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xp keeps restarting due to virus with picture of skeleton skull at boot up.
Hi,
my dell inspiron 5100 laptop with xp pro keeps rebooting with a message "warning this operating system was developed by professionals and/or total idiots. In either case, microsoft or you and or any of your buddies should not expect this software to run without crashing... and has picture of skeleton skull. It comes up when you select xp boot screen in the o/s screen. Everytime i try to run kasperksy antivirus on it the pc turns off. I can't even load another operating system or format the disk coz it turns off each time. Any advice? Thanks.
my dell inspiron 5100 laptop with xp pro keeps rebooting with a message "warning this operating system was developed by professionals and/or total idiots. In either case, microsoft or you and or any of your buddies should not expect this software to run without crashing... and has picture of skeleton skull. It comes up when you select xp boot screen in the o/s screen. Everytime i try to run kasperksy antivirus on it the pc turns off. I can't even load another operating system or format the disk coz it turns off each time. Any advice? Thanks.
ASKER
ok will try that. i can boot in safe mode and am running kaspersky now and will see if it completes. I turned off the advanced setting which tells xp to auto restart in the event of a system failure so that might help. I had left the laptop on overnight without logging into windows and it stayed on so seems to only turn off when inside of windows already and system fails which was set to do so before but i turned off as i mentioned.
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ASKER
tried kaspersky including in safe mode but everytime it gets to around 20% it shut laptop off. However if i just leave it on system will stay on for few hours so is it possible that drive has bad sectors? Will try ewido as well to make sure it's just not kaspersky. Thanks.
The drive could have bad sectors, but the fact that you are getting that message with the skeleton picture clearly shows some virus infection. Try Ewido, and post the HJT log also if possible.
The hijackthis log can telll us the exact malware that is present in your system, we can then tell you the exact tool to fix it.
Please download HijackThis 1.99.1
http://www.cyberanswers.org/forum/uploads/HijackThis1991.exe
Open Hijackthis, click "Do a system scan and save a logfile" don't fix anything.
Notepad will also open, copy its contents and paste it to either these sites:
http://www.rafb.net/paste/
then at the bottom left corner click "paste"
Copy the address/url and post it here:
Or paste the log at --> http://www.hijackthis.de/
and click "Analyse", click "Save". Post the link to the saved list here.
Please download HijackThis 1.99.1
http://www.cyberanswers.org/forum/uploads/HijackThis1991.exe
Open Hijackthis, click "Do a system scan and save a logfile" don't fix anything.
Notepad will also open, copy its contents and paste it to either these sites:
http://www.rafb.net/paste/
then at the bottom left corner click "paste"
Copy the address/url and post it here:
Or paste the log at --> http://www.hijackthis.de/
and click "Analyse", click "Save". Post the link to the saved list here.
If you can get into Safe Mode w/networking, go here and run online scans (all), allow them to delete whatever they find.
http://housecall.trendmicro.com/
http://housecall.trendmicro.com/
ASKER
Hi, did the save analysis for hijack this but how do you post the link to the site where i saved it? thanks
Here are instructions (repeated from my first post above):
Copy-and-paste the resulting log back to that same web site (not here)
Click on "Analyze", and then click on "Save Analysis" at the bottom of the next page.
Finally post a link here to the saved analyzed page.
To post the link, highlight the address in the address bar, right-click, select "Copy", then right-click in this window and select "Paste"
It should look something like this:
http://www.hijackthis.de/logfiles/4b347cf60ad630d343c3d26230b4bf6a.html
Copy-and-paste the resulting log back to that same web site (not here)
Click on "Analyze", and then click on "Save Analysis" at the bottom of the next page.
Finally post a link here to the saved analyzed page.
To post the link, highlight the address in the address bar, right-click, select "Copy", then right-click in this window and select "Paste"
It should look something like this:
http://www.hijackthis.de/logfiles/4b347cf60ad630d343c3d26230b4bf6a.html
ASKER
Hi,
thanks for the extra instructions. here is link to my logfile from hijack this.
http://www.hijackthis.de/logfiles/ca7b9d4ebe9cea6a8afed9d9279fa441.html. The only thing that concerns me is that as i mentioned before, when i try and format drive so i can reinstall xp fresh, it still turns off laptop so i thought that virus shouldn't execute when you are not in windows and are simply trying to install operating system again.
thanks for the extra instructions. here is link to my logfile from hijack this.
http://www.hijackthis.de/logfiles/ca7b9d4ebe9cea6a8afed9d9279fa441.html. The only thing that concerns me is that as i mentioned before, when i try and format drive so i can reinstall xp fresh, it still turns off laptop so i thought that virus shouldn't execute when you are not in windows and are simply trying to install operating system again.
