Date Keeps Resetting to 2005!

[tedanderson]

I have an older Sony Vaio Deskop Pentium 4 PC with Windows XP Media Center that was purchased in 2005. It worked fine up until a few months ago when some unauthorized people used it and got it slammed with spyware. So I ran the built-in system restore program which essentially wiped it clean and restored everything back to the original factory setup.

Now I have an interesting problem- Whenever I shut down the PC or restart it, Windows thinks that it's today's date in 2005. At first I thought it was the battery so I changed it, went into the BIOS and reset the date and time to be current. But even after resolving this problem, the year still goes back to 2005. The date stays consistent..as it will say June 23rd right now but I still have to go in and manually reset the year to 2010 in order for all of my date-sensitive applications and websites to work.

Any ideas on how I can solve this problem or what could be causing it?

Thanks!

[zactommo]

My first though would be to flash/update the bios. Sounds like something has got messed up in the bios, so that would be the easiest and most obvious solution.

[KeckCreative]

You found a time machine! Although I'm not sure I'd want to necessarily be stuck in the year 2005.

[katanna]

In the past I have used a program from WorldTimeServer.com to keep my PC's date always synced: http://www.worldtimeserver.com/atomic-clock/

Matthew

[petereit]

Have you run Microsoft Update to bring it up-to-date with services packs/updates?

[tedanderson]

Have you run Microsoft Update to bring it up-to-date with services packs/updates?

Yes. All of the updates are current and I am on SP3.

In the past I have used a program from WorldTimeServer.com to keep my PC's date always synced

Those programs usually expect you to be within 1 to 2 days of the current date but I'll try it.

My first though would be to flash/update the bios. Sounds like something has got messed up in the bios, so that would be the easiest and most obvious solution.

Actually the BIOS is fine. When I go into it at startup, it reads the correct date.

You found a time machine! Although I'm not sure I'd want to necessarily be stuck in the year 2005.

What I wouldn't give to go back to 2005 and start these last 5 years over again!

[frank]

From http://forums.techguy.org/windows-xp...ry-time-3.html, it seems it's a virus. "Thanks for the info in the thread on the date resetting to 2005. I experienced this after lending a laptop to someone whose own laptop was in for repair because of this problem!

The free version of AVG Antivirus identified a trojan horse backdoor agent, which it deleted. Norton did not identify this threat. Everything is now working OK."

[[Director] Joseph B]

have you tried running 30 day trials and seeing if they keep on running?
Maybe a blessing in disguise.

[petereit]

If you're not running a virus scanner, the PC techs at my work recommend Microsoft's Security Essentials. They say it does a great job and doesn't slow your machine to a crawl. But mostly they recommend it because it's free.

[tedanderson]

have you tried running 30 day trials and seeing if they keep on running?

That's an excellent point! The machine came loaded down with all kinds of good stuff. This PC was custom configured by Sony for the previous owner (who happens to be a well known name in the entertainment field) and it is possible that something was done to ensure that they could have unlimited perks.

I will also investigate the possibility of a virus. Many years ago when I was in IT school, I've heard of teachers having to literally throw away hard drives because the virus was so bad that formatting didn't get rid of it.