I am helping a friend that has a E Machine Computer with Windows XP Home on it. I'm afraid he has run the computer without virus protection for so long that he has some major problems to resolve.

He had Panda virus protection but I'm not sure how long but probably several months since there has been any virus updates. I deleted the Panda virus and put AVG Free on the computer. After updating AVG definitions I ran a scan and it found 186 virus problems. Many were trojans. After the initial scan, AVG deleted 70 and sent sent 104 to the virus vault. A notification came up that said something about a system 32 file should not be placed in the virus vault or the system might not work properly. So I didn't.

After that much work on viruses I downloaded and installed Spy Bot Search and Destroy. After updating it, I ran it and it found over 600 various malware and spyware. I cleaned all of it.

Ran AVG again and it found an additional 12 viruses. One was deleted and the others were sent to the virus vault.

A problem that showed up when I first put the computer on was really different. When you first start it up it just sits at the monitor screen with the big E for about 15 to 18 minutes with nothing appearing to work. After that the mouse and keyboard come alive and it goes into the desktop. For the most part the computer works comparatively well after that. My guess is that it has a boot sector virus.

What steps should I take to see if I can correct this for my friend? I've cleaned viruses before but I've never experienced such a long wait time for windows to start. Waiting so long I couldn't get into safe mode as the keyboard wasn't responding.

Once into the desktop I can get online. I thought I might try the free virus scanner from TrendMicro.

Please-if anyone has any suggestions on how I can proceed from here, please post back and let me know. It really is a pretty nice machine once you can get in. At least now his security center is O.K. and his virus definitions with AVG are up to date.

Thanks for any and all help.

Put Windows defender on there as well and firefox with zonealarm free firewall.

Hello JazzMahn,

Can you identify the trojans and malware that were removed? One of my concerns is that one or more of those may have been a backdoor trojan. If that is the case, generally the safest thing to do is a reformat and clean install.

If you wish to continue cleaning the machine, I do have an additional program for you to try.

Please download Malwarebytes Anti-Malware and save it to your desktop.
alternate download link 1
alternate download link 2

• Make sure you are connected to the Internet.
• Double-click on Download_mbam-setup.exe to install the application.
• When the installation begins, follow the prompts and do not make any changes to default settings.
• When installation has finished, make sure you leave both of these checked:
  • Update Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware
  • Launch Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware
• Then click Finish.
• MBAM will automatically start and you will be asked to update the program before performing a scan. If an update is found, the program will automatically update itself. Press the OK button to close that box and continue. If you encounter any problems while downloading the updates, manually download them from here and just double-click on mbam-rules.exe to install.
• On the Scanner tab:
  • Make sure the "Perform Quick Scan" option is selected.
  • Then click on the Scan button.
• If asked to select the drives to scan, leave all the drives selected and click on the Start Scan button.
• The scan will begin and "Scan in progress" will show at the top. It may take some time to complete so please be patient.
• When the scan is finished, a message box will say "The scan completed successfully. Click 'Show Results' to display all objects found".
• Click OK to close the message box and continue with the removal process.
• Back at the main Scanner screen, click on the Show Results button to see a list of any malware that was found.
• Make sure that everything is checked, and click Remove Selected.
• When removal is completed, a log report will open in Notepad and you may be prompted to restart your computer. (see Note below)
• The log is automatically saved and can be viewed by clicking the Logs tab in MBAM.
• Copy and paste the contents of that report in your next reply and exit MBAM.

Note: If MBAM encounters a file that is difficult to remove, you will be presented with 1 of 2 prompts. Click OK to either and let MBAM proceed with the disinfection process. If asked to restart the computer, please do so immediately. Failure to reboot will prevent MBAM from removing all the malware.

Please post the MalwareBytes log in your next reply.

Orange Blossom