- Joined
- Jan 12, 2010
- Messages
- 454
Well as the title clearly states I have been having some computer troubles the last few weeks and I'm looking for some advice as to what to do next, as I'm more or less at wits end and I know alot of tech savy people belong to the Hive.
I guess I'll start from the beginning, (It's a long story so go grab some chips and a soda...
)
I have been running MacAfee Total Protection for a year know until little over a month ago when my subscription ran out, and I was waiting on my rebate check for funds to renew it.
During the 1 and 1/2 to 2 weeks it was down I idiotically kept surfing my usually sites, all of whom I trust, but I got infected with a Trojan, MacAfee was the one who alerted me to the Trojan but do to not having an active subscription it could do nothing about it and so I just turned my PC off for a week until my check arrived and I had the money to renew it.
When I did I turned my computer back on and quickly re-downloaded MacAfee Total Protection after renewing my subscription, and did a scan to find the Trojan as soon as it was finished.
It found the usually tracking cookies but didn't find any Trojans, I (idiotically) assumed it had found and deleted it and started a fresh scan afterwards.
Feeling confidant that all the was well on my computer again I did a little surfing and decided to restart my computer, when I did I got the blue screen of death saying there was some kind of problem, I tried to let my computer fix itself (thank you Microsoft for making redundant systems for people like me
) but I kept getting the blue Please Wait........ screen.
Frustrated and at wits end I turned off my computer for a couple of days to consider my options as to what to do next. Later that week my dad fired up my computer and did a disk check and was able to fix the problem and get back to my desktop, for some reason it deleted my MacAfee, which I reinstalled.
I did another full scan but still got nothing. Thinking I was gaining ground I was shocked when a pop-up came up saying about a hundred things from Keyloggers to Trojans where attacking me, and what was running this "scan" was really a piece of Malware called XP Total Security 2011, which I did NOT download at all.
To my (then) shock, I found MacAfee was completely useless and couldn't even see, let alone, remove this piece of Malware.
I tried to get to the internet to download Malwarebytes (which I have heard alot of good things about) from Cnet.com but this fake Anti-Virus kept blocking me.
I rebooted in safe mode, the first time it still came up to bug me, but the second time I went in safe mode it didn't and I did a System Restore back two days before the Malware had popped up.
It kept the Malware from popping up outside of safe mode and let get to Cnet and download Malwarebytes which found the Trojan from before (which may have been the source of the Malware as well) as well as two infected registry files and deleted them.
I was hoping I was in the clear at last but for some reason when I went to do a scan with MacAfee it said that "an error had occurred" and it couldn't complete the scan.
I tried to download the MacAfee Virtual Technician from their official website to find the problem and fix it, but it said it "couldn't find it". I then had a MacAfee support technician walked me threw some solutions to fix it, including completely uninstalling and reinstalling my MacAfee back on, which (for reasons unknown) couldn't install on my computer.
The tech said I may still have some (bad) things left on my computer that may be preventing MacAfee from installing and pointed me to a Virus Removal Service that MacAfee offers for $89.99.
I shut my computer off for a few days again (big shocker right?) and turned it back on today and tried to reinstall MacAfee (again) after deleting some suspect files before I shut it off, but alas... no luck.
I decided to take what measures I could until I could find a solution to this sad little tale, so I downloaded and have Zone Alarm running to watch incoming/outgoing internet traffic and backed up all my important files on too a pair of CDs.
If I can't find any solutions I'm going to completely format my hardrive and reinstall my operating system back on, but this is a last resort. I had to do this once before a year earlier to get rid of a major problem virus problem I had, (this was before I had MacAfee and the reason I got it afterwards) so I know how to do it.
So what the irony in all this? I had gotten my rebate check back just a day before my anti-virus went bad, but I had signed in the wrong place so had to re-sign it and send it back, which was the 2 week wait when my anti-virus.
And so here I am!
To all of you who actually read this entire thing, you get a cookie for your patience and kindness.
I'm just drain with this constant tug of war with Malware on my computer and need some advice as to what I can do to fix this whole mess.
