How do I clean my pc from a spyware, and does the free antispyware offered online (ex:spyware doctor) works?

October 19, 2009

I got a virus when I was trying to view a movie from a website when it asked me to download something for my window media player to play the movie. Then a window poped saying that my pc got a virus called Torjan. I tried to remove a suspicious program from the add & remove option but it never removed. I also tried to restore my pc and it didn’t work as well.

Manually cleaning-up Windows XP #3?

October 15, 2009

I recently acquired my brother’s old laptop as he bought a new one, he has a lot of his old files & stuff on here, but doesn’t have the start-up disks. I could wipe out the hard drive but then I’d be stuck using Vista and if I’m as computer illiterate with Vista as I am with XP, then that’s a whole other can of worms.

Anyway, I’ve actually got two questions this time around.

1.) He has two folders marked as My Backup w/ the created date following them. I’ve tried to delete these files completely but to no avail. There is nothing in them that he needs that he doesn’t already have, so any advice on how to get rid of them in their entirety?

2.) What is this file: regedit cache.reg ?
Answer #1: The link you gave, the downloaded file doesn’t work.

Answer #2: I’ve already ran CCleaner.

I just need to know how to get rid of the backup folders & if it is safe to delete the regedit file.

Best stand-alone freeware firewall?

October 9, 2009

Antivirus = Antivira.

Antimalware = Malwarebytes.

Registry/cache cleaner = CCleaner.

I need a firewall that’s JUST a firewall, & hopefuly won’t have any problems with my other security software.

I’m having a problem with my latop?

October 6, 2009

Well, I had a problem and then I fixed it, but lots of my settings are lost. I always used to have a little thing on my screen show up when I changed the volume using the button on my computer. That no longer shows up. Also, on the taskbar, I used to have a battery meter on the right, just left of the icons next to the time. I would like to get these two things back. My computer is an IBM thinkpad T30 and I’ll give you some details on the problem I had earlier.

I got a bsod when windows tried to load, with the error c0000218 which said that the file c:\windows\system32\config\software could not be found, so I replaced it with the file at c:\windows\repair\software and the computer could then load, but my settings were lost here.
I just remembered something else which actually probably caused the problem. When I was desparately looking for solutions, I went into windows recovery mode and tried the command "fixboot" which said it would create new boot instructions or something like that… It didn’t colve my problem though. I think it might have caused these new ones. Is there any way to go back to the old settings??
one more little detail to add

Here’s the IBM downloads page for my computer. What on here might help me?
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?sitestyle=lenovo&lndocid=MIGR-42358#PA

Computer help for Windows Vista. virus? memory problems?

September 25, 2009

My 32 bit windows vista has just had its second birthday and I’m beginning to have major problems with it. It has always run very smoothly because I have always been sure to keep it up to date with the latest updates and virus protections. And, despite what other people say about how "terrible" Vista is I really think its been much faster than any XP ive ever had.
I have Norton Antivirus 360 (version 1 i think) and there has never been a time without it and it says the computer is secure and it full system scans 2 times per week.
I also have Windows Defender and I click on it to full system scan it atleast once a month and it cant detect any viruses, but it likes to turn itself off without my permission and i have to turn it back on to scan (I heard that is because of Norton and is nothing to worry about, please correct me if im wrong)
I have a registry cleaner called Eusing Free Registry Cleaner and I scan the computer with it at least once per week and fix all of the registry issues, which seems to slightly speed up the computer for a couple of hours.
I also occasionally download and use the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool and full system scan with it. It says while its scanning that 2 files are infected and when it is done scanning it says that nothing is infected and the computer is running normally, although its like it "forgot" that the computer has 2 infected files and doesn’t seemed to have done anything.
I also use the Disk Cleanup as commonly as the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool and defragment once per week.
Now as far as memory goes I have most of the programs that came with Vista and a few others such as Photoshop Elements, Perfect Typing Pro (a typing program), Google Earth, & Mozilla Firefox (my main browser) and very few personal files. Most of my files, which are mostly thousands of pictures, are kept on 2 USB flash drives and aren’t kept plugged in most of the time.
The memory (RAM) is 2.00 GB and the computers rating is 3.0, according to the System page under System & Maintenance in the Control Panel.
In windows task manager the Physical Memory (MB) says
Total: 1917
Cached: 1209
Free: 39
Kernel Memory (MB) is
Total: 214
Paged: 140
Nonpaged: 74

I would really like to know whats wrong with this computer. Is it possible that I have an undetectable virus or that i got a virus from my flash drives (that i scan as often as the computer) or do i just need to dump the Cache or something?

I really don’t understand much of this stuff but, if anyone could give me (for example) the link to a safe program to either dump all of the unnecessary files, like temporary files, without getting rid of programs or important files or give me a link to a really good working virus scanner or something would be greatly appreciated.

Also be free to ask any other questions about memory, programs, downloads or anything else of the sort pertaining to my computer.