spyware/malware/bot/garbage remover for XP

[dream beamz]

Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware is on top of its game, it doesnt require any technical expertise to get rid of resident infections where as spybot s and d and lavasoft adware sometimes dont get rid of everything that is currently running.

In short get Malwarebytes
http://www.download.com/Malwarebytes...=dl&tag=button

Free and no infections

[p1t8ull]

Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware is on top of its game, it doesnt require any technical expertise to get rid of resident infections where as spybot s and d and lavasoft adware sometimes dont get rid of everything that is currently running.

In short get Malwarebytes
http://www.download.com/Malwarebytes...=dl&tag=button

Free and no infections

I agree, MWB is a tip top bit of software but I have seen S&D pick up things that MWB didn't. S&D will also drag the offending bit of crapware out by it's earlobes when you reboot if it's locked process.

Both are (literally) killer apps IMHO and along with AVG free and sensible web surfing, you'll Windoze machine will be as clear as a nuns conscience for zero cost

[frank_1257]

I ran a computer store for a great number of years I swear by the following combination in 5 years I have not had a single issue.

Spybot search and destroy this runs full time and can do scans for malicious stuff you pick up browsing!

It is FREE! it is internationally popular and documented for any imaginable language.

On the antivirus AVG free home is absolutely perfect it's free it never expires.

Beware on AVG home it can be downloaded in free to never expire and trial 90 day versions. When googling for Avast, Search AVG HOME FREE , not trial!


I as part of servicing any computer would install this pair on anything I touched and unless the customer altered or removed them they NEVER EVER had any problems.

I have experienced such immunity from problems I take how well they work for granted NEVER a WORRY!

Just like this forum, spybot survives on charitable donations only!

Nothing is going to cure plain old obsessing, if you download every cute little program you see your system will slowly grind to a halt, having being overburdened by terminate and stay ready programs (TSR's) If you open a dos prompt and at the prompt type msconfig a window will open it will allow you to go through and manually deselect the programs to disable them at startup.

I owned a custom computer store for years, you can ignore my advice and play he said she said and will have headaches forever (NOT ME) or take my advice and you will NEVER sing the blues again using this pair together AVG automatically checks for updates, however spybot search and destroy should be checked for updates and a system scan performed ideally weekly.

Do this and you will experience Nirvana

Oh by the way if you have other service provider antivirus spyware stuff MC AFEE SYMATECH SIMILAR BULLSHIT remove it, throw the damn disks in the trash and quit choking on spoon fed spam by your ISP the frigging assholes things like msn google browser toolbars all this crap GET RID OF IT!

There is a lot to be gained from learning to setup your email and internet access via cable or dsl modem manually instead of using these ISP provided programs they are terrible they are designed to lead you to the ISP and associates sites and burden your computer with every manner of crap they inherently do not want to block pop ups and such as that is how their partners advertise to you!

You can often setup your dsl or cable modem by opening a browser and typing the IP address of your modem mine is 192.168.1.254 all you often need is the pass word and username/domain (your email address), your router or modem may have a password (get this from ISP tech support or modem router mfg. as well as you will need your original ISP provided password. Your modem often will have a graphical user interface and simply enter the passwordand username

My father is an electrical engineer and like so many will use these ISP install disks and his computer is on the slow boat to China can't tell him Xhit probably you either, I go to other peoples houses and use their computers to access info what takes me seconds takes ten minutes on their perfectly fast PC because of all this ISP supplied crap, makes me want to cry.

Beware of the following ploy. Some software is maliciously installed on your PC and although going to add/remove programs to remove applications, is the politically correct way to remove software, it may not successfully do so.

Many creeps will play a trick on you and if you do not remove their programs via the Start programs, find app, select uninstall, method, you may be left with unwanted remnants of the program.

Usually when this happens reinstalling the original version of the software and uninstalling this way will get rid of these bastards.

Many malaware removal programs use this nasty ploy to forever become a part of your life!

One other thing doing a control-alt-delete will open task manger, after doing this click or processes tab. It is hard to decipher what the numerous processes are doing however look for ones that are gobbling significant cpu usage.

This can show what is choking your computers capacity to do your desired new tasks. You can highlight the process and see if ending it will clear things up, a malicious process will simply restart.

Googling the image name may give insight to what program is running the file and disabling at startup or uninstalling the circumspect application may give much relief.

Some of the most notorious CPU power hog's you will ever find are called p2p programs these share software on your PC with others and vice versa, SKYPE is one of the worst of these. Do not select to run automatically at startup if at all possible as this alone is the number 1 worst cpu HOG!

HAPPY COMPUTING!

anybody know of a working spyware/malware/bot/garbage remover for XP
that is under 25-30$ and works, and DOES NOT create more infections of its own?

My laptop is slowing down.

And is just me, or is IE7 the latest piece of microsnot crashware? I just downloaded firefox as a quick fix.

