I have a client whose Win 98SE computer starts normally and then shows “It is now safe to turn off your computer” before it gets into windows. I step through the startup and notice that Norton runs and then completes. After that when you select load WIN, then the computer displays the following:
C:\windows\wininit.exe
C:
e h i k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z ….. some garbage characters and then …. Press any key to continue…
then after a period of time the screen displays the shut down option.
Sound like a virus? I tried to look it up on Norton and Mcafee but found nothing that directly pertains. One more thing, the hidden files at the root include a BOOTSECT.F16 modified today and there is no BOOTSECT.DOS as there should be. I ran FDISK /MBR and nothing happened.
There are no unusual files in the root of the drive or the windows directory. There are however several hundred FFFF~1.TMP files in the C:\WINDOWS\. I figure they are just temp files that need deleted since they are dated differently.
Please advise.
