Computer Crash

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AkCoyote
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Computer Crash

Post by AkCoyote »

On Dec 31st my computer crashed. It wasn't just any ol crash but a virus that erased my local settings file. Without that, I couldn't even get it to boot. To make a long story short, I put in another hard drive and operating system and tried to access my old drive. ACCESS DENIED became the buzz words. Had no choice to to reformat the old drive and use it for storage.

There went over 100 pages in WORD of the recipes that I've been putting together :cry: Morale to the story is BACK UP YOUr COMPUTERS so it doesn't happen to you. XP is great but don't rely on the Restore feature. That's what triggered the virus.

AkCoyote
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Re: Computer Crash

Post by Guest »

AkCoyote wrote:On Dec 31st my computer crashed. It wasn't just any ol crash but a virus that erased my local settings file. Without that, I couldn't even get it to boot. To make a long story short, I put in another hard drive and operating system and tried to access my old drive. ACCESS DENIED became the buzz words. Had no choice to to reformat the old drive and use it for storage.

There went over 100 pages in WORD of the recipes that I've been putting together :cry: Morale to the story is BACK UP YOUr COMPUTERS so it doesn't happen to you. XP is great but don't rely on the Restore feature. That's what triggered the virus.

AkCoyote
I went through the same thing a couple months ago, I just went through it again 2 weeks ago as well. I thought I was over-cautious. I scan with Norton, Spysweeper, spybot, adaware, AVG, and Microsoft's new Beta1 a minimum of 3 times a day (no exageration), and i still manage to get something major about 3 times a year.
knuklehead
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Post by knuklehead »

Sorry to hear that AK. I just went through almost the same deal only I was not dealing with a virus, just a new operating system boot failure. I put in a second HDD as well, loaded my old operating system again and managed to access and recover all my files.
... I say God bless you, I don't say bless you ... I am not the Lord, I can't do that ...
Dane Cook
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Post by Guest »

knuklehead wrote:Sorry to hear that AK. I just went through almost the same deal only I was not dealing with a virus, just a new operating system boot failure. I put in a second HDD as well, loaded my old operating system again and managed to access and recover all my files.
A friend of mine has a CD that has some version of Linux, that he can run right off the CD incase he ever has problems with XP. He has used it once with plenty of luck, no need to install another HD.
AkCoyote
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Post by AkCoyote »

That's a UBCD (Ultra Boot CD) that you're refering to and I have a copy. The problem is that my setting file was deleted and without that it's impossible to access your personal files because to the computer, you no longer exist. I was able to access the old HD but everything in the personal folders was ACCESS DENIED. Two firewalls, Norton Antivirus, Spybot, Stinger, and Adaware and I still got a virus.

AkCoyote
knuklehead
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Post by knuklehead »

Ever think all those security companies are the ones releasing the viruses?
... I say God bless you, I don't say bless you ... I am not the Lord, I can't do that ...
Dane Cook
Fourway
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Post by Fourway »

I've used nothing but mac os, linux, bsd and solaris on my own computers for a great many years and I have never been victim to a virus.

Meanwhile I spent a good many of those years working to take care of systems and networks that used windows and toed the microsoft line and I've spent literally years of my life fighting virus outbreaks, malicious hackers, restoring lost or corrupted files and trying desperately to convince management to do things differently.


there are a few very simple things you can do (in addition to running fully up to date virus and spyware software) to significantly reduce your chances of being harmed by a virus or worm:

Number One: DO NOT USE OUTLOOK. Dont do it. stay away. remove it from your computer, put it in a box, burn it and have yourself hypnotized so that you'll be overcome with nausia and revusion when you see it's icon.
Either use only web mail or use a local client like eudora that the virus writers are not anticipating.
Number Two: Don't use Internet Explorer, use Opera, Mozilla Firefox, Netcaptor, Netscape... anything but IE.
Number three: Don't boot from your C:drive... if you have only one drive partition it so that it has a small C: that you can use for random crap and install windows on E: or F: if you have two CD/DVD type drives.
This one simple stupid change can ward off the ill effects of 80% of the bad voodoo floating around out there because co much of it is specifically looking for files to infect and corrupt in C: without any contingency for if they aren't there.
Number four: Back up your files. Get a large external hard drive, connect it only for backups and use it .
"a woman who drives you to drink is hard to find, most of them will make you drive yourself."
anon--
AkCoyote
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Post by AkCoyote »

Fourway:
We have at least 4 computers around here and I've been wanting to learn the Linux system. Is there a particular version of the OS that you would recommend?