And please, no switch to linux comments, I need xp for some things.



Steve Roberts

[mixedgas]

My problem is after 7.8 years at a university, with some really cool tools, now I'm at the mercy of the civilian net. Source right now is a borrowed sprint high speed wireless card from a company I do some minor consulting for. Call it the friends and family net program. DSL and ADSL are not available here as I'm too far from the CO (24.1 miles) and I cant justify cable or satellite nor afford it. Wimax hasn't made it here to this part of the state yet as we have nasty hilly terrain.

The internet machine at the house right now is a toshiba laptop.

I dont download every little program that walks by, I'm old school having leaned on a system that predates 8" disks. The place I used to work with fended off on average 200,000 Takeover attempts per month minimum and we had great firewalls. This was not foolproof, ie the grad students would download just about anything and sometimes so would the profs. As my job was critical computing to keep the various robotic and data gathering and scada stuff stuff up, I would lock out most of them. So since I knew better then to just click on anything, life was fairly easy, and we had the "G" drive, aka the terrabyte or more campus junk storage place where I could store whole images of drives.Plus since nobody wrote viri for 3.11, one of my best storage machines was a 3.11 machine kept hidden from the main computing center. removable hard drives and ghost 7.2 saved me frequently. Also since I was in a lab, I could justify keeping the all campus guys from doing the mandatory auto updates, with the side effect that they frequently tried to come into our building and rule that all dos machines and linux machines should be scrapped. The fact that some of these systems were 200,000$ legacy science machines running custom code that could not be ported saved us from them.

The laptop came with mcafee installed and I want to get rid of it, I look at the task list and there are too many running.

I've tried one or two things and am scared that the average anti this or that software is written by guys who have a interest in propagating little nasties that keep them in biz, ie I have long suspected that some of these guys leak back doors in order to sustain their lifestyle. While I'm a former eagle scout and raised by a Marine father with the honor code, if I were in their business I'd see a need to leak data to sustain the biz.

So that is why I asked. Malwarebytes did'nt find anything, and I just switched to firefox after too many latchups with IE7. I also have the microsnot autopatch turned off, and now need to learn how to get rid of the toshiba factory installed mcafee, as I cant see paying them 49 bucks for nothing. I hate the popup message every half hour

So it looks like malwarebytes and spybot s and D and one or two other things you guys have suggested.

XP will be the last MS operating system I ever use. I only keep it because a lot of scientific tools and laser show tools are MS only.

now if there were a linux patch that would run zoofscope and laseroids and LFIplayer and anarchy and pangolin, I'd ditch windows. Most of my real workhorse machines run 98. One runs dos.

thanks for the tried and true suggestions.
Steve

[frank_1257]

I can relate my first usages of computers were on Terminals with TTY printers, connected to mainframes offsite at WSU while in junior high school in 75'. Ten years later I was using stuff like archie and gopher with Windows 3.10 then WFW 3.11 , many pcs before these but this was the beginning of the internet. Still remember altair 8800. I have a scary collection of Windows plethora of operating systems releases , prereleases beta versions NT4.0 back office still gives me service pack nightmares.But I agree emphatically were it not for lack of certain software support I would still be using 98 SE. I have resigned myself to XP PRO X64 and were it not for minor issues with java, appletime and adobe flashplayer support, I would have no complaints. I still have my quad processor pentium pro 200 with the huge raid array that dims the lights at startup and can heat my office on cold wintery days. I do not miss the hassles bugs associated with maintaining large raid arrays, ah but I miss the jet engine sounding hard drives all spinning up.

[gottaluvlasers]

is it bad to have more than one adware/malware/spyware program installed and running? i know with AVS you shouldnt have more than one running. is it ok to have sbybot SD *AND* this MWB installed and running on a machine??

-Marc

[stanwax]

I would ordinarily say that having 2 apps trying to do the same thing is not good which is why I like to use tools that you just run to get rid of the nasties and dont need to be sitting there in the systray. That said MWB does not seem to do this unless you buy the full version so only runs when you ask it to. The other thing that I have come to learn is that there still is not a single solution to all these nasties. I have a small arsenal of tools I use to clear out a machine most of which have already been discussed on this thread

Rob

[James Lehman]

I think it's a bad idea to have anything like that running, at all!

Malicious software attacks don't rely so much on vulnerabilities of your computer. They rely on YOU!

You need to run anti-malware software in your head!

I don't run anything. If I think I may have stepped in some doo-doo, I scrape it off my computer with a few scanners.

James.

[thesk8nmidget]

i agree with james! i usually dont get any kind of yucky stuff on my computer but i got to my moms and her computer is just filled with crap and all she does is simple browsing and work related stuff.

i have to clean her computer up all the time and they always wonder why i never have a slow computer.

my laptop used to et infected and i couldnt figure out why then i realized my brother would get a hold oh it when i didnt know... so glad i no longer live near him!