Downloads keeps crashing during copying from browser

Hi, please can someone help me?! :)

Sorry about the essay, I'm not brilliant with computers and thought I'd just try and give as much information as possible in case any of it turns out to be relevant.  

My laptop is running Windows 8.1.  I have been trying to delete the contents of my Downloads folder so that I can download some folders from my iCloud Photo Library and check that they are not duplicates (so basically I want nothing else in that folder).

I managed to delete everything in it up until the letter 'I', and then the Downloads folder suddenly crashed, and the Desktop and other open apps all refreshed and then re-opened where I was, but all open Explorer windows closed.  

Since this time, I have been unable to open the Downloads folder.  Sometimes I can see it for a few seconds before it crashes, and I can even click on files within the folder occasionally, but then it just goes again.  In the last two hours, the rest of the windows and applications that are open do not recover after Explorer crashes, and it goes to a blank screen.  From here, there is nothing to press except Ctrl-Alt-Del (Task Manager opens but does not show any open programmes except for itself).  I have therefore had to continuously restart the computer by holding the power button.  

There are no problems with anything else loading once it has restarted, and only once I try and open the Downloads folder does the cycle start again.  

I have tried to scan for corrupt files in it by using the System File Checker tool and following the instructions given by Microsoft.  However, I only have a very basic knowledge of (and am extremely apprehensive about) doing anything that involves messing around with computer systems.  Following the scan, around four dodgy things had been found, but I had no idea what they were or where to find them.  They all say something like this:

000008d9 [SR] Cannot repair member file [l:36{18}]"Amd64\CNBJ2530.DPB" of prncacla.inf, Version = 6.3.9600.17415, pA = PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE_AMD64 (9), Culture neutral, VersionScope = 1 nonSxS, PublicKeyToken = {l:8 b:31bf3856ad364e35}, Type = [l:24{12}]"driverUpdate", TypeName neutral, PublicKey neutral in the store, hash mismatch

I have read countless other forums (some far too techy for me to have a clue what they mean), however one suggested that it might be due to a virus type called malware.  I scanned for anything dodgy on Windows Defender - nothing was found - and then on the advice of a forum, downloaded MalwareBytes.  This was able to identify 7 unwanted files which I then removed.

I have checked that all updates have been completed, and attempted to update drivers (although I have no clue what they are so after a while gave up with this).  I also copied the entire contents of the Downloads folder onto a memory stick.  There are far too many to check that every single file is working but there were no problems with it crashing whilst it was open on the memory stick.  

There are a few other troubleshooting suggestions that I have tried, including copy and pasting the Explorer.exe system file into the System32 folder (apparently this worked for someone else), and seeing if the folder opens in Safe Mode.  It still didn't work; the whole page went blank again and I was unable to do anything but restart by using the power button.

The problem is is that if there is a corrupt file in the Downloads folder, I can't get into the folder for long enough before it crashes to find and delete it.  Having not much idea of what I'm actually doing, if there is some corrupt file, I guess it is also possible that it is not even in the Downloads folder at all, but in some system file, and it just so happens that the Downloads folder is the one that is being affected.  The thing I just can't get my head round is why it worked until I got to 'I' in the alphabet before all of this started.  

Due to trying to sort my photos out (for which I'm seriously OCD about chronology and most are all over the place at present), I did download two programmes called BulkRenameUtility and Advanced Renamer.  I thought these would help to extract photo EXIF information.  Neither of these were what I wanted on opening them so I uninstalled both straight away.  However, I wonder if it's possible that the download could have been the start of all the issues with opening the Downloads folder.

Please please please can someone help me :(

Thanks

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