Metropocalypse
New member
- Local time
- 1:39 PM
- Messages
- 3
I apologise that the title couldn't be more specific. My laptop recently was infected, I presume, with what appeared to be a pretty bad virus. I can only presume that's what it was since I couldn't find out exactly what the virus was, and even after going through extreme lengths to remove any trace of software that's suspicious or out-of-the-ordinary even in the slightest (nevertheless I ensured that anything I removed wouldn't damage the PC), I'm still having issues.
I can provide you with a rough timeline of the issues. I would seriously appreciate help because this is INCREDIBLY urgent, I am a Design student at University, and I have to hand in all my work on Friday. I haven't slept in 2 nights, last night was spent removing malware. I haven't been able to back my work up because I just simply don't have anything to back it onto, money is incredibly tight at the moment, but I don't wish to ask for sympathy. Anyway, here's basically what happened
Laptop has been running absolutely fine for months. Occasionally I'd slip up and accidentally let a toolbar install itself onto the system, eg. conduit and anything along those lines. I had also made the mistake of lending it to friends a couple times, and of course finding myself having to uninstall toolbars every time I got it back. Months and months ago, I did happen to install PrivitizeVPN while trying to get around the strict university filters, and I found out this morning that PrivitizeVPN is actually a piece of malware disguised as legitimate software - incidentally the problems my laptop eventually started having fit the description of the PrivitizeVPN virus. However, I didn't start getting any problems until months after I'd installed it, though I never used it.
About 3 days ago problems started cropping up with the laptop. Initially it was just the browser crashing when running flash. Then eventually other issues would join in, the sound would just go, pages stopped loading, and if I closed the browser and tried to re-open it, the hourglass would be displayed for half a second and no browser window would open - but in task manager, a new Chrome process would appear. At some point afterwards, other issues would join in.
Explorer ended up crashing every time I tried to do anything more than browse. The first couple times this happened, it would quit then restart. But now when it crashes, I have to reboot the laptop. Another issue that occurs a lot is the start menu just stops working. Pressing "start" would open the menu as normal, but I would be unable to even highlight anything, and if I tried clicking, it'd make that ping sound as if there was some sort of dialogue box open that I needed to close.
These issues would all take effect gradually following a restart. It works fine for maybe 5-10, sometimes after only a couple seconds, but on average between 5 and 10 minutes, and then after that time, the problems all join in one-by-one. Windows Media Player also crashes EVERY time I try and launch it.
So that's essentially the timeline of the problems. As for solutions, basically I sat down to fix the virus at 8pm last night, it is now 6pm the following day and I haven't slept, only really had a break during this time for about 2 hours at the most. My attempts to resolve the issues consisted of initially restarting. As expected, that fixed the problem for a couple minutes, but only a couple minutes. The next thing I did was a system restore. That would actually fix the problem for maybe an hour or so, maybe 2 or 3. By this point I was pretty sure that I had a virus and decided to download, install, run every trusted anti-virus and malware I could find on the internet, following countless instructions on removing viruses - and I always made sure to uninstall the last anti-virus before installing the next. Quite a lot of threats were found in this time. I ran CCleaner numerous times. I tried quick scans, full scans, and any other scan available until not a single piece of anti-virus software could report anything. Restart. Problems continue. So I browse my C drive, googling every suspicious file to see if it's meant to be there, and deleting it providing google says it's okay to do so. Same with the registry. Nope, still having problems.
I figure, maybe the virus, or my rigorous virus-removal scheme damaged the system somehow? Well, unfortunately, all the system restore points are gone now for some reason. I tried to do a disk check, after 2 hours it was only on 15% so I figured that this isn't gonna work. Right now, I am able to browse the internet and write this without too many issues. But that is all I am doing. I have noticed that my sound has gone once again, and I'm sure if I attempt to use the start menu or windows explorer to excess, or if I try and launch WMP, the problems are just going to come flooding back.
Don't get me wrong, I am pretty tech savy. I have been a pretty intense computer user now for about 10 years and not experienced any big issues with viruses or malware until now. And I'd say now is probably the worst time in this 10 years for me to have an issue. My laptop didn't come with an install disk, just a repair disk which is currently in my home country, whereas I'm in England for university. I would seriously appreciate any help because I am going to fail my university course if I don't get this issue sorted within the next couple of hours, I already have no choice but to not sleep for the next 2 nights (having already done an all-nighter last night).
I am happy to provide logs from some of the anti-virus software if needed. Thank you!
I can provide you with a rough timeline of the issues. I would seriously appreciate help because this is INCREDIBLY urgent, I am a Design student at University, and I have to hand in all my work on Friday. I haven't slept in 2 nights, last night was spent removing malware. I haven't been able to back my work up because I just simply don't have anything to back it onto, money is incredibly tight at the moment, but I don't wish to ask for sympathy. Anyway, here's basically what happened
Laptop has been running absolutely fine for months. Occasionally I'd slip up and accidentally let a toolbar install itself onto the system, eg. conduit and anything along those lines. I had also made the mistake of lending it to friends a couple times, and of course finding myself having to uninstall toolbars every time I got it back. Months and months ago, I did happen to install PrivitizeVPN while trying to get around the strict university filters, and I found out this morning that PrivitizeVPN is actually a piece of malware disguised as legitimate software - incidentally the problems my laptop eventually started having fit the description of the PrivitizeVPN virus. However, I didn't start getting any problems until months after I'd installed it, though I never used it.
About 3 days ago problems started cropping up with the laptop. Initially it was just the browser crashing when running flash. Then eventually other issues would join in, the sound would just go, pages stopped loading, and if I closed the browser and tried to re-open it, the hourglass would be displayed for half a second and no browser window would open - but in task manager, a new Chrome process would appear. At some point afterwards, other issues would join in.
Explorer ended up crashing every time I tried to do anything more than browse. The first couple times this happened, it would quit then restart. But now when it crashes, I have to reboot the laptop. Another issue that occurs a lot is the start menu just stops working. Pressing "start" would open the menu as normal, but I would be unable to even highlight anything, and if I tried clicking, it'd make that ping sound as if there was some sort of dialogue box open that I needed to close.
These issues would all take effect gradually following a restart. It works fine for maybe 5-10, sometimes after only a couple seconds, but on average between 5 and 10 minutes, and then after that time, the problems all join in one-by-one. Windows Media Player also crashes EVERY time I try and launch it.
So that's essentially the timeline of the problems. As for solutions, basically I sat down to fix the virus at 8pm last night, it is now 6pm the following day and I haven't slept, only really had a break during this time for about 2 hours at the most. My attempts to resolve the issues consisted of initially restarting. As expected, that fixed the problem for a couple minutes, but only a couple minutes. The next thing I did was a system restore. That would actually fix the problem for maybe an hour or so, maybe 2 or 3. By this point I was pretty sure that I had a virus and decided to download, install, run every trusted anti-virus and malware I could find on the internet, following countless instructions on removing viruses - and I always made sure to uninstall the last anti-virus before installing the next. Quite a lot of threats were found in this time. I ran CCleaner numerous times. I tried quick scans, full scans, and any other scan available until not a single piece of anti-virus software could report anything. Restart. Problems continue. So I browse my C drive, googling every suspicious file to see if it's meant to be there, and deleting it providing google says it's okay to do so. Same with the registry. Nope, still having problems.
I figure, maybe the virus, or my rigorous virus-removal scheme damaged the system somehow? Well, unfortunately, all the system restore points are gone now for some reason. I tried to do a disk check, after 2 hours it was only on 15% so I figured that this isn't gonna work. Right now, I am able to browse the internet and write this without too many issues. But that is all I am doing. I have noticed that my sound has gone once again, and I'm sure if I attempt to use the start menu or windows explorer to excess, or if I try and launch WMP, the problems are just going to come flooding back.
Don't get me wrong, I am pretty tech savy. I have been a pretty intense computer user now for about 10 years and not experienced any big issues with viruses or malware until now. And I'd say now is probably the worst time in this 10 years for me to have an issue. My laptop didn't come with an install disk, just a repair disk which is currently in my home country, whereas I'm in England for university. I would seriously appreciate any help because I am going to fail my university course if I don't get this issue sorted within the next couple of hours, I already have no choice but to not sleep for the next 2 nights (having already done an all-nighter last night).
I am happy to provide logs from some of the anti-virus software if needed. Thank you!
My Computer
At a glance
Windows 7 home 32bit
- Computer type
- Laptop
- Computer Manufacturer/Model Number
- Dell Inspiron 1546
- OS
- Windows 7 home 32bit
- Antivirus
- Avast!
- Browser
- Google Chrome
