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Computer Virus help question...


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I have a machine that I am working on with Windows 98. I installed norton on it and now when I go to reboot it says it has detected a virus and will be shut down and I never actually complete the reboot process. I can't even access the computer anymore. Someone was telling me about some anti-virus boot software...something that I can put on a floppy disk and boot up with? Anyone have any idea what this is?

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I thought that Norton and McAfee both required you to create a boot disk on a floppy when you first install them.

See if this article helps:

http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nav.n...nav&svy=&csm=no

I think you'll need to create it on an uninfected computer though.

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Yeah but I don't have a machine with 98 on it, except for that one. I didn't create a rescue disk because I never do.....

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I guess you'll start doing that in the future won't you? ;)

Does anyone have an old computer you could throw 98 on and make a rescue disk? Or perhaps someone here still runs 98 and could do it for you. I have 98 on an old machine at home but I don't have Norton. I have a very old out of date version of McAfee (this computer is no longer connected to the internet). I have an iMac as my main computer now.

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But I believe there is a software besides Norton that you can put on a floppy and boot up from it, but I do not know what it's called.

I actually won't be making anymore of those rescue disks in the future because I despise dealing with 98...I was trying to put 2000 on that machine when it started doing this crap...

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You may have to re instal Windows 98 (reformat the c: drive) if you can't even get into Windows. Do you have the Windows 98 install CD? Rescue disks may or may not get the virus out of the computer. If you reinstall the drivers it will delete everything off your computer but will get rid of the virus. If you are not good with computers I would take it to a computer repair store and let them do it.

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Are you able to boot in Safe Mode? If so, you might be able to create a boot disk from there.

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I am good with computers...its just everyone needs a little help every now and then. I do not want to reformat the drive because it isn't my computer and I can't loose all that info...so...I am kind of lost as to what to do....let me try a couple more things real quick

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If all else fails, try this - Take the hard drive out of that computer and make it a secondary drive in another computer. As long as the other computer is running a Windows flavored OS (98, 2000, XP, etc) it should be able to recognize the drive. You could copy all the important data off of that drive, then you wouldn't have to worry about data loss if you had to reformat it when you put it back in the original computer.

If you do this, make sure the other computer has an up-to-date virus scanner on it, and scan the infected drive as soon as you boot up. That might be enough to fix it, but copy the data over anyway.

Some hard drives have jumpers that has to be configured to specify that the computer will recognize it as a secondary (slave) drive, and some primary ones have to be configured to know that there is a secondary drive. So get the info on your hard drives from the internet before you start in case you need to set those.

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If you are upgrading to W2K, try just booting to the CDROM and doing the upgrade. That won't get rid of the virus, but at least you will be using the W2K OS when you run Norton next time to clean it....

I suspect the machine will act ALOT different when cleaning a virus in W2K ;)

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If I was you I would get Symantec Enterprise Security it is for corporate offices it has Norton AntiVirus Version 7.6 on it. I stole a copy from my work and loaded it on my computer works a lot better then any home edition of Norton. You buy the one copy and you don't have to keep updateing your Norton edition. Well worth the money.

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It is possible that reformatting won't kill the virus. Try booting in safe mode or using a boot disk that should come with Windows. I wouldn't resort to changing out hard drives just yet....

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