Virus's, Mates Computer

[Paulp]

Went to manchester today to try and fix a mates computer for him.

Heres the scenario.

Computer started fine, passed POST, and soon was into windows XP.

Once the computer loaded up, there was like a 'flash' program as his desktop background. Saying "this computer is at risk, blah blah" and was hyperlinked to a website (didnt click it as it could do more damage).

Also he has many pop ups and viruses.

First things first, tested if internet worked. Got onto internet fine.

Deleted his cookies, temporary internet files, etc.

Downloaded AVG 7.5, updated, then ran it. Found a couple Trojan's, But couldnt get rid of them ( i know there a bastard to get rid of, i used norton to get rid of them many moons ago on my brothers computer ).

Then i downloaded Spybot, found loads of problems. Fixed them all.

But the desktop background is still the same, like a Flash program, hyperlinked to a website.

I decided, i couldnt remove it so i would do the best i could. Found where the image was stored on his computer (right click and properties), went and found it, deleted it.

But now he has a white background with no hyperlink (so it works for the time being perfectly). Tried changing his background but couldnt. This white background is there because the image no longer exists. But the program is still there. Im hoping im making sense here.

Even though this virus (or viruses) isnt damaging his computer for the time being, i would like to get it off.

I recommended to him we format his hard disk and re-install XP, but he doesnt have the disks.

Any advice?

All the popups have stopped for now.

[djmartin]

you tried to roll back the system?

checked to see if its a program that loads up with the dos

go to start>run>type msconfig then click on start up see what files load up with windows .

[Paulp]

Yeah i checked the start up. Couldnt find it in there.

Checked task manager, couldnt find anything wrong in there. But most viruses are hidden from task manager these days anywayz =\

Didnt try to roll back system, you mean a system restore mate? Damn thats the one thing i forgot. He downloaded quite a few albums last night and didnt want me to lose them so was careful with what i was doing

[djmartin]

yeh system restore same thing

most viruses connect to a file in th register just to be a twat so it may put in its place the old registry file (fingers crossed like) once done that get nortons on it and ad-aware.

then go to microsoft.com and do updates even if hte system says it does not need them sometimes they put updates on and once they have enought files up then ur pc says oh time for a bulk size update .

[RootDogg]

Do the virus checking/removing it safe mode, they should be able to be deleted then as the software to hide them shouldn't have loaded up etc..

Or if its really bad, best to format

[Mochachino]

whats the name of the program?

try going to the control panal the performance and maintenance then adminisritive tools then services, that will show a load of programs that are running in the background which wont show up in the task manager.

see if you can find it there and right click and disable it