BleepingComputer.com: Acer Laptop/Vista/Slow/Many trial programs/buggy

I am trying to help a friend of mine out. He has an Acer Laptop, model 5520, and it has been "buggy" and slow for him. I took a look at it tonight (it was my first real experience with Vista, to my recollection," and it seemed to be overloaded with trial and extra crap software. I tried to remove the trial of Norton, and it hung up at the very end. I am not sure if it's gone or not.

Because I am extremely unfamiliar with Vista, I need help in navigating it, and knowing what to, and how to, delete what I need to do.

I am pretty sure this computer has next to no spyware/adware on it, although, I have been proved wrong.

Jeremy

Start by using this free tool to remove the remnants of Norton: http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgen...005033108162039
Then immediately get a replacement for it. Here's a link to our freeware topic that gives some alternatives: http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/topic3616.html

After that, check the Taskbar to see what's running that doesn't need to be. Then, using that info, go to the Control Panel...Programs...Uninstall a program applet to remove the one's you don't need.

Once you've done that, then investigate the processes running in Task Manager...Processes tab to see what else is running that you don't need.
Research the image names to find out what program the process belongs to - and then remove the one's that you don't need.
Once that's done, post back and we can offer more advice to help with the svchost.exe processes (there's stuff running inside them too).

usasma, on Feb 21 2009, 08:13 AM, said:

Before I posted my inital post, I went through the add/remove programs to remove norton, and there were multiple listings of Norton in there. I removed one completely, and one is still there. However, I don't know what version of Norton is still on this comptuer. Also, the Norton icon has been removed from the Start Menu and also the main screen. so, is it completely uninstalled, or, are there fragments?

Jeremy

Most likely there are still remnants of it on your system. Use this free tool to remove those remnants of Norton: http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgen...005033108162039

May I ask, what are the specs of this Laptop? And exactly how long have you had it?

I have resolved the issues with this laptop. Thank you so much.

Jeremy

How did you fix it? It will just be information if someone else were to get this same problem.

The main issue that I had was that I had been unable to see what version of Norton had been on this computer, so, it took me a while to be able to know what removal program to download. After that, the computer still seemed "buggy," and I finally attributed it to an issue with that specific model and the mouse pad on the laptop.

After disabling the tapping feature, it operated much more smoothly. I nearly deleted all of the Acer management software that was on it, but, after reviewing that the computer had a high amount of ram, I decided to keep it on there.

So it was your mousepad and the Norton?

Yes.