TeeJay Posted January 4, 2010 Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 Silly me, clicking download on an unknown file, and within seconds, the usual "Your computer is at risk, download Spyware" pop ups... I was surprized that the AVG didn't catch it as a malicious file, but, no worries, I used Superantispyware (program), and that cleared the trojan, but for some reason, I couldn't get online. IE was as much help as a chocolate tea-pot, but Safari at least gave an error message, which I googled, and found the suggestion to try creating a new user account. Did that, and all seemed to be working fine again, so I set about restoring my preferences, and decided to erase the old user account, and that's when things started going wrong... I'd previously been running Vista OS X, but when I tried to re-install it on the new account, I kept being asked if I wanted to uninstall it, but checking on the install/uninstall frame showed the program as not installed (but saved as a download to the desktop) Might this have had something to do with it? The system is slow as molasses, and most programs are 'not responding'. Attempting to restore the system did nothing (if anything, things got worse) so I was wondering if anyone here might have any suggestions... Any places where I could just download a fresh copy of vista I could download to another PC and then upload to this one? Any other superduper anti-spyware worth running (although every scan says that there are no harmful files on the computer) (or any similar ideas?) I'm going to call it a night, having spent nearly 24 hours on the problem... Thanks in advance, amigos Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shundi Posted January 4, 2010 Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 My advice- Scrub the whole thing and switch to Windows 7... Vista is horrible bloatware... If you don't wanna pay for it, try downloading Win7 Ultimate 32 bit or 64 bit and Windows7Loader to bypass Windows Genuine Advantage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jkay Posted January 4, 2010 Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 The best course of action after realizing you have a nasty virus is NUKE and re-install. Do you *really* want to risk a hidden key logger sending all your CC and bank info to Russian mobsters?? Back up your photos, music, and documents regularly. When you get a virus, format and re-install Win. It's the only way to be sure, short of a full HDD analysis done in a lab. How long does it take to re-install everything? Not very long on a modern computer: Windows Mobo drivers GFX card driver Firefox OpenOffice SpyBot Search & Destroy AVG Free iTunes A handfull of hours and you're good to go. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TeeJay Posted January 4, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 Thanks for the advice, guys I had everything saved on 1TB external hard-drive, so no worries about losing data, I just haven't had much luck getting the restore to work, but I'll have a look at windows7 and see what that can do for the situation Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highoeyazmuhudee Posted January 4, 2010 Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 restore with Windows7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Agrippa Posted January 4, 2010 Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 Undoubtably, get shot of Vista and install Win7. Vista worked fine for me, but Win7 is a whole other, sleeker, faster, nimbler, better beast. On top of that, much improved safety and stability. For the skint, Pirate Bay is you friend. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mickey Padge Posted January 4, 2010 Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 Re-install Win7, search for the latest bie release, everything is built in and works really well After the re-install, before you plug your 1TB drive back in, update to a proper virus program (Kaspersky 2010 works great for me) and do a full scan of the external drive, just in case. You don't want to start from scratch only to re-introduce a virus back onto your clean install..... Cheers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TeeJay Posted January 4, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 4, 2010 Thanks for the advice, amigos, I haven't had time to search for Win7 today, but will get round to it in time Every virus check I have run since eliminating the trojan has reported that the system is clean, the only problem, is the actual system response time is really lagging. Does anyone have a product key for Win7? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fakemaster Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 Would a Vista computer have the resources to run 7? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jkay Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 Would a Vista computer have the resources to run 7? Win 7 uses less power than Vista. The idea is that MS listened to the users and admitted that Vista is bloated and wasteful. Games run as fast as Win XP under 7 .. not sluggish like Vista. Still, it's no lightweight. 2GB RAM is a great idea and 4G if you run games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Agrippa Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 More resources are always better, but I have a friend who is running Win7 quite comfortably on a netbook. He's tweaked it a bit of course, but Win7 is certainly A LOT snappier than Vista when installed on identical hardware. If you read the official blurbs, resource usage and management are also mentioned as two of the areas of improvement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jkay Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 I'd think that running Windows 7 on a Netbook with insufficient RAM would wear out the SSHD rather quickly, since it's being used way too much for Swap. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Eleven Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 (edited) Try cleaning your PC with Hitman Pro and Malwarebytes Anti-Malware. Then, when your PC is finally clean, install Sandboxie and always browse under Sandboxie. Edited January 5, 2010 by Mark Eleven Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mickey Padge Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 The bie releases of Win7 do not need a key http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5130799/Microsoft.Windows.7.ULTIMATE.x86.OEM.DVD-BIE_-_by_Mick Installed that release on about 5 work mates PC/laptops, and tested first on my desktop and it works perfectly, no need for keys or cracks, as the loader is already pre-installed. Just leave the part where the install asks for a key blank, and untick the activate online box, easy as pie..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highoeyazmuhudee Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 I havnt reinstalled Windows in years since i discovered "deepfreeze" you basically sandbox your system meaning anything you run or download isnt a permanent problem once you restart your PC, it goes back to factory fresh. You partition your drive and keep one partition "thawed" for holding data like personal important stuff and downloads you wish to keep. It's good practice regardless, to keep the system drive and everything else on a seperate partition, makes restoring a bad system a breeze. You can also restart in a universal thawed mode to do updates and maintenance to the frozen drive. I no longer have an anti virus or spyware software installed, freeing up system resources and my boot time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TeeJay Posted January 5, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 The bie releases of Win7 do not need a key http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5130799/Microsoft.Windows.7.ULTIMATE.x86.OEM.DVD-BIE_-_by_Mick Installed that release on about 5 work mates PC/laptops, and tested first on my desktop and it works perfectly, no need for keys or cracks, as the loader is already pre-installed. Just leave the part where the install asks for a key blank, and untick the activate online box, easy as pie..... Thanks, bro, downloading now I havnt reinstalled Windows in years since i discovered "deepfreeze" you basically sandbox your system meaning anything you run or download isnt a permanent problem once you restart your PC, it goes back to factory fresh. You partition your drive and keep one partition "thawed" for holding data like personal important stuff and downloads you wish to keep. It's good practice regardless, to keep the system drive and everything else on a seperate partition, makes restoring a bad system a breeze. You can also restart in a universal thawed mode to do updates and maintenance to the frozen drive. I no longer have an anti virus or spyware software installed, freeing up system resources and my boot time. That sounds interesting, I'll give it a look Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spooky driver Posted January 5, 2010 Report Share Posted January 5, 2010 Undoubtably, get shot of Vista and install Win7. Vista worked fine for me, but Win7 is a whole other, sleeker, faster, nimbler, better beast. On top of that, much improved safety and stability. For the skint, Pirate Bay is you friend. wow i have a new friend Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TeeJay Posted January 6, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 6, 2010 The bie releases of Win7 do not need a key http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5130799/Microsoft.Windows.7.ULTIMATE.x86.OEM.DVD-BIE_-_by_Mick Installed that release on about 5 work mates PC/laptops, and tested first on my desktop and it works perfectly, no need for keys or cracks, as the loader is already pre-installed. Just leave the part where the install asks for a key blank, and untick the activate online box, easy as pie..... The download's finished, but when I try to open the file, it just tries to burn it to a CD... Is that a necessary step? I've never actually tried installing a new OS on a computer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highoeyazmuhudee Posted January 6, 2010 Report Share Posted January 6, 2010 if you need to boot from the DVD burn the image file to disc using nero and restart the computer. make sure the bios is set to boot from the disc device. You could also trying extracting the image to a usb key and booting from there if your bios supports that. but it's best to burnt he dvd and be done with it, that way you also have a hard backup of the OS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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