thank you for your time in-advance!

i have been through countless webpages and forums tryin to find a resolution to this problem. i am posting this on behalf of a friend, who knows nothin about computers :/

friends computer is PC running windows ME, default browser is IE.

theres whats happening: everything was workin fine a few days ago, and all of a sudden icons within browsing windows and instant messaging services had become very distorted, and pictures online no longer show up no matter what browser being used.
there is also a picture that, (even after being deleted and cleared from recycle bin) that still comes up on the spash screen during computers startup.

what we did: updated his video card driver, this corrected the icon problem, and improved overall display. updated IE to version 6, image problem still there. DELETED random picture, but still shows up.

possible but unclear as problematic: in his browser window he has YAHOO toolbar, AOL toolbar, and an "anti popup" program. i have read that certain security programs can interfere with image display, but everything was fine with all of these aspects on a few days ago. i also know that ad-aware is installed as well. can the YAHOO or AOL be conflicting possibly? or ...? ive tried everything i know plus about a dozen of other troubleshooting tips.



thanks again.