Need the type of help only an expert can provide...

So I'm turning to my favorite computer help site.

HP Pavillion 533w
Operating System Windows XP 2002
No service packs installed (by choice)

I'll start at the beginning so you get the full idea. A few months back Dec or Jan maybe my original hard drive started to run like crap and eventually died. I was unable to backup as my CD/DVD Rom wont burn anything either. SO I went out and bought and installed a new hard drive. Aside from losing a shietload of stuff because I couldnt back up everything ran fine. My server was SBC Yahoo DSL. I was using Norton Anti-Virus 05 after the install of the new hd.

Now June 1st I moved went offline for 2 full months as I had no connection to the net. Had the computer hooked up because my daughter played games on it. SOmetime in the middle of July I get a message saying that Norton has detected a virus while I was trying to open a Word document. What the heck? So I do a full scan and nothing turns up.

August 1st I move again and go with my local cable company as a provider. About a week into it, I notice I cant open MS Word at all. It just wont load. I remember the Norton incident from earlier this summer so I un-install Norton and then I can open Word with no problem.

The I go to update both SpySweeper and MSN Messenger and when I do, it says I have no connection to the internet. Then Firefox says it needs to update and then IT starts crashing and freezing the computer. I am now running MacAfee and it doesnt detect ANYTHING.

SO I finally call my service provider who tells me its NOT them and that I have a virus and to reformat. Thing is I have my cable, net connection AND phone service through them and the phone service is pretty much crap so I'm thinking it IS them.

Im loathe to reformat as I have approx 13 gigs of Smallville Episodes on here and I dont want to lose them not to mention a ton of Star Wars and music files.

I have run PC Dr. twice and other than saying I dont have a CD/DVD Rom drive everything is situation normal. Can anyone help me here?

 

In the other thread you started, you mentioned having SP2 installed.
*IF* you installed that yourself, and *IF* you had spyware/adware/viruses
on your computer that you had not caught, you could have those
types of problems. Before you try to reformat, remove SP2 and see
if the problems go away. If they do, then scan the living daylights
out of your computer for pests before you try to put it back on.
In the spyware forum here, there is a stickied thread full of free
scans that you can run.
Also, why not put a cd-rw on the computer. They are very cheap
right now and you could save your data in case of reformat.
Also, do you still have the old drive that went bad? Did you ever try
to see if you could drag the data off of that drive onto the new one?

BTW, I was not able to get SP2 to play well with my
hardware so I just deleted it and my computer runs fine.

 

I deleted SP2 about 6 hours after I insalled it as nothing would run with it on there, same goes for SP1.

Ive come to the conclusion that service packs are more trouble than they are worth.

No I didnt save the old hard drive as it was shot, as in didnt run at all and there was nothing worth risking transfgering the virus I had to my new hd.

And I still HAVE the original CD/DVD Rom on here. It will play things it just wont burn more than one thing at a time and it wont show up as being installed in PC Dr.

 

My point is to get a burner, so that you can back up your stuff
before you try a reformat.
But going by what you are saying, I would run the spyware scans
in the stickied thread in the spyware forum here.

At the very least, run some of the main scans like
Spybot S&D and Adaware SE.

Since you have been running antivirus
all along, you may be good on that front.

Also, are you running a firewall at all?

 

Just an fyi here, you didn't mention running any
anti-spyware/adware on your machine. If that is the case,
there is a *significant* chance that your computer is
loaded up with pests.

 

I dunno......This sounds like a ton of erratic behavior problems to me. Seems like pretty near everytime I work on a machine that has multiple oddities like that, it's usually a bad stick of RAM. If your lucky enough to have 2 ram sticks installed, try running with only one of them in the first slot. If same....pull that one out, then try only the other one in the first slot. I have seen bad RAM cause some weird problems. INCLUDING messing things up so badly, that it "appears" the hard drive had failed !!! The only problem is.....if it IS in fact a bad RAM stick, the machine may STILL not run 100% after you've found the bad one. You'll probrably have to reformat once more, to get things right again. Unfortunately WHY, is a bit over my head. But I'm guessing that bad RAM somehow screws up data when it gets written to the drive (amongst other things), causing just a general mess. Things I've experienced with a bad RAM stick: Lock-Up, blue screens, error messages, random "no boot-ups", self "shut downs", programs opening by themselves, programs not opening at all, drivers dissapearing, operating system not found, etc etc. Anyone else agree or disagree with my thoughts???

