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I have a HP dv-600 laptop which is installed with Windows XP home edition. It was working fine but from few days whenever I start the laptop, the Windows boots and then the system gives an error saying "Lsass.exe -The application failed to initialize properly 0xc0000005. click on OK to terminate the application".When I click on OK the system restarts. This happens everytime I start the laptop. How can i solve this error? Is this because of some virus? Please help
Lsass.exe (Local Security Authority Subsystem Service) is a system file which is very much needed to run the windows properly. The operating system on your computer must be missing hence you are getting such an error. Try to replace the file from some other computer which is running with same operating system as on your Laptop. Once you replace the file from some other system then your operating system will be able to find it and will not give the error again.
I believe that HP laptop come with a pre-installed data recovery software. As you are missing the Lsass.exe on your laptop, you can use this utility to restore the Windows installation. Restoring the windows installation will restore all the system files which are missing on the system. Hence you will not get any error after windows restore. But before going for windows restore, dont forget to take the back-up of the data because if there is some problem while restoring then you will have to format the hard drive. Therefore to be safe taking back-up is only option.
Booting the laptop in safe mode will help you in diagnosing the problem. While the system is booting, Press F8 to get the options for booting in safe mode. Select Boot in safe mode option. Once the system is up and working, locate and find lsass.exe on the system. Ideally the file should be present at this location "Windows/System32". If you find the file at any other location then delete it. Also try to replace the file in "Windows/System32" with lsass.exe from some other computer. Once the file is replaced and deleted, restart the system and boot in normal mode. Check if the Windows gives the same error or not. Hopefully it will not give any error after restarting.
This is typical issue which is related to a virus attack. Your system is infected with some virus which replaces the original system file with some other file with same name. Try and delete the duplicate lsass.exe files and see if the problem persists. Scan your system with an updated antivirus. Repair or quarantine the infected files but dont delete any infected file as it may lead to complete failure of system. If you dont have an updated antivirus then you can use the facility of online scan provided by different Antivirus solutions providing companies. The online scan is available for free.
Lsass.exe error occurs due to presence of a trojan on the system. You will need a appropriate trojan removal tool to remove this virus. Download the Malwarebytes program which is available for free online. Install the application and then reboot the system in safe mode. When the system is up in safe mode, run the Malwarebytes program. It will search and delete the traces of the trojan which is creating the problem. Once the system is clean, normal boot the system and see if it still gives error. If the problem continues then formatting the hard drive and fresh installing the windows will solve your problem.