Any advice or opinions, on what to do, would be greatly appreciated.
Regards,
Jake
I guess I'll start from the beginning, (It's a long story so go grab some chips and a soda...
)I have been running MacAfee Total Protection for a year know until little over a month ago when my subscription ran out, and I was waiting on my rebate check for funds to renew it.
During the 1 and 1/2 to 2 weeks it was down I idiotically kept surfing my usually sites, all of whom I trust, but I got infected with a Trojan, MacAfee was the one who alerted me to the Trojan but do to not having an active subscription it could do nothing about it and so I just turned my PC off for a week until my check arrived and I had the money to renew it.
When I did I turned my computer back on and quickly re-downloaded MacAfee Total Protection after renewing my subscription, and did a scan to find the Trojan as soon as it was finished.
It found the usually tracking cookies but didn't find any Trojans, I (idiotically) assumed it had found and deleted it and started a fresh scan afterwards.
Feeling confidant that all the was well on my computer again I did a little surfing and decided to restart my computer, when I did I got the blue screen of death saying there was some kind of problem, I tried to let my computer fix itself (thank you Microsoft for making redundant systems for people like me
) but I kept getting the blue Please Wait........ screen.Frustrated and at wits end I turned off my computer for a couple of days to consider my options as to what to do next. Later that week my dad fired up my computer and did a disk check and was able to fix the problem and get back to my desktop, for some reason it deleted my MacAfee, which I reinstalled.
I did another full scan but still got nothing. Thinking I was gaining ground I was shocked when a pop-up came up saying about a hundred things from Keyloggers to Trojans where attacking me, and what was running this "scan" was really a piece of Malware called XP Total Security 2011, which I did NOT download at all.
To my (then) shock, I found MacAfee was completely useless and couldn't even see, let alone, remove this piece of Malware.
I tried to get to the internet to download Malwarebytes (which I have heard alot of good things about) from Cnet.com but this fake Anti-Virus kept blocking me.
I rebooted in safe mode, the first time it still came up to bug me, but the second time I went in safe mode it didn't and I did a System Restore back two days before the Malware had popped up.
It kept the Malware from popping up outside of safe mode and let get to Cnet and download Malwarebytes which found the Trojan from before (which may have been the source of the Malware as well) as well as two infected registry files and deleted them.
I was hoping I was in the clear at last but for some reason when I went to do a scan with MacAfee it said that "an error had occurred" and it couldn't complete the scan.
I tried to download the MacAfee Virtual Technician from their official website to find the problem and fix it, but it said it "couldn't find it". I then had a MacAfee support technician walked me threw some solutions to fix it, including completely uninstalling and reinstalling my MacAfee back on, which (for reasons unknown) couldn't install on my computer.
The tech said I may still have some (bad) things left on my computer that may be preventing MacAfee from installing and pointed me to a Virus Removal Service that MacAfee offers for $89.99.
I shut my computer off for a few days again (big shocker right?) and turned it back on today and tried to reinstall MacAfee (again) after deleting some suspect files before I shut it off, but alas... no luck.
I decided to take what measures I could until I could find a solution to this sad little tale, so I downloaded and have Zone Alarm running to watch incoming/outgoing internet traffic and backed up all my important files on too a pair of CDs.
If I can't find any solutions I'm going to completely format my hardrive and reinstall my operating system back on, but this is a last resort. I had to do this once before a year earlier to get rid of a major problem virus problem I had, (this was before I had MacAfee and the reason I got it afterwards) so I know how to do it.
So what the irony in all this? I had gotten my rebate check back just a day before my anti-virus went bad, but I had signed in the wrong place so had to re-sign it and send it back, which was the 2 week wait when my anti-virus.
And so here I am!
To all of you who actually read this entire thing, you get a cookie for your patience and kindness.
I'm just drain with this constant tug of war with Malware on my computer and need some advice as to what I can do to fix this whole mess.
Any advice or opinions, on what to do, would be greatly appreciated.
Regards,
Jake