AkCoyote
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Post by Guest »

knuklehead wrote:Ever think all those security companies are the ones releasing the viruses?
The people that put the viruses out there want to do anything possible to ruin microsoft and to get people to stop buying microsoft, that's why most of the worms and viruses attack all the holes in microsoft products.
Guest

Post by Guest »

AkCoyote wrote: Is there a particular version of the OS that you would recommend?
http://www.freebsd.org" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

Its the base of the #2 computer OS - Mac OS X.
Fourway
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Post by Fourway »

AkCoyote wrote:Fourway:
We have at least 4 computers around here and I've been wanting to learn the Linux system. Is there a particular version of the OS that you would recommend?

AkCoyote
Fedora Core 2 (core 3 is out but video card support is incomplete) for a complete system with a very good desktop, complete suite of applications (all free) and support for daily software updates.

just to check out linux and get a feel for it try knoppix. it runs entirely from CD.
Another CD distribution worth checking out is Mandrake Move which stores all your files and personal preferences on a usb key.

FreeBSD mentioned above is also a decent way to go but it tends not to be as slick as linux.
"a woman who drives you to drink is hard to find, most of them will make you drive yourself."
anon--
Fourway
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Post by Fourway »

Anonymous wrote:
knuklehead wrote:Ever think all those security companies are the ones releasing the viruses?
The people that put the viruses out there want to do anything possible to ruin microsoft and to get people to stop buying microsoft, that's why most of the worms and viruses attack all the holes in microsoft products.

Um... not really... they go after microsoft because it's security is poor and it represents 99.9 % of the desktop systems in use.
They are mostly bored underemployed young eastern european hackers and they'd attack whatever was easiest and most common no matter what it was. Its a game to them.
"a woman who drives you to drink is hard to find, most of them will make you drive yourself."
anon--
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Re: Computer Crash

Post by Professor Duck »

knuklehead wrote:Ever think all those security companies are the ones releasing the viruses?
There's no need for them to bother, there's enough wankers doing it for them.
Anonymous wrote:I went through the same thing a couple months ago, I just went through it again 2 weeks ago as well. I thought I was over-cautious. I scan with Norton, Spysweeper, spybot, adaware, AVG, and Microsoft's new Beta1 a minimum of 3 times a day (no exageration), and i still manage to get something major about 3 times a year.
It's weird how some people get so many virus attacks and some people don't. I only started using AVG about 6 months ago, and for about 5 and a half years before that I used no virus protection. I've only ever had 2, maybe 3 viruses ever.
Image If Leonardo da Vinci had a video camera.
Jaxom
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Post by Jaxom »

heh, only one virus in 15 years online...and that was on a monitor's driver diskette! Love the heck out of linux, but not enough software to suite me out for it......yet. So I run a Bastille linux firewall to my router and then all my ms stuff behind that....

FYI avoid the heck out of P2P software like Kazaa or voice chat's like Pal talk... Also, if yer not gonna use netmeeting, dump that too, big security holes in that piece of junk!

Jaxx
Fourway
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Post by Fourway »

and for the time being disable system restore.
when microsoft fixes it so that virus writers cant use it as a boobytrap you can have it back.
"a woman who drives you to drink is hard to find, most of them will make you drive yourself."
anon--
AkCoyote
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Post by AkCoyote »

Yup. Restore is what got me. I just can't figure out where the virus came from. Virus definitions wereup to date as well as being behind the server firewall, XP firewall and McAfee firewall.

I'm going to check out Linux and put it on one of my other computers to see how it operates. Thanks for the suggestions Fourway.

AkCoyote
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