Are you trying to format and install a fresh copy of XP?
If so, make sure you've got good backups of any essential files (documents, pictures, email etc.) that you can't afford to lose.
To do a format and install from CD, boot directly from the XP CD. When it shows the existing partitions, you can delete the existing one (caution: all files will be lost) and create a new partition back in that same space, then choose the defaults pretty much to install XP.
You may find this link helpful:
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html
If you'd rather just clean the existing system, I think that is possible. The HJT log shows various malware that can be removed. Post back if that is what you'd rather do.
If so, make sure you've got good backups of any essential files (documents, pictures, email etc.) that you can't afford to lose.
To do a format and install from CD, boot directly from the XP CD. When it shows the existing partitions, you can delete the existing one (caution: all files will be lost) and create a new partition back in that same space, then choose the defaults pretty much to install XP.
You may find this link helpful:
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html
If you'd rather just clean the existing system, I think that is possible. The HJT log shows various malware that can be removed. Post back if that is what you'd rather do.
ASKER
Hi,
yes i'd rather try and fix the existing malware since reformatting i've done many times and it's too easy so would like the challenge of actually getting rid of some of these guys. Could you tell me how to proceed, thanks.
yes i'd rather try and fix the existing malware since reformatting i've done many times and it's too easy so would like the challenge of actually getting rid of some of these guys. Could you tell me how to proceed, thanks.
SOLUTION
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ASKER
Hi,
sorry took a while to respond. i did all the steps and tried to rescan laptop using kaspersky but still turns off around 20%. I then decided to reinstall xp so i reformatted drive but during format it also turned off after 3 attempts. Would a bad sector on drive cause this once it reads that part? Any suggestions? At this point i just wanna start fresh but can't even format drive. I wanna use diskette to start up win98 startup disk but laptop doesn't have floppy drive. Don't mind getting one but fact that it turns off during a format concerns me. Thanks.
sorry took a while to respond. i did all the steps and tried to rescan laptop using kaspersky but still turns off around 20%. I then decided to reinstall xp so i reformatted drive but during format it also turned off after 3 attempts. Would a bad sector on drive cause this once it reads that part? Any suggestions? At this point i just wanna start fresh but can't even format drive. I wanna use diskette to start up win98 startup disk but laptop doesn't have floppy drive. Don't mind getting one but fact that it turns off during a format concerns me. Thanks.
SOLUTION
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Sorry forgot to follow up earlier.
If you don't have a floopy you can download the ubcd bootable CD (using another computer) then boot from that and run various diagnostics:
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
If you don't have a floopy you can download the ubcd bootable CD (using another computer) then boot from that and run various diagnostics:
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
ASKER
Hi,
was able to download ultimate boot cd but when i tried loading fdisk or other utilities on it they all fail and also system halts or turns off laptop again with a reference that boot sector is corrupted or something to that extent. As i mentioned i can't even do a format and the message with a skull on bootup is shown when you select the other choice in boot menu so really suspect that this is a boot sector virus. With your knowledge of ultimate boot disk utilities, is there any choice i have that can clean boot sector virus without using floppy? Thanks!
was able to download ultimate boot cd but when i tried loading fdisk or other utilities on it they all fail and also system halts or turns off laptop again with a reference that boot sector is corrupted or something to that extent. As i mentioned i can't even do a format and the message with a skull on bootup is shown when you select the other choice in boot menu so really suspect that this is a boot sector virus. With your knowledge of ultimate boot disk utilities, is there any choice i have that can clean boot sector virus without using floppy? Thanks!
Maybe the best thing for you to do is download and install it to a floopy on a computer that you know isnt infected. Then make sure you lock the floopy from being written to.
I also suggest Kill Disk at http://download2.lsoft.net/killdiskfloppysetup.exe
The trial will let you do a single pass.
I also suggest Kill Disk at http://download2.lsoft.net/killdiskfloppysetup.exe
The trial will let you do a single pass.
never mind, I just looked at that ultimatebootcd and it has kill disk on it already. So boot up that cd and use killdisk. It will wipe your whole drive and you can start to scratch.
Do you have access to another computer that can connect to the Internet?
If so, then do the following:
Download and run HijackThis from http://www.hijackthis.de/
Copy-and-paste the resulting log back to that same web site (not here)
Click on "Analyze", and then click on "Save Analysis" at the bottom of the next page.
Finally post a link here to the saved analyzed page.