 

Err SpySweeper is a adware destroying program. And I have the purchased version not the free one.

 

Brian C, I agree with a lot of what you say there but I wonder about one
part. If you swap out ram and you still have to reformat, how would you
know it was really the ram? Reformatting fixes an awful lot of problems.
One time as a curiosity, I would put the old ram sticks back in
after the reformat to see if it ran normally. Or maybe even everytime,
just to see.

 

Yeah, I just spotted that a minute ago. My bad. But I will say, and practically
everybody here will back me up on this, that no one antispyware program
catches everything. Sometimes if you have a tough problem like that,
it can wind up being a bug your program doesn't catch. I run regular scans
with over a half dozen programs. And once in a while, each program
will catch a pest.

 

Well heavens to besty, how many different anti-virus and adware programs do I need? The reason I dont have several is because it slows my computer down horrendously. The reason I havent purchased a new burner is quite simple. Im a single mother working witha fixed income and that simply isnt in the budget. I did run the Bitdefender just now and there were a few trojans that got deleted. Unfortunately when I was running the scan I forgot to turn off my system restore. I have since shut it off and now Im running the RAV anti-virus. Im at the point now where Im tempted to just say the hell with it and reformat and lose everything, really the only thing hanging me up is losing the 38 episodes of Smallville I have on here.

 

It's not an easy process. Usually, you can "tell" which one is bad when you do the swapping thing. Machine will run "a lot better" with the good one in, and the bad one out. But still will not run 100% right, due to the data damage already done. It will probrably require SEVERAL reformats to get things squared away, between narrowing down the bad stick, and reloading the O/S and testing it out. I DO know that if it is bad RAM, and you get the bad one out, reformat, and all is well............Putting the bad one back in, will mess things up again, and the machine will need reformatting again !! I just went thru this a few months ago with someones machine. I was the third one that got asked to try to fix it. Had THREE sticks of RAM in it, and one was NG. I believe I ended up reformatting 6 times when all was said and done, just to positively narrow down the actual bad stick. Oh yeah, and I tried several of the "RAM Tester" programs out there, and none of them spotted it as bad.

 

I would hold off on the reformat. As far as the basic programs go,
Spybot S&D, Adaware SE, those programs don't really take much
resources. Certainly no more than spyware sweeper. BTW, how much
memory does your computer have?

All that stuff in that sticky thread is a royal pain in the butt to run,
but it will make sure your computer is oh so clean. I highly
advise you try at least most of it. You did say that you are already
finding trojans. I actually think that is a good sign. The more you find
and remove, the better the chance that your computer will be running
better afterwards.

 

Ah ha! I found a way to get back the episodes that I'm going to lose. So I guess I'll just reformat the dog. I do have a question about that. When I put in the new HD I used disks that HP sent to me to get it up and running. Now will I have to do that again or will that stuff all be on my recovery disk? Especially since I had turned it off before to run the scans?

 

Does anyone know?

 

Windows recovery console is not the same as recovery disks.
If you plan on doing a reformat/fresh instal, you need to put
the HP windows xp disc/discs in the cd drive.
Normally you just put the xp disc in and follow the prompts for
an install.

 

Well thats odd, Ive had to do a reformat about 2 weeks after I got this thing and I didnt need to put any discs in. Of course my computer didnt COME with any either. HP said everything was on the D drive. I just assumed that when I replaced the hd that the discs that hp sent to me at that time would re-set that part of my computer up?

 

You will never need those 7 or 8 disks again, unless you replace the hard drive again. The entire contents of those disks are in your Recovery Drive partition : HP_Recovery (D. So to reformat, you just hold down the F10 key when you see the blue HP Logo screen during bootup. That will enter you into Recovery Mode. Follow the onscreen instructions, and do a full "destructive" recovery. The Harddrive will reformat itself, and XP will reinstall. It will take less time to do than when you had to run the CD's after you replaced your harddrive, because XP will be installing TO the harddrive, FROM the harddrive!! Mutch quicker speed. But please note....I'm still recommending you look into possible bad RAM.

 

Well its wasnt a ram thingy. After the reformat everything is running smooth as silk. Thanks all for the help. Im going to go cry me a river now over losing my stuff.