hey im new to the forum. my pc has been infected with some sort of virus i believe bcuz i have run 3 antispyware programs such as ad-ware, spybot, pc doctor. my pc moves super slow, freezes, and have like 200 popups even when IE is closed. i tried using the restore cd (emachines) and it went through the process, and i booted up, but 2 mins later it showed signs of being infected. i dont have a Windows XP cd, and i can barely get on the pc. can someone help me reformat or fix my computer? im typing this from my laptop. thank you.
need help reformatting
- Thread starter cvance
- Start date
That's a mess alright. And eMachines notoriously fails to include a 3 1/2' floppy drive you could use to gain access to the drive with an old 98 or ME startup disk for use of the updated fdisk utility. Without your system running normal I imagine you don't have a working cd or dvd burner either? You can install a 3 1/2" drive if you have a 5 1/4" drive bay free depending on model. It is readily advised that you consider getting an installation disk. You will need that if the drive is wiped to install Windows on a fresh clean drive.
knockout34
New Member
put your computer under high powered magnets. lol
How about making some "usefull" posts on this subject.
If your friend has a cd writer onhand a bootable cd could be made for retreiving anything you wish to save off of the drive before wiping it clean with a deletion of the current partition. But that will also wipe the recovery partition eMachines puts on the hard drive. A full installation disk would then be the item needed to see Windows running again. When a drive was wiped on one eMachines desktop here XP went into it's online references to locate the drivers needed for the board. For a iso image for making up a bootable cd for creating as well as wiping NTFS partitions, http://www.bootdisk.com/ntfs.htm
If your friend has a cd writer onhand a bootable cd could be made for retreiving anything you wish to save off of the drive before wiping it clean with a deletion of the current partition. But that will also wipe the recovery partition eMachines puts on the hard drive. A full installation disk would then be the item needed to see Windows running again. When a drive was wiped on one eMachines desktop here XP went into it's online references to locate the drivers needed for the board. For a iso image for making up a bootable cd for creating as well as wiping NTFS partitions, http://www.bootdisk.com/ntfs.htm
Instead of wiping out the HDD, try and clean it up. Grab yourself Ewido, Hijackthis, CCleaner and Killbox. Ad-aware isn't that great, spybot is pretty much useless now and I'm not sure about the last one.
However those programs I mentioned I use on all my service calls and I haven't had one warranty claim yet.
I would have this moved to Computer Security where you can post your logs and what not and we can get it cleaned up. Screwing around with floppies, FDISK and all that other nonsense is completely unnecessary.
If you insist on wiping it clean, use the CD to not recover a windows installation, but do a fresh install. Your recovery CD should allow you to do this.
However those programs I mentioned I use on all my service calls and I haven't had one warranty claim yet.
I would have this moved to Computer Security where you can post your logs and what not and we can get it cleaned up. Screwing around with floppies, FDISK and all that other nonsense is completely unnecessary.
If you insist on wiping it clean, use the CD to not recover a windows installation, but do a fresh install. Your recovery CD should allow you to do this.
The most that could be tried there before wiping the drive is the repair installed method to get Windows running well enough to run scans with various removers. Trojan downloaders which sounds likely here with the description of tons of popups suggest items hidden on the drive. Plus the ability to run Windows is hampered there.
If the repair install can be performed with the recovery disk the other programs and removers could then be tried to clean the drive up. That would also replace any system files altered by malware or viruses. Other files can also be infected that wouldn't show up in any HJ log. That is for use in finding new startups and IE addons. The main problem is that a large number of things like trojans that hide well are most likely at the root of C or hidden in folders. The "install to repair" method is a good tool to see if the present partition can be preserved. All restore points would have to be deleted however to avoid any reinfections. http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm
If you are unable to use the recovery disk to follow the steps here an installation disk would then be needed in order to install an OS onto a new partition.
No, it isn't. A repair install will not solve the problem at all. All it does is overwrite the Windows files. It does not wipe out any programs, which includes virii and spyware. 
Once you repair a Windows installation, it will only be a matter of minutes (if that) before the spyware or virii reinfect the system, especially considering the fact that the original malware is not deleted, nor is the Registry.
There are only two viable options. Either clean it or start from scratch with the recovery CD. If you don't want to lose your data the only thing that makes sense is to clean it, and this can be done. I do it on an almost daily basis.
Once you repair a Windows installation, it will only be a matter of minutes (if that) before the spyware or virii reinfect the system, especially considering the fact that the original malware is not deleted, nor is the Registry.
There are only two viable options. Either clean it or start from scratch with the recovery CD. If you don't want to lose your data the only thing that makes sense is to clean it, and this can be done. I do it on an almost daily basis.
No, it isn't. A repair install will not solve the problem at all. All it does is overwrite the Windows files. It does not wipe out any programs, which includes virii and spyware.
Once you repair a Windows installation, it will only be a matter of minutes (if that) before the spyware or virii reinfect the system, especially considering the fact that the original malware is not deleted, nor is the Registry.
There are only two viable options. Either clean it or start from scratch with the recovery CD. If you don't want to lose your data the only thing that makes sense is to clean it, and this can be done. I do it on an almost daily basis.
If Windows won't even run long enough for anything else a repair install is simply performed to get it running long enough to clean the &%@ off of the drive. The use of the various removers and antivirus utilities will then tell what files remaining are infected and may have to deleted off the drive. Once you know all of the &*#@ is gone including changed files you delete the current for a fresh installation to rule out any infection of the repair.
The easiest and fastest way is to simply "wipe the drive clean". But you have to be able to install Windows back on. You forget that cvance wants information on "reformatting" the drive. That's his choice not yours!
Like I said before... Read the entire post..
The purchase of a full installation disk would solve "more then one" problem here already. Plus the disk would be onhand if needed again on another system when upgrading. You should start reading the entire post.
Oh for pete's sakes.
You can't seem to get it in your head that the restore cd that came with the system was tried and saw no working results. The option to delete the current partition should have been there when the installer was started. But eMachines is a low budget brand with only the recovery option available and not the other tools seen on a regular XP recovery or full install disk.
[quote: cvance]
" tried using the restore cd (emachines) and it went through the process, and i booted up, but 2 mins later it showed signs of being infected. i dont have a Windows XP cd, and i can barely get on the pc. can someone help me reformat or fix my computer? im typing this from my laptop. thank you."
It only takes one look to see that using a normal not eMachines cd will get the drive wiped and see a new primary partition with XP installed on it. In the event the disk itself was bad you can contact tech support for a link in order to download the 4 some cd images for creating the new primary along with the recovery partition. Those carry the drivers and softwares for the model board in that model. But you will still need an operating system to go on.
Recently when a friend's son brought an eMachines system over to either have Windows reinstalled or the hard drive wiped it came new with no recovery disk to start. The kid downloaded two pirated versions of XP. What a mess just trying to get that crap off. An XP recovery disk with SP1 not SP2 on it "could not" wipe the drive. The drive was put into another case to use a 98 startup floppy and fdisk there. The failed 98 install with 2gb of ram finally gave the XP installer something to grab onto and delete the two partitions. The SP1 recovery disk went with the machine. No problems since!
He didn't try to restore the drive back to factory condition. That's the point you missed because you have an obvious problem with reading only half a post, applying your own inference and discarding the rest.
He tried to do a repair install. That doesn't work when you are infected, and if you had paid attention, which you obviously didn't, you would have not only noted that, but noted where I told you already that that wouldn't work.
I already told him that he would have to wipe the drive clean and start over or clean up the infections with the programs that I provided to him.
Puhleeeease.. I beg of you. Read the posts in their ENTIRETY and if you still can not get the meaning, please don't hesitate to ask. Even PM me if you don't get where I'm coming from if you want. But don't go misguiding people because you aren't armed with all the information necessary to make the appropriate diagnosis. You are going to cost them time and money, something that I suspect many of the young folks here don't have. I don't know how you do things, but judging by what you have been telling people I sure wouldn't take my computer to you. You would have me spending a zillion dollars and doing stuff I don't even need. That is why I get so frustrated with so many techs today. They either make things far more complicated than they need to or they don't know what they are doing. Either way they are costing people time and money and giving the trade a bad reputation. It's no small wonder people group us in the same class as mechanics.
He tried to do a repair install. That doesn't work when you are infected, and if you had paid attention, which you obviously didn't, you would have not only noted that, but noted where I told you already that that wouldn't work.
