Brinson
Daemon Poster
- Messages
- 1,195
I've worked on several PCs that were eat up with viruses and adware. It usually takes a few hours, but I am able to clean them and repair them without formatting.
I have one I am working on right now... sort of. It is an old Dimension Something. No ethernet, so I can't just connect it and do my thing. The owner has not updated this thing in forever, and uses AOL. No antivirus, no firewall, no nothing. Her song downloads music from where ever. Windows is screwed up, and the restore partition won't work. I tried using a WinXP Home disk, but it can't repair it (missing file).
I have finally got it so it will run a full adware scan, but it takes over an hour, sometimes two (P4 1.4). I am too embarrassed to say how long I have had it sitting here. I am to the point I am ready to just toss it, or just format it and start over... if it will let me. Safe mode pulls up a blank screen, no task bar, no nothing. Argh!
I am actually setting up a PC for my mom and went with the free aol software. The new aols have a firewall and spyware built in. The firewall is decent and the spyware is...passable, but what I like about it is no choice- it just runs without you having to so much be at the pc. Good for older people or kids.
I'm actually a fan of AOL when it comes to software. Their service SUCKS, but if anyone knows how to make software that is **** usable its AOL. Once you gain a bit of net maturity it becomes overkill, but for the occasional user AOL is bliss. Some of the things they have in beta at the moment, too, show why they dominated the isp market for so long.