RunAway CPU Utilization!

[QUOTE=Cliff789;2385130]

This didn't do me much good because whatever was locking my system up was also making everything else non responsive.

Yeah, which makes it impossible to run any virus or malware scans. It's starting to look like I might be infected. I tried running Norton Bootable Rescue Tool from a USB flash drive, but even that stopped scanning. SO I pulled the HDD out of the machine and hooked it up to another computer via USB and ran a Norton scan. Found a few viruses/trojans, yet when I re-installed thew drive it didn't seem to fix the problem....

[QUOTE=technomann;2386282][QUOTE=Cliff789;2385130]

It's starting to look like I might be infected. [...] hooked it up to another computer via USB and ran a Norton scan. Found a few viruses/trojans, yet when I re-installed thew drive it didn't seem to fix the problem....

What antivirus internet security were you running?

If you like to play where things are dangerous, either run something like this:Sandboxie - Sandbox software for application isolation and secure Web browsing
or build yourself a dedicated trash box that you don't care about and are willing to format and F-disk any time.
I run one for just that sort of thing. It's no fun coming home with fleas.
Another solution is to do it all using a KNOIPPIX disk which you can get free.


About the possible virus issue: On a good box load a good antivirus like Kaspersky internet security. The whole suite. Then plug that HD in to that and see what you get as a result. Those free scanners are only so good and I'm afraid they are pretty limited.

[QUOTE=Cliff789;2386309][QUOTE=technomann;2386282]

Cliff789 said:

If you like to play where things are dangerous, either run something like this:Sandboxie - Sandbox software for application isolation and secure Web browsing
or build yourself a dedicated trash box that you don't care about and are willing to format and F-disk any time.
I run one for just that sort of thing. It's no fun coming home with fleas.

I think the problems started when I tried to update Google Chrome. I heard there was a new update, but I couldn't figure out how to update it from the Chrome browser. So I googled "update chrome" in Firefox. I went to a page in the results and clicked on that. But instead of updating Chrome the file I clicked on installed a bunch of bogus toolbars on Firefox and IE. I got fooled!

Sandboxie looks great-- I'll try that...