I already told him that he would have to wipe the drive clean and start over or clean up the infections with the programs that I provided to him.
Puhleeeease.. I beg of you. Read the posts in their ENTIRETY and if you still can not get the meaning, please don't hesitate to ask. Even PM me if you don't get where I'm coming from if you want. But don't go misguiding people because you aren't armed with all the information necessary to make the appropriate diagnosis. You are going to cost them time and money, something that I suspect many of the young folks here don't have. I don't know how you do things, but judging by what you have been telling people I sure wouldn't take my computer to you. You would have me spending a zillion dollars and doing stuff I don't even need. That is why I get so frustrated with so many techs today. They either make things far more complicated than they need to or they don't know what they are doing. Either way they are costing people time and money and giving the trade a bad reputation. It's no small wonder people group us in the same class as mechanics.
From the sounds of it you spend TOO much time fixing the problem because you are constantly overanalyzing things, making things more complicated than they need to be and not listening to what people are saying. None of these attributes make for a good technician to be honest with you.
When I am called to a site, I first sit there and listen to everything the client has to say. When I don't get where they are coming from, I ask for clarification or ask them to demonstrate the problem. I analyze the situation, apply my experience to it and then set out to work on the problem. One of my mottos is "time is money". I don't want to cost the client any more money than is necessary, and I'm not going to work for free either. I get the job done right, the first time, and they always call me back when they need something. Repeat business is your friend. Taking three hours to do a one hour job is not exactly the way to get repeat business, and if it does they are suckers and deserve whatever is coming to them. Not only that, but it gives the distinct impression that you have no clue what you are doing.
It doesn't matter to me how you do business, but I don't think it's very kind of you to bring that ethic here and mislead people to places or concepts they don't even need to go. That's the point I'm trying to get at.
When I am called to a site, I first sit there and listen to everything the client has to say. When I don't get where they are coming from, I ask for clarification or ask them to demonstrate the problem. I analyze the situation, apply my experience to it and then set out to work on the problem. One of my mottos is "time is money". I don't want to cost the client any more money than is necessary, and I'm not going to work for free either. I get the job done right, the first time, and they always call me back when they need something. Repeat business is your friend. Taking three hours to do a one hour job is not exactly the way to get repeat business, and if it does they are suckers and deserve whatever is coming to them. Not only that, but it gives the distinct impression that you have no clue what you are doing.
It doesn't matter to me how you do business, but I don't think it's very kind of you to bring that ethic here and mislead people to places or concepts they don't even need to go. That's the point I'm trying to get at.
Funny when I put a new case together for someone XP is on it within 2hrs. of taking everything out of the packaging. I already know where everything is going to go ahead of time. When they goof something up later I seem to be their problem solver. That's part of being a good tech.
Well dude, no offence but even a chimp can do that. hehe. 
From what I have seen of you on here, and I mean you absolutely no disrespect...please understand that, is that your troubleshooting methods are severely flawed. I'm not saying that to be mean or anything. I'm just saying that to see if things can't be turned around. Sometimes it helps getting an outside perspective. I'm sure you've been doing this a long time and it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks so to speak, but so have I. 18 years to be precise. Everything from programming in assembly language to binary to teaching computers in elementary school (grades 4 to 8, including special ed), to networking, sales, service, installations and tech support running my own business.. Workstations, servers, terminals, laptops, printers, networked photocopiers, RIPs and firewalls. Switches, routers, the works. I have an alternative perspective to yours and maybe I might have some insight that you might find useful. I don't know, but I'm hoping.
From what I have seen of you on here, and I mean you absolutely no disrespect...please understand that, is that your troubleshooting methods are severely flawed. I'm not saying that to be mean or anything. I'm just saying that to see if things can't be turned around. Sometimes it helps getting an outside perspective. I'm sure you've been doing this a long time and it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks so to speak, but so have I. 18 years to be precise. Everything from programming in assembly language to binary to teaching computers in elementary school (grades 4 to 8, including special ed), to networking, sales, service, installations and tech support running my own business.. Workstations, servers, terminals, laptops, printers, networked photocopiers, RIPs and firewalls. Switches, routers, the works. I have an alternative perspective to yours and maybe I might have some insight that you might find useful. I don't know, but I'm hoping.