[Old_Dude]

Okay - it's time to do something. First of all, when I use the "family" computer it's REALLY slow. We can't get DSL so we're still using dial up (very rural area) and my teenagers have been downloading programs, music, videos, et cetera for years. There's so much spyware and there are so many viruses on this machine, I'm surprised it even works at all. When I'm online, the modem status dialog box shows uploads of 5MB when the received is about 500K. What's being sent & who's getting it?

The bigger question - I told my sons they'd have to back up their data and I was going to wipe everything off, repartition & reformat the hard drive, reinstall all the software & they had a coniption fit, telling me it'd be impossible for them to back up all their files & blah, blah, blah.

So - if we renewed our Norton Anti-Virus software (it's been well over a year since it's been used), would that take care of everything, or is there another, similar anti-virus software I should try instead (McAfee?), or should I stick with plan I and wipe everything off & reinstall?

Thanks,

OD

 

[The Kadvang]

Before you do a complete reinstall, reload your anti-virus and download/run spyware and ad-aware. It speeded up my family computer greatly.

 

[Transcend]

At this point, i would say the only way to be certain its clean is to nuke it. Takes about 2 hours to do a full wipe (dont bother repartitioning).

As for file backup, a CD burner does wonders at 3 mins a cd.

Following the reinstall, grab AVG antivirus from Grisoft, it's free and works wonderfully. Then grab adaware and keep it up to date and run weekly scans.

 

[binary visions]

At a certain point (and it sounds like you're at that point), it's just not worth it to try and clean the machine out. It will never be clean. No virus scanner in the world can actually clean every virus, and most will start screaming and run away when you try to clean out a seriously infected computer. They're much better as a protection device.

Just buy a CD burner to back stuff up. It'll take no time at all.

Oh, and load some new virus software, then get all of the virus definition updates for it, THEN start putting the old files back on the computer. Otherwise you'll be back to square one - guaranteed that some of your sons' files will need to be cleaned.

 

[Old_Dude]

Originally posted by binary visions
At a certain point (and it sounds like you're at that point), it's just not worth it to try and clean the machine out. . . . blah, blah, blah . . . back to square one - guaranteed that some of your sons' files will need to be cleaned.

This is exactly what I told him, but I was a little unsure. I think this is the best plan of action - I don't like it, but as is, the computer is nearly unusable. Fortunately, this machine has a CD burner. I'll do the following:

1 - write down my Internet connection info
2 - get everyone to back up their stuff onto CD's
3 - wipe everything off (format the C: drive)
4 - reinstall the original software
5 - renew my subscription to Norton (or get a new subscription to McAfee, or et cetera)
6 - reload the backed up data files
7 - run a/v s/w to help prevent new bad stuff coming in

Question - does Ad-aware & similar software really work, or do they just clog things up? Is there an anti-virus software that will block spy-ware too?

THANKS!

 

[binary visions]

Originally posted by Old_Dude
This is exactly what I told him, but I was a little unsure. I think this is the best plan of action - I don't like it, but as is, the computer is nearly unusable. Fortunately, this machine has a CD burner. I'll do the following:

1 - write down my Internet connection info
2 - get everyone to back up their stuff onto CD's
3 - wipe everything off (format the C: drive)
4 - reinstall the original software
5 - renew my subscription to Norton (or get a new subscription to McAfee, or et cetera)
6 - reload the backed up data files
7 - run a/v s/w to help prevent new bad stuff coming in

Question - does Ad-aware & similar software really work, or do they just clog things up? Is there an anti-virus software that will block spy-ware too?

THANKS!

Sounds like a good plan. Some things to think about backing up that I personally always miss and end up wiping:
-Favorites/Bookmarks
-Mail (Outlook) files
-Internet & mail settings (which you covered)
-Downloaded files that are kept in weird locations (e.g. C:\Program Files\WinMX\downloads)

I don't know about any anti-virus software that will block viruses, but Ad-aware really does work. I wouldn't bother with the pay-version that runs in the background and prevents new spyware from loading, just run it once a week and you should be fine.

 

[ET_SoCal]

Just trying to help here, but shouldn't this be in the:

"Tech Forum (Tenchiros MS virus support forum)"

 

[binary visions]

Originally posted by ET_SoCal
Just trying to help here, but shouldn't this be in the:

"Tech Forum (Tenchiros MS virus support forum)"

Well, the tech forum hardly gets as much traffic as the Lounge.. Like the Mechanics and Tech forums, often questions posted down there get ignored or the people who know the answers don't see them.

 

[pixelninja]

I concure with what everyone here says - time to start clean.

Although, in my opinion, backing up to CD can be a pain in the butt. You say that they've been downloading videos. There's a possibility that they may have some files that are more than 650MB in size. If this is the case, burning to CD is a royal pain. I suggest getting an external firewire hard drive for this. You can pick up a 200 GB drive for less than $150 (plus $10 for a firewire card), and your kids will have absolutely no reason not to backup their information. All they would have to do (and you too), is select all their files at one time, drag onto the external drive and thats it. No trying to re-organize files. No trying to decide what goes onto each CD. No trying to figure out how to backup the 700MB Britney Spears video file. One time drag-n-muthafukin-drop.

 

[DHracer1067]

they had dial up so i wouldnt imagine they downloaded something bigger then 650mb. that would takes days or even weeks to download.

 

[pixelninja]

Originally posted by DHracer1067
they had dial up so i wouldnt imagine they downloaded something bigger then 650mb. that would takes days or even weeks to download.

True, true. Still, you have to admit that backing up to a firewire drive would be much easier than burning multiple CDs. And will make future backups that much easier also.

 

[DHracer1067]

yeah yeah. an extra hardrive and using a firewire would be alot easier. i actually use a smaller one as a regular hardrive in addition to the one on the computer. i keep alot of my movies and big files on it.

but sometimes you have wierd people like me that will download huge files on dial up. when i still had it i downloaded stuff thats like 500mb before.

 

[Transcend]

Don't bother with norton. That program is a BEAST and all it does is hog cycles for no reason.

Go to grisoft.com and get the free edition of the AVG antivirus, one of the best AV apps out there.


And yes adaware works. It detects, destroys and immunizes for just about every nefarious form of spyware/adware etc.

I prefer spybot - search and destroy, however to adaware.