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Bad, Bad Virus?

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9 replies

by arichart

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I need to ask! I have a couple of W98SE workstations that have been locking up repeatedly. As of 20 minutes ago, the ones with the locking up symptoms will not boot back up properly. When the computer is restarted, I can get to the point where one has to log in (or hit esc) and it shows the mapped drives connecting, but then no icons come up. When you hit ctrl+alt+del, there is nothing listed in the applications area to actually end a task. This happens when you try to boot into safe mode as well. I have tried a anti-virus boot-up disk and it says that the boot sectors are missing, but still runs a scan. I have been scanning the anti-virus websites to no avail. Has anybody else run into this problem lately that might be of some help??? Any ideas is greatly appreciated!!!

9 replies

by krunch

I just had the exact same issue with a computer, I found and deleted several viruses but the problem remained. I think you, more than likely, have a corrupt Windows registry - you can try to rebuild that registry or simply reload Windows 98SE (which is the easiest thing to do I think.)

If you put your cab files on the hard drive, just run setup from c:\windows\options\cabs\setup.exe - if not then go to www.bootdisk.com, download a bootdisk that will enable your cd-rom from the command prompt and run setup.exe from the cd-rom drive.

Cheers,

Krunch

by krunch

Run your anti-virus software against the computer once again after you have reloaded Windows 98SE.

by arichart

Yeah, I had started doing this. I figured that a fresh install was the quickest and easiest way, but of course the user loses his e-mail, desktop settings, and the shortcut. Oh well...

by curacao_dejavu

hold on.
you can install the hd in a secondary machine and scan for viruses.
Also when installed as a secondary harddisk you can copy the files to the other harddisk so the user won't loose any information.

Also if you have a bootable win98se floppy disk with the sys command on it you can try to transfers the files harddisk and see if it boots.

from the a-drive type:
sys a: c:

Leopold

by arichart

Already pulled the HD, but for some strange reason, the hard drive that I pushed all of the data to is now unreadable. It seems now that the user is SOL on any backup data. Thanks anyway!

by krunch

I don't think you need a fresh install at all, you can re-install Windows98SE and you won't lose anything. I'm suggesting that you just re-install the O/S not doing a clean install at all. I think just your windows registry is hosed, by re-installing Windows98SE you'll just be copying over the o/s files. I've done this many, many times - you won't lose one BIT of information.

Please let me know if you have further questions.

Cheers,

Sullie

by krunch

I don't think I made myself clear previously. You boot up Windows98SE, you re-install Windows98SE with the setup.exe command right over top of your current Windows98SE o/s (just like you're installing any other piece of software) and the user retains all their e-mail, system settings, wallpaper, screen savers, printers, EVERYTHING.

All that you're doing is copying system files back over that may have been damaged by a virus, etc. The only problem you may run into is that you'll probably have to re-install your anti-virus software or you may get warning messages during your install from your anti-virus software saying something is trying to write to the boot partition, etc.

by arichart

Too bad you didn't post earlier. I would liked to have tried that, but since the job waste very time sensitive I couldn't wait. Thanks for the info though!

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