[jwramp]

i recently went over to someone's house to fix their computer (because of some viruses)....it had msblast....i removed it......
but there is still this problem that when i open windows (like to install something) after a few seconds it will close (if it's been more than 10, it will stay open)....i have no idea of what's causing this or what it's called so i can search for answers...

any ideas?

 

[blueice]

why not install a good antivirus program.

Also check for the spywares using adaware and spybot. both of them are free.

 

[jwramp]

yeah...installed ad-aware and found nothing......the anti-virus program closes before i can do anything usefull.....

 

[wallijonn]

can you boot from the anti-virus CD rom?

try online virus checkers.

 

[Chinchy]

Easy answer: it's still virused.

I and a friend tried to fix someone else's computer. We thought it was MSBlast too, but it turned out it wasn't. Even after removing it, it wouldn't let us keep Regedit open, or do other stuff. It automatically closed Regedit, virus programs, etc. Go ahead and try it. If you launch regedit, and it automatically closes, it's probably a hidden virus.

Ad-aware won't help you. It looks for spamware, not virii. Try looking for a program called RegCleaner. We used it to check the contents of the registry and found an odd entry in the startup key (I think it's under HKLM\software\microsoft\windows\CurrentVersion\Run ) that was a bunch of ASCII characters. Even after deleting it, it would reappear.

Needless to say that after 2 days, we gave up and formatted that sucker, and did a clean install.

Good luck!

 

[itza2mer]

Install a good anti-virus program on your computer. Pull your friend's harddrive, and take it over to your house. Slave his drive to your drive, so that the OS on your drive boots up. Run the anti-virus program on your drive to clean up his drive.

Since I'm using Road Runner, I downloaded eTrust Anti-Virus, which is free for a year to RR customers. Next to AVP, it's the best Anti-Virus software I've used.

Oh yeah, get Spy Sweeper. It's better than Ad Aware.

 

[MichaelFranks]

It is generally a good idea to reformat windows every so often. This will force you to keep important things backed up, and allow a vulnerable, crappy OS a second chance at performing a bit better. After you do a fresh install, go straight to microsoft's updates, then install a decent antivirus program.

 

[MD1032]

You have a virus problem it seems. I'm sure there's an easy way to get around it. Check out TechIMO.com and ask the people there. That's where I go to ask my questions.

 

[jwramp]

yeah....i went over there and did a reformat....everything worked fine except for the drivers.....tryed everything and they still didn't work, but i called up Dell (in india, of course) and got that straightened out.....i still have a bit of a problem, though (it's little)....whenever i reboot, a selection screen pops up and asks if i want to boot xp home edition, or xp home edition....the same thing!....so now i have to wait 30 seconds or press enter every time i start it up.....do you know of any way i could bypass that and set it as a default or something?

 

[MichaelFranks]

Did you not reformat the drive? If you did it shouldn't be seeing two different os's. Search google for the bootloader modification, shouldn't be too hard.

 

[Duncan]

On XP, there is a way to clear that with msconfig...

Go into MSConfig, and then to the Boot.ini tab, there it will show you your two XP Home Edition entries... click on the 'check all boot paths' button, if that comes back saying all OS settings are okay, then you haven't formatted correctly... and that will be your problem, else if it tells you that there is an invalid link, and asks you if you want to remove it... do so, and hey presto... the multi-boot startup is gone

 

[Pierre Lambion]

If I understand right, windows reboots 'spontaneously' after a few seconds of uptime? Probably with some warning.

If so, it's probably the effect of an attack on its RPC stack. It is a long known weakness but it's easy to fix, either through service packs or through a firewall.

The quick fix is to configure the action of windows on the RPC overflow.

I have a French version, so the exact names can vary ...
Control Panel > Admin Tools > Computer Mgmt > Services and right click on Remote Call procedure (RPC); select the Recovery tab and set no action.

P.

 

[wallijonn]

for W2K it would be control-panel -> system -> Advanced -> Startup & Recovery, uncheck one of the two boot options. also set the time to default.

 

[jwramp]

Pierre Lambion, i already got that fixed....we're working on another problem....thanks anyways, though