I’m in big trouble! I got a virus that won’t leave the computer and its destroying the thing! Let me start at the beigining:
OK 2 days ago I got a virus warning with Norton telling me I had a virus so I deleted all four files and guess what, IT CAME BACK! No matter what I did it kept coming back. I looked it up and Norton said it wasn’t a destructive Virus, WRONG! Yesterday it starting acting up a bit but today has been the worst, it messed up all my games, deleted stuff that took hours for me to make, wrecked the internet (1 in 3 times I restert the computer the internet works but only for 5 minutes), and worse of all. THE STUPID VIRUS DISABLED NORTON AND MY SPAM BLOCKER SO I’M GETTING SPAMMED LIKE HECK!!!
Can anybody help? By the way for those on the MSN group with me I won’t be on their anymore[:(]
Ok, there’s a number of potential solutions here - I’m assuming that by now it’s a case of “kill or cure” for this PC?
Firstly, did you make a set of rescue disks when you installed Norton? I think these are intended specifically for this situation. Boot from them and remove the virus. If you can borrow a friends PC, consider emailing Norton (quoting the name of the virus) and ask their advice.
Failing that, try a different virus scanner/killer. Norton is the best I’ve found, but there are others that may be more effective.
Lastly, and this is something of a nuclear option, consider formatting the hard drive and reinstalling from scratch. Make sure you have drivers for all your hardware and all the software keys, etc for your software. This will lose any data, but it will kill the virus - sometimes there’s no other option than to “nuke the sucker”!
Hopefully one of these will be of help - though I should probably point out that I’m no professional IT specialist, just a fairly skilled amateur! Thankfully I’ve never had to deal with anything as severe as your PC’s problem.
Dougal, I had what sounds like the same problem. I did it the easy way and exchanged the computer. I was told it comes from pop ups and jumps to the next file every time you try to zap it. All i can say is good luck.
Hi Dougal,
Have you gone to Norton’s website and had your machine checked out? www.symantec.com, then follow the links. They will “remote scan” your 'puter and tell you what’s wrong and what to do.
Al
Yeah I just went through the same thing about a week ago. So my friend wiped everything out & reinstalled everything. A little time consuming but it sure got the job done.
O. K. don’t jump out the windows(yet)! Symantec’s Norton is the bomb, however, you need to follow the printable instructions, to the letter. Norton will I.D. the virus, and the Symantec website has a list of all the “nastygrams,” along with the downloadable file to scan and cure the problem. All e-mail is scanned and nasties are immediatly quarintined to a file in details in Norton anti-virus, which by the way cannot detect internet website invasions. That is Norton Internet Security business. If you can click on “Send to Symantec” do so. If not, just delete the file out of quarantine. The infected e-mail has had the attachment deleted, so go ahead and delete the email, inbox. It’s not useful without the info anyway. Don’t fear the internet or e-mail, Norton is an effective protection, you just have to put the fear behind you and learn how to use the Symantec logic on how to use the software. Believe me, there are tens of thousands of idiots, with no life, who spend ever waking minute trying to figure out a new program to bother others. However, they are no smarter than anyone else, and the controls they wi***o have are known to the rest of the world. Backup copy is effective, a course in computer IT is also good. Actually, I’ve learned more about Windows-XP through virus infection than you can imagine. Don’t think for a moment that I haven’t aquired a few minor problems from the hundreds of www sites I’ve been to. I stay out of the chats, porn, and keep on a subject thread, like the on we’re on. Digital Elevation Modeling, Trainz, whatever. Enjoy Your WorldWideWeb!ACJ\backyard.
First thing I would do is reinstall your antivirus. DO IT NOW NOW NOW!!!
It sounds like the virus is disabling all the guards on your computer (Which most viruses do nowadays) and your computer is a mess. See if you can fix it with the Antivirus before you decide a more drastic measure (I’m talking about reformatting the hard drive)