some virus rewrite this file and have it do things inside of windows.

[justsomeperson]

2 minutes ago, Onboard87 said:

Me personally if i feel i have a virus i first turn to a anti-virus but as i use my computer for banking, gaming, and other personal info i 99 percent of the time nuke it and bring it back to stock. and explorer.exe is the Windows Program Manager or Windows Explorer. It manages the Windows Graphical Shell including the Start menu, taskbar, desktop, and File Manager. By removing this process the graphical interface for Windows will disappear. also some virus rewrite this file and have it do things inside of windows.

What do you mean by "nuke it"? Do you mean resetting it like I talked about or reinstalling Windows entirely or what? When explorer.exe doesn't work, I usually open Task Manager, restart it or end task; however, this time it wouldn't load fully and then wouldn't work at all, and would freeze very often. Same goes for all other programs.

[Onboard87]

1 minute ago, justsomeperson said:

What do you mean by "nuke it"?

reinstall windows 10 but when it asks if you want to keep your files say no have it totally clean your Drive YOU WILL LOSE EVERYTHING THAT IS NOT BACKED UP!!!!

[justsomeperson]

1 minute ago, Onboard87 said:

reinstall windows 10 but when it asks if you want to keep your files say no have it totally clean your Drive YOU WILL LOSE EVERYTHING THAT IS NOT BACKED UP!!!!

I'm okay with losing everything because I already backed up the files I want to keep

[Onboard87]

1 minute ago, justsomeperson said:

I'm okay with losing everything because I already backed up the files I want to keep

after it reinstall's you should be fine. if you do a lot of internet downloading pay for a great anti-virus like bit locker, avg, or kaspersky. all a great way to add a layer of protection.