Toshiba M100 hiccups with worms

I could be telling a long story on the predicament that I had been through as my Toshiba M100 had the worms thing that kicked in after my Windows Live Onecare expired. I was at work on an offshore rig for a month where I had no one to turn to and no disks of the useful sort that could get me out of trouble. All I had access to was the internet where I googled a lot on the symptoms and possible solutions to my laptop's misery. I found out and experienced first hand what it is like to be hit by worms. Two very important lessons I learned from the experience are:

1. Always keep your anti-virus definitions updated.
2. and obviously, never let your anti-virus expire.

One can be so slack with his internet security but at the very least, never ever let the antidote expire. I learned it the hard way and I hope anyone who reads this blog will just learn from this as well because I always thought that my internet habits are healthy and that I am not vulnerable to virus/worm attacks.. WRONG.

My M100 ended up with several symptoms a couple of which are the ones below:

• searching problems (indexing)
• msconfig hanging
• regedit not working
• task manager not working
• blue screen of death after using system restore - tried this a few times too
• and all other sorts of problems that came up later as I persevered to fix it.

To top up the problem I only remembered after a couple of days that my anti-virus had expired... Obviously it seemed like sometime in the past few days I disabled the nagging reminder for subscription renewal.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I found a forum that sort of explains how the virus/worms kick in when the anti-virus definition is not up to date or expired at the worse. Here is the link >> http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?t=154877

But before I mislead the reader with different thoughts on how I fixed my computer here is a list of services I did not have to be able to repair it.

1. I did not have services such as msconfig, regedit, task manager, admin controls and a couple of others do not run in normal mode.
2. Windows Live Onecare stopped or suspended.
3. Windows Installer does not run in any mode (safe or normal) - which means most installations can't be done eg.. virus scanners etc. but downloaded small third party programs like RegCure can run and finish off the job (maybe) if you register and give them a credit card number..
4. Anti-virus does not run on normal mode
5. moving files from one directory to another does not always work.
6. Even renaming of files and/or folders don't work.
7. There were a couple more but i will insert them here later as they come back to memory

Resouces I did not have:

1. No Vista Home Basic disk - was not supplied at purchase. Only the recovery disk which I ditched anyway.
2. An installed and running anti-virus program

Options I considered doing:

1. Purchase and reinstall from a genuine Vista Home Basic ( AU$285)
2. Upgrade to Vista Home Premium (AU$118)- idea dismissed after knowing that a fresh install of the original might be required.
3. Purchase System Mechanic (software) hoping that it will take care of everything.
4. Format and install XP Home Edition which I already have (genuine with serial number and all)
5. Run Norton Systemworks which I also have (genuine) and paid for - idea dismissed as well considering that no installation of softwares will work but I ended up using this later.

Options I have tried:

1. Downloaded and created a Vista Recovery Disc from neosmart only to find out that it is not a miracle cure. It's not even a useful tool if you don't have any backup disk or partition.
2. Downloaded and used a lot of patches from the net - with each and every one of them claiming glory for having fixed problems. None of them worked. Mind you, patches are like bandaid which can only be used for small cuts or wounds.
3. Pointlessly renewed Windows Live Onecare subcription (AU$99 - big mistake). Too late. The system is already too screwed for this microsoft thing to fix.

The solution that started reviving my computer:

1. Let anti-virus scan in safe mode and eliminate the nasties. (I got hold of Bit Defender trial)
2. Run msconfig from safe mode
3. Set to "diagnostic start up" on the general tab - this runs the computer with the services disabled, including the worm that was stopping things from happening.
4. Reboot to normal mode.
5. Insert Norton Systemworks CD ....and HERE's the TRICK

• > launch utilities from CD
• > run Norton Windoctor.... and fix problems using this utility.
• (note: this part does not have to be a Norton but any other utility that can launch operation without having to install to the hard drive)

At this point I finally got a computer that is almost running normal with the operating system fixed.

1. Opted to install Bit Defender instead of relying on Vista's in-built Windows Defender or Norton Anti-virus.
2. Updated virus definitions.
3. Scanned and cleaned

Now my Toshiba Satellite M100 has security like Fort Knox. I have 3 Anti-virus programs, 2 firewalls and one set of utility programs installed. Of course I don't let them work simultaneously because although they are all well meaning programs, they compete against each other and always prompt me to terminate the other.

Once again my Toshiba Satellite M100 gets another life.



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