Momopi, viruses and memory hijack in my computer!

momopi · Post by **momopi** » May 23rd, 2011, 9:20 pm

Winston wrote:What does it mean to image your drive? Vista hasn't given me any problems before, until now with this virus attack or whatever. But the viruses seem to have stopped after disabling system restore.
Is deleting system restore points the same thing as deleting system restore files and folders?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_cloning
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_di ... g_software

1. Reformat and build a CLEAN windows install
2. Install only the critical applications and updates you need
3. Create a disk image of your HDD and store it on CDROM, DVDROM, USB memory stick, external HDD, etc.

Whenever you need to reload the OS, just load the disk image. This is what we do in corporate environment. There's only 6-8 hours in a work day and we cannot waste time cleaning viruses. If your computer has a problem, we'd simply re-image your hard disk in under 1 hour and off you go. If that doesn't fix the problem we'd just give the user a replacement workstation and junk the old one (usually out of warranty by then).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Restore
Yes, deleting system restore points is same as deleting system restore backup files. Instead of system restore, try VMWare instead. Use virtual machine sessions for your online work, then exit the VM without saving session changes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VMware

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If you're having trouble getting things done, you shouldn't be wasting time trying to fix PC problems. Get into a habit of wiping your hard drive once a year and only reinstall what you use. Same with old cloths in the closet. Having a 500 GB HDD in your laptop doesn't mean filling your C drive with 450 GBs of crap. The less you install to a boot drive or boot partition, the better.

Post by **Winston** » May 28th, 2011, 2:50 pm

I finally figured out why my memory and hard drive space was depleting. I had only 1 GB of hard drive space left, which was not enough for windows to swap space and virtual memory or paging files. So the system kept slowing down or giving me the blue screen and restarting.

In addition, this caused Windows Error Reporting to keep generating files for some reason, which added up quickly, depleting the rest of the hard drive space even more. Sheesh.

Once I used the disk clean utility in Advanced System Care, it freed up about 6 or 7 GB in my Recycle Bin. I don't know how, but it seems that something in the Recycle Bin was taking up space. Maybe it was the deleted files or windows was misreporting the space available there?

Anyway, after 7 or 8 GB in my hard drive was free, these problems stopped. And my Avira AntiVir took care of the rest of the viruses. I'm not sure if I should turn System Restore back on or not. I guess I don't need it anyway.

I found my Vista startup disk, which I may use to reinstall Vista just in case some system files were corrupted during all this.

The only error messages I get now are those "Windows Hosting Services has stopped" but which are relatively harmless. When I googled it, I found out that it means that there is a conflict somewhere.

Anyway, I don't know why many computer geeks I know recommend getting a new computer or reformatting the hard drive whenever there is a problem. That's like using a bazooka to blow up sheep. Way overkill. It's more logical and makes more sense to try all means to fix a problem first. I'm fortunate to be very resourceful and have been able to fix a ton of problems with my computer. Reformatting and reinstalling windows and all my many programs would take two whole days. No way!

People don't make sense and are not logical. I'll never understand people.

odbo · Post by **odbo** » May 28th, 2011, 4:32 pm

It's because with Windows you should re-install once a year anyways. And once your system has had a serious virus, to avoid further problems it makes sense to re-install. FYI next time you do so, you can make an additional partition for the paging file and later in Windows, allocate it as the swap/virtual memory/paging drive. I think Windows recommends 1.5x bigger than your ram, so if you have 1 gb ram make the swap drive 1.5-2gb, if you have 4gb make it 6-8gb.

Remember you can free-up some space by turning off hibernate mode, or decreasing the allocation for "restore" mode. Also you can delete all that porno.

momopi · Post by **momopi** » May 28th, 2011, 11:52 pm

Winston wrote: Anyway, I don't know why many computer geeks I know recommend getting a new computer or reformatting the hard drive whenever there is a problem. That's like using a bazooka to blow up sheep. Way overkill. It's more logical and makes more sense to try all means to fix a problem first. I'm fortunate to be very resourceful and have been able to fix a ton of problems with my computer. Reformatting and reinstalling windows and all my many programs would take two whole days. No way!
People don't make sense and are not logical. I'll never understand people.

It's not cost effective to "try all means to fix a problem". A technician cost money in salary, benefits, overhead, insurance, etc. It's cheaper to have the technician re-image the drive in 1 hour. While the drive is being re-imaged, you can put the technician to work on other stuff.

Post by **Winston** » July 12th, 2011, 12:19 am

You don't understand though. Running antivirus programs can be done in the background while you're doing other stuff. But reinstalling all applications takes many hours. I know from first hand experience. Don't you have things backwards?

Btw, some virus programs are undetectable and masquerade as legitimate drivers, and shut down your antivirus programs. One of them, called "Vista Security 2011" shut down all my programs and kept showing a fake scanning program that forces you to pay for a fake program. It was horrible. Even worse, when I ran my computer in safe mode, it still ran along with it! I've never seen a virus running in safe mode before! That was a first!

The only way I was finally able to get rid of it was right clicking on Malware Bytes and selecting "Run as Administrator". Otherwise, Malware Bytes would not open. After that, I had to reinstall my virus programs to get them to run again.

Apparently, I had this trojan that hides in drivers and then opens the door for other viruses to get in from the internet. Windows malicious detection tool finally found them after I updated. See here:

http://ezinearticles.com/?Alureon-Remov ... id=5905637
http://www.squidoo.com/google-redirect-virus-removalz

Those viruses are undetectable and hide in your drivers. Really nasty. They also shut down most of your applications so that you can't even do anything about it. It pretty much checkmates you unless you can find a way around it.

They got in my computer when I deactivated my Avira Antivirus Guard for a while. Then suddenly they sneaked in and stopped all my programs and antivirus software from working. Even in safe mode, it still ran! That was a first. I was pretty much checkmated. I was only able to get Avira to work again by redownloading it. But I could not go on the web without cleaning out the "Vista Security 2011" virus first, cause it blocked the web browsers. So I was able to break the checkmate on me by right clicking Malware Bytes and selecting "Run as Administrator". For some reason, that opened it even though the virus had blocked it.

Whew.

I guess the moral is: Never turn off your antivirus scanner guard!

But it was easier than reinstalling everything. Believe me.

Post by **Winston** » July 12th, 2011, 12:27 am

odbo wrote:It's because with Windows you should re-install once a year anyways. And once your system has had a serious virus, to avoid further problems it makes sense to re-install. FYI next time you do so, you can make an additional partition for the paging file and later in Windows, allocate it as the swap/virtual memory/paging drive. I think Windows recommends 1.5x bigger than your ram, so if you have 1 gb ram make the swap drive 1.5-2gb, if you have 4gb make it 6-8gb.

Remember you can free-up some space by turning off hibernate mode, or decreasing the allocation for "restore" mode. Also you can delete all that porno.

Thanks. As to my depleting hard drive space, I am going to get an external hard drive to put my biggest files in. I found some at the mall at 3000p for 500GB, and 6000p for 1TB.

Is that a good deal Momopi?