Laptop help

[plod]

although I've ended up cleaning so many machines for other people in the past which have malware infections despite up-to-date AV...

Ain't that the truth Matt

Is there any way of finding out if your pc has an infection then?

A mate knows someone who "supposedly" knows his stuff looked at my laptop, and had it for about 4 hours but dropped it back to my mate, as I was out on the road, so don't know the real outcome, and still a tad paranoid.

After the incident, the "Microsoft Security Essentials" I think teamy recommended, I had installed, was gone, and it wouldn't let me reload it, so have downloaded AVG as a temporary measure at mo

[teamster1975]

A few of the current nasties will prevent the AV from loading.
Download TDSSKiller from here for starters; I've seen this rootkit cause such behaviour.
Also run Combofix.

[Gary406]

virus's usually let you know their there,

usually pc/laptop will not respond to things u do, and so on,

[plod]

A few of the current nasties will prevent the AV from loading.
Download TDSSKiller from here for starters; I've seen this rootkit cause such behaviour.
Also run Combofix.

Nice one Bud
Although I need to get my hands on winzip to decompress the file

[flyerdave]

My experience over a number of years of building and maintaining my own Pc's leads me to think that many of these cleaning programs do more harm than good.

I have tried a number of them and nearly always, a few weeks later my windows system starts to play up as they tend to remove not only the stuff you don't want but also system files.

I have used a little program called "Window Washer" for a long time, each time my system boots up and this gets rid of most of the crap that builds up each time you go on the internet or open up other programes. It realy does work without interfearing with system files.

I also tend to rebuild my system software every 6 months or when the machine starts to slow down as over time system files get corrupted or even lost.

Realy good advice is to keep regular backups of your stuff as your hard drive can fail for many reasons at any time.

I use AVG free and PC Tools firewall - some like them others don't.

[FarmerPug]

mcafee even though it costs £25 a year has never let me down, ive had my old dell laptop for 5 years now and the performance never changed

[teamster1975]

Pc repair and maintenance is a very subjective area which is why I tend not to get involved when it comes up in conversation.
Give us a shout if you need a hand plod

[flyerdave]

Pc repair and maintenance is a very subjective area which is why I tend not to get involved when it comes up in conversation.
Give us a shout if you need a hand plod

I agree, as each problem to do with computers needs individual attention, very few problems concerning performance turn out to have the same remedy every time:lol: