mam91031

I thought I had my spyware and viruses solved, but now the computer will not boot. After following the windows startup troubleshooting from microsoft, I found that it had a problem loading a tsr. I thus followed the directions and stopped the following autoexed.bat files from loading: CD C:\windows, Call C:\windows\command, and C:\windows\win.com\wx. The first caused the computer to stop at C:\windows, while the other two would cause a reboot cycle. Any ideas? Should I leave them unselected? I then had to reinstall my internet because?

AVG found that shell32.dll has changed. Should I be concerned? Plus, Zone Alarm was installed, but now it mentions a windows\temp\vsinit.dll error. I tried to manually uninstall as their website suggested but it didn't solve the problem. One of the steps was to go to https://getca.verisign.com to reset root certificates?, which no longer exists. Would this cause other problems? Since I cannot complete the suggestion, I planned on installing another firewall rather that keep trying for days on that one. Lastly, I have issues with my active X controls. I try to update windows but it mentions "software update incomplete." I have added trusted sites, changed active x settings, but nothing has worked. The active x settings also makes me unable to use housecall or panda scan. One more thing why would it mention that sending stuff on internet could cause problems, and would you want it to keep mentioning it later or something to that effect.

Hopefully you may shine some light on some of my issues.

Bartender

mam -
Maybe this is just me, but it kinda sounds like you're just trying things in a willy-nilly fashion. I certainly wouldn't just go into auto.exec and start turning stuff off if they were working before. Can you post a link to the instructions that told you to do that?
From my admittedly limited experience, this sounds like failing memory to me. Try running memtest or, if you have more than one stick of memory, placing just one stick at a time in the #1 slot and seeing if the PC runs OK.

If nothing else, running memtest will tell us that it's NOT your memory and we can move on to other things. If you're not familiar with memtest, look on the download page for either the floppy version (DOS - Windows) or the thumb drive version (DOS - Windows).

EDIT: I re-read your post - if you were hammered by viruses and thought you'd cleaned them but the PC's still goofed up it's probly not hardware. You may have to retrieve your personal data with a Linux LiveCD then re-install.

mam91031

The article is from microsoft help and support, here's the link: <http://support.microsoft.com/kb/188867>.
I will try that mem test as well. Anything regarding my other questions in paragraph #2?

Bartender

You've got so many weird things going on at once. It sounds like a real mess. Since your error messages don't ring any bells, about the only thing I could suggest is to retrieve your data with a Linux LiveCD and re-install the operating system.
That's probly not the best advice. Someone a lot smarter than me could probly wade thru it and get you going again. Have you asked over in TSF's spyware section? Since the problems are very likely related to the malware situation you mentioned maybe someone over there would have some ideas.

Jeepers, that's a complex Microsoft help page. If I had the PC in front of me I'd probly work thru the list one by one. It would take me hours!

This won't help you right now, but I suspect you're using Internet Explorer and probably Outlook Express? If you get this PC running again, I'd strongly suggest switching to Firefox and Thunderbird. My malware problems have disappeared since moving away from IE. (Where's some wood to knock on?)
Another thing - who's your ISP? I have no proof of this, but firmly believe some ISP's (MSNMSNMSN) are more dangerous than others. If you're signed up with MSN or AOL you'd probly be safer with a smaller ISP like Copper.net or even a local ISP.
Oh, yeah, free anti-virus for Win98 is getting awful scarce, but some friends are using ClamWin and seem to be happy with it so far.

OldGrayGary

Hi again mam91031 (& Hi There, Bartender)


Is your system OK now?

If not, read on:

I looked over at your thread in the Security section, and your system looks pretty clean as of that last post there.

If you have access to a Win98se (Windows 98 2nd Edition) installation CD, you can run an over-the-top reinstallation, that - when successful - does not result in the loss your current programs and personal data (documents, music, pictures, etc.). An over-the-top will likely solve much of the trouble with autoexec.bat & shutdowns and such. Before you start that procedure, copy down your current product key, because that is the legal key for your system = you'll want to continue using that.

