Fun with puters part three

Wear protection.....

from WinCustomize Forums

A friend complained her XP machine was 'acting up' and brave old me said 'no sweat...I'm a consumate genius and modestly can fix it in a jiffy'.

She brung it over me joint and I rolled up the proverbials and got stuck into it.

Bit of a mess was putting it mildly....it hadn't a firewall or AV running for 'some time'.

I found a dozen or two 'issues' with it ...before pulling out the drive and chucking it in a caddy to load into my own machine...to do a thorough clean....

Norton got about 39 .... Pest patrol a further 26 then Ad Aware got the last...another 20 or so.....about 75 in all, ranging from key-loggers, 4 virii, trojan loaders and trackers...usual crap.

Then it was a simple case of copying all the 'data' to backup, full format, repartition and dump the data back on the 'D'.

All well and good.

Put the drive back into her machine...installed her XP and loaded a freeware ver of AVG.

Of course, that was out of date....needed new signature files, so I got on dial-up to update them....went to make a coffee.

Came back half an hour later....

ERROR on download.......

Something was wrong...so I did a drive scan with the 'old' AVG, and Ad Aware.....

303 hits

Oops, thinks I....perhaps it'd be wise to load that Zone Alarm first, before hooking to the net.

ZA pops up....."Ist.exe" wants access...."bugger off", I say.

A rush of frantic denials and several sweeps of the system later and I'm back to squeaky clean again.

Still....she's happy, now....;)

Moral of the story....get yer protection BEFORE hooking to the pox-ridden net...;)

84,367 views 38 replies
Reply #1 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Moral of the story....get yer protection BEFORE hooking to the pox-ridden net..



Very wise advice...
Reply #2 from WinCustomize Forums Top
You know Jafo - I run weekly ad-aware tests and they usually come up with 20 to 30 critical objects. Mostly IE tracking cookies. Anyhow I haven't had any problems yet. I have heard that I have a hardware firewall or that my ISP blocks stuff. I'm not sure.
Offworld Trading Company
Reply #3 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Stone the flamin' crows, Jafo ...thats a lotta muck and dander on the one rig...

It never ceases to amaze me just how many people still put themselves in harms way ~by not staying protected.

There's so many good "free" apps available to protect your valuable 'puter with nowadays, there should be no excuses as to why somone has no protection.

Perhaps in the case of your friend there's a good reason, but I know of quite a few folks who still surf the net without any form of protection.

Silly, really.
Reply #4 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Oh...forgot to mention how the 'error' manifested itself....

Every minute or two there'd be a message 'Explorer has encounted a problem and needs to close'...then the message would go, along with the Explorer shell [desktop] which would simply reload itself and repeat the message.

The simplistic re-install of XP over the system was a waste of time....hence the reformat, etc....

Reply #5 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I did a scan with Ad-aware for my friend...

...700 something hits.
Reply #6 from WinCustomize Forums Top
One suggestion..MS Anti Spy..http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx
Real Time Protection + deep scanning..
It seems to be a great program so far..
I use Ad-aware also..but rarily now..MS Anti Spy seems to do the trick..
Reply #7 from WinCustomize Forums Top
There are a few other nifty things I do to my friends PC's when im called upon to get them out of a jamb..::laughs:: It's funny but you know..I think there are more people like Jafo's friend than there are like "us"..

Set-up IE prefs to dump cookies/history/temps every time the browser is closed.. In IE this works "Okay" it isnt great and not 100% like it is in Firefox..but it's better than not setting the prefs at all!

Of course I already mentioned MS-Antispy ..the "Real" time protection of the program is awesome..there is another free program that I use in IE that is also "Real-Time" protection..

GoGo Data Toolbar - http://gogodata.com/
It also has many other features, some of which are built into the Firefox browser as a standard, but IE lacks. I dont recommend putting it on a Win98 machine..

Last of all, a file and registry cleaner/repair that was actually posted here in a thread.. It cleans out so much more than what the other programs mentioned do. I actually no longer run "Disk Cleanup" This program, Ccleaner, pretty much wipes out ALL the junk you could ever want to wipe out... More than "Disk Cleanup" does..
You can get it here http://www.ccleaner.com/

Ontop of all that, the standard ZoneAlarm, Nortons, AVG, etc..etc...
LoL..Sad isnt it?? all these utilities just to be able to keep a healthy running machine connected to the internet...::SIGHS::

Ah well, These are just a few of the programs I use against all the junk out there we are bound to run into & collect, im sure there are a ton of other progs, since it is obviously a HUGE problem..

Just remember your protection!,
Dont log-on without it..LoL
Reply #8 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Ja. When I got my Dell, the first thing I did was to format it in reinstall the system my way. However, I found it hard to get the updates from Windows Update because the computer kept giving me a message that the system will shut down in 30 seconds shortly after I connected. Solution was turn on the built-in firewall while I downloaded the updates. (At that time I didn't have a firewall, just a anti-virus program.)

