In dire need of help

Hi everyone. Basically, there has been a series of unfortunate events pertaining to my computer. I have resolved some, but there are others that need attention. Here's a list of my problems in approximate order of appearance:
1. My moniter. Basically, it would take about an hour to turn on after I press the power button. I took my moniter to Best Buy and the guy there said that it was dying, so I had to get a new one. I got a new moniter a couple weeks ago and all was well. Resolved
2. A few days after I got my new moninter, my computer just spontaniously restarts itself every so often. I stumbled upon the solution when I dusted the inside of my computer for the first time in two years. Apparently, there was enough dust to block the fan's air from cooling the system, or so I think that was the problem. Resolved
3. After a few more days, all of my Microsoft Office programs stopped functioning. It was working fine one day, but the next day, Word wouldn't open, and Powerpoint and Excel can't open any saved documents. I tried reinstalling the whole thing, but the problem persists. By the way, I do have a legal copy of Microsoft Office 2007. Does anyone know how to fix this? Unresolved
4. At around the same time, my AIM stopped working too. For some reason, it can't connect to the internet or something, but I do have a working internet connection. I tried reinstalling it and turning off my firewall, but to no avail. Help please? Unresolved
5. The most recent problem involves Maplestory, specifically, HackShield. When I try to open Maple, I get a "HackShield: Update Error (805306416) Cannot connect to server" message. I also tried turning off my firewall, but that didn't work. It's wierd because it was working fine the night before. Does anyone know what might be causing this? Unresolved

It's kind of wierd that the last three problems just happened spontaniously. I mean, everything was working fine, and then these problems just come up one by one. To my knowledge, I didn't change anything but my moniter and downloaded some updates. On that note, when I downloaded Internet Explorer 8, I couldn't view any websites. Even Firefox couldn't do anything, and I know my internet was working at the time, so, I had to remove IE8.

If anyone can offer their assistance for these problems, I would greatly appreciate it. I'm not much of a computer expert, so I don't really know how to solve these technical problems. All I can do is fiddle around with stuff and hope for the best.

Here's my recommendation:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using...store.mspx

It's saved my ass plenty of times in the past.

Oh, yes, I have tried system restore. In fact, I restored my computer to the earliest time that was available, and now I can't go any earlier. Unfortunately, my problem persists. Thanks for your input though, Fiel.

For the internet-related problems, thoroughly test your connections at various levels. If you're using a router, type in "192.168.0.0" (the usual private network IP address) and see if you can connect to your router. Test to see if you can connect directly to the modem and use the internet that way. Check to see if you can connect to google.com by typing in "74.125.45.100" using the various setups and whatnot.

Basically, just try everything. Never know what might come up. And if the last test succeeds where everything else fails, then it's a DNS problem, or related to it.

Here's an IP address locator called selfseo.com: 87.230.105.175.

 Spoiler

Actually my first guess was that your computer suffered some kind of hardware failure, but I have nib knowledge with that stuff, so I don't know what's wrong exactly.

My second guess is that you got hit with something really nasty from the internet.

Personally, I'd run HijackThis and check out what's going on in the computer. Tho if you do not know how to read the log, it's best to ask for some help on their forum.

I've been getting that hackshield error too... And I was able to log on earlier today... Let me know if you resolve it yeah? xD