Any ZoneAlarm verson newer than version 4.5 is just a pain to run on a Windows 98 system. I think Reid in the HiJack forum mentioned that he runs Commodo, and has had good luck with it. You could try that. Of course, do try to uninstall ZA (while offline) beforehand as well as possible. And, in your case, a run of CCleaner might help if the ZA uninstaller can't finish it's work. You may have to manually delete the ZA program folder if an uninstall has halted prematurely, and then run CCleaner to catch the mismatched entries. Your system is an exception to the current rule of our not recommending Registry Cleaners (especially since you may follow up with an over-the-top).

You'll likely get new version root certificates when you visit Windows Update after the over-the-top.

Here's a copy-and-paste of a guide I made a while back for Win9x in-place reinstalls ("over-the-top") ---
=============================

Windows 98/Me "Over-the-top" Reinstall

Sometimes an over-the-top reinstallation of Windows can be a timesaver. On most recent computers the whole procedure can take as little as 30 or 40 minutes. A nice feature of this procedure is that your programs do not have to be reinstalled, and your data is not lost. You likely will need to visit Windows Update when finished, though, to download and reinstall some of the Security Updates. [Windows Update still works for Windows 98/Me, even though its period of active support by Microsoft expired in mid-2006 (all the updates up to that point can still be found there)].

Beforehand:

You may need to temporarily disable the Bios virus protection that is found on some motherboards (if your motherboard does not have this feature, you can skip this step). Enter Bios Setup by pressing the key displayed during startup, and somewhere on the first or second menu should be an item to Enable or Disable Bios Virus Protection (might be called BiosShield, or VirusGuard, or whatnot) ---> then, when you're finished with your reinstallation of Windows, re-Enable the Bios protection feature.

On some systems, and over-the-top will require your CD-key (Windows 98/Me product license key). [This is often on a sticker either on the case, or on the original CD]. If you've lost your CD-key: before you start the reinstall look for it by starting regedit from the Start/Run box, then navigate to the key (you navigate in regedit like you do in Windows Explorer) HKEY_Local_Machine/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion . . . if you click on "Current Version", you should see a list of keys and values in the box displaying on your right. One of these will read "ProductKey" and will consist of 5 sets of 5 alphanumeric characters = your CD key. Be careful when in regedit just to look at things and not make accidental changes.

During the reinstall, it is also a good idea to be entirely disconnected from any networks, wired or wireless (unplug ethernet cables, disable wireless), and to be disconnected from printers, scanners, cameras, multifunction devices, fax machines, PDAs, memory card readers, USB flash drives, external USB/Firewire/SATA drives, etc.
____________________________
Over The Top ReInstall:

Place your Windows98/Me CD in the CD/DVD drive (or be ready to point Windows to the place on your hard drive where your Windows 98/Me installation files are stored).

Boot with a bootable floppy or CD - "with CD-rom support", and from DOS rename the win.com file to win.bak. Like this

C:
cd \Windows
rename win.com win.bak

If you have the Windows 98/Me CD in your CD/DVD drive, you can then switch to the drive letter of your CD drive [often drive D:], simply by typing the drive letter followed by a colon ( for example - D: ) at the command prompt.

If you have the Windows 98/Me installation files on your hard drive, switch to that location (which is often C:\Windows\Options\Cabs - by typing cd C:\Windows\Options\Cabs ), and start setup (by simply type the command: setup)

*** When Windows asks if you want to use the directory C:\Windows.000, instead choose Other and type in C:\Windows (without the .000 following) ***

Make sure that you have your antivirus, antispyware, and firewall running before you connect to networks afterward. Don't forget to visit Windows Update ASAP to get the Critical Patches that need reinstalling.
=======================

Best of luck
. . . Gary