The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    Boot Sector Virus?

    Discussion in 'Security and Anti-Virus Software' started by vdawg, May 16, 2009.

  1. vdawg

    vdawg Notebook Enthusiast

    Reputations:
    96
    Messages:
    38
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    15
    So my laptop which is running vista home premium and norton anti virus won't work. I'm not sure a 100% why because my brother was using it when he supposedly got the virus.

    He said he was on the internet when he got a message saying someone was hacking our computer. He then proceeded to shut the laptop off and turned it back on. When he turned it back on, after booting up a voice comes up and an advertisment for an erotic website is shown with a black background. I can use ctrl-alt-delete to shut the laptop down but i can't end tasks or anything like that.

    There is a lot of important information worth more than the computer itself. I'm a noob at computer stuff so i'm not sure what to do. Any thoughts?
     
    vdawg, May 16, 2009
    #1
  2. Fragilexx

    Fragilexx Get'cha head in the game

    Reputations:
    513
    Messages:
    2,369
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    55
    First things first, slap your brother round the head.

    Have you tried creating a CD ROM Boot disc and boot from that using something like BartPE? That way you can get into your computer and try running the Antivirus software?

    Alternatively, booting from DVD with your windows installation media present can offer a "repair" option. This may be risky though as I'm not sure what it constitutes a repair as.
     
    Fragilexx, May 16, 2009
    #2
  3. vdawg

    vdawg Notebook Enthusiast

    Reputations:
    96
    Messages:
    38
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    15
    thanks for the quick reply. i never made a boot cd and i dont think i have one. how would i create a boot cd with my laptop not working?
     
    vdawg, May 16, 2009
    #3
  4. Baserk

    Baserk Notebook user

    Reputations:
    2,503
    Messages:
    1,794
    Likes Received:
    1
    Trophy Points:
    56
    Can you boot in to safe mode?
     
    Baserk, May 17, 2009
    #4
  5. vdawg

    vdawg Notebook Enthusiast

    Reputations:
    96
    Messages:
    38
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    15
    nothing happens when i hit F8 to get to the advanced boot options to boot into safemode. I think that I can use the command prompt tool to retrieve data files on the windows installation disk when i boot from that cd.
     
    vdawg, May 17, 2009
    #5
  6. Michael York

    Michael York Company Representative

    Reputations:
    152
    Messages:
    36
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    15
    Hi vdawg,

    This is Mike from the Norton Authorized Support Team.

    Your best bet in resolving this issue is to use another computer that has a CD burner to create a Norton Recovery Disk. You will then boot your computer from this disk, which will then download the latest definition files and allow you to scan your computer for infections.

    Carefully follow the instructions in the link below to create the Recovery CD.

    Download the Norton Recovery Tool

    Thank you,
    Mike


     
    Michael York, May 19, 2009
    #6
  7. zfactor

    zfactor Mastershake

    Reputations:
    2,894
    Messages:
    11,134
    Likes Received:
    3
    Trophy Points:
    455
    agreed with mike. or check out remove-malware.com and use his recovery boot disk
     
    zfactor, May 19, 2009
    #7