PCTech Forums

My PC is seriously angering me now, I've had a number of problems for weeks:

- I had a blaster worm which restarted my comp whenever I connected to the internet, I also had many other viruses and my computer was acting very strange. To get rid of these I restored my whole computer back to factory settings i.e lose all installed data and programs.

- After this it worked fine until I got the blaster virus again, I caught it in its early stages and removed it.

- I then tried to install Norton AntiVirus 2004. I installed it all correctly but it wouldn't load up, it just loaded a bit and then did nothing. Along with this when I ran programs like Windows Task Manager they would flash up for half a second and then close by itself.

- I did a total system restore again, then installed Norton AntiVirus straight afater it had finished, it worked fine and everything was great.....until all of a sudden it decided to stop loading up and Task Manager started closing almost instantly aswell!

It has totally baffled me, why won't Norton AntiVirus or Task Manager work? Surely it can't be a virus because even shortly after system restore it did.

Any much needed help would be very welcome guys

unfortunately without proper windows updates, most anti-virus programs cannot prevent all viruses. You simply must run windowsupdate in order to keep your system secure. If you don't apply the security patches microsoft offers, a hacker, or a well written virus, can take over your machine, disable your antivirus software then install whatever it wants to.

you may be able to rid yourself of the virus with Mcafee Stinger. You'll probably need to download it from a working computer that isn't re-starting (it's small enough to fit on a floppy), then boot the infected PC into safe mode, and run stinger.

you'll probably also need to un-install and re-install norton antivirus, and RUN WINDOWSUPDATE!!!! You can also check-up on norton antivirus to make sure it's getting everything with Housecall Antivirus (which is a free, web based virus scanner that works extremely well)

you can find links to most of the above mentioned programs here

ya man....I think its pretty safe by now to install SP1 for windows XP. I'm pretty sure that includes the patch to get prevent the blaster virus from getting in...but you already have it. First thing you need to do is remove it!

This is a link to symantec's blaster removal tool...follow these instructions.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/av ... .tool.html

somewhere in the instructions it includes you to go update windows...if you don't know how, just go to microsoft.com, there's a tab there that says "windows update" use that.

if you suspect virus trouble, i suggest you run all these :

STINGER http://www.chip.de/downloads/c_downloads_11105456.html
Spybot : http://www.download.com/3000-8022-10122137.html
adaware : http://www.lavasoftusa.com/
http://housecall.trendmicro.com/ online scan for trojans
http://www.ravantivirus.com/scan/

You can always d/l and post a logfile. Our moderators can take a look at it and see if there is anything else giving you trouble.


(Always create a Folder for HiJackThis anywhere but your Temp/Temporary Internet Folders. A good place to make a folder would be in My Documents,
as this is where it will save the backup files needed if there's a problem.)