Now I keep some essential programs on my USB flash drive. Ad-Aware, Spybot, Deamon Tools. I should put some freeware antivirus and firewall on it. Quite nice when someone I know need an emergency binary operation.
Reply #9 from Stardock Forums Top
I think far too many people don't realize that if they just spend some time using their machines and understanding them then they wouldn't need to "abuse their friendships" or waste actual money getting it fixed all the time. A few simple things and about 30minutes a week can keep your system up to date which will help it stay clean. Of course then there is the problem of those blasted kids always doing crazy crap, but I guess thats there job, keep parents on their toes and lint in their pockets.
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
Oh and thomassen you were getting hit by one of the numerous RPC virus that are out there. Simple Windows Update will fix that problem but since you gotta be online to do that and you'll get hit again if you are online the best thing to do is just download the stand alone patch, disconnect (pull out ethernet cord if you have to) and then update, then go back online and finish the rest of the updates.
Reply #11 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Latest update...no sooner had I sorted my friend's machine than my Niece's one turns up on the doorstep... she's 14 and her IE is being hijacked to porn sites...and it's a particularly feisty infection....quite likely a full reformat again...

If I ever get my hands on one of the retards who thinks Hijackers are kewl I'll slit his nostrils...

....and feed his gonads to my cat....

Reply #13 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Jafo, the sad part is that most times you will end up doing the same clean-up a few months later. Most people seem to just click on whatever little thing pops up in front of them, or fill their PC full of spyware cause they just have to have that weatherbug and all it's little friends sitting in their systray. (Not saying that will be the case with your friend or nephew. It just seems to be a pattern with a lot of people.)
Reply #14 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I finally got a Notebook computer.

Since they don't sell the cases, keyboards, and monitor's that are standard in compatibility - I bought a Dell (really nice). Decided before hand that I don't want all the prepackaged stuff, so -

Step #1 - Download all board and hardware drivers from Dell (all there!).

Step #2 - Do clean install Windows XP w/SP2 (including reformat NTFS - Raw).

Step #3 - Install all drivers.

Step #4 - Go to Windows Update and install all patches I want.

Step #5 - Install AV and Internet Security software (I like Symantec, so that's the one).

Step #6 - Install all software programs I use, including the all important customization stuff.

Step #7 - Run Ad-Aware and Spybot.

Step #8 - Done - all is well and I love this Notebook (first one ever!).

Simple, practical approach and common sense precautions = a wonderful future with computers.
Reply #15 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Corky - the best way to ruin a new PC is by installing SP2 - you know that right?
Reply #16 from WinCustomize Forums Top
For some reason, I have no issues with SP2 - though it may be because most of my software is from 2002 and 2003 which seems to have had the bugs fixed early on in the life of SP2.

I have indeed seen that SP2 can create some problems at work with older databases, so I agree that care must be used when deploying it in large networks with older hardware and obsolescent programs.

The Dell notebook I purchased is a 2005 model, so they built it after SP2 came out, and it runs the 915 chipset and a PCIe bus with compatible hardware which include drivers written for XP w/SP2. Symantec also managed to write a fix for NIS 2003 so it communicates with the XP firewall and allows peaceful coexistence.

All in all, I really like the Notebook, especially the fact that Dell made this thing easy to upgrade in all aspects of hardware.

Fabulous fun.
Reply #17 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Well my system is not that old and I have many problems after SP2 installs - the biggest one being the whole systems seems to slow to a crawl.

In case your wondering - I have a Nvidia Nforce2 chipset.
Reply #18 from WinCustomize Forums Top
sp2 fine here.

i have never gotten viruses or been hijacked, even through those 2-3 years i didnt have an internet security solution.
Reply #19 from WinCustomize Forums Top
the biggest one being the whole systems seems to slow to a crawl.


Should be easy enough to track down... what have you looked at to diagnose it?

I've got SP2 installed on 4 different machines (1 laptop 3 desktops including a 633MHz PIII, all XP Pro) with no problems at all.

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Reply #20 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Step #4 - Go to Windows Update and install all patches I want.

Step #5 - Install AV and Internet Security software (I like Symantec, so that's the one).

Do that the other way round. Don't even think about connecting without a firewall being installed

Reply #21 from JoeUser Forums Top
As the fix-it guy for friends, family, and a number of coworkers here in the IT department, I've had to go through the fun experience of cleaning up a hopelessly infected PC. I've done it so many times I have a CD with a standard set of apps I load up on a machine before plugging in the network cable. Sadly, within a few weeks, the user disables everything I installed because they think it's slowing them down, so shortly after that I'm back at the machine working on it again.

I've gone so far as to remove admin access on my parents PC, and tell people if their machine shows up at my desk with Norton or ZoneAlarm disabled, or if they aren't reasonably up to date with WindowsUpdate, I won't fix it again. It's a simple matter to keep your PC in working order... Hell, people change the oil in their cars religiously, this isn't much different from that.
Reply #22 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Do that the other way round. Don't even think about connecting without a firewall being installed


In most cases, I would agree.

Because I did not want all the extra "stuff" they include - I requested the installation disc, which is XP with SP2 (all drivers are available from site) - so the XP firewall was automatically turned on after clean install.

Grabbed the critical patches from Windows Update, then installed the NIS 2003.
Reply #23 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Trust the XP firewall do you?
Reply #24 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Should be easy enough to track down... what have you looked at to diagnose it?


At this point it's just easier to uninstall SP2 and not use it.
Reply #25 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Trust the XP firewall do you?


Only enough to go to Windows Update - not for anything else.

I prefer to install all the OS files - including available patches - when doing a clean install. I feel there is a greater chance of things going correctly with the OS if I take care of that first, then install the third party software.

If I had to go to any site other than MS to get OS updates - NIS 2003 would go in first.