More Awesome Than You!

I had to do the uninstall/reinstall dance for reasons pertaining to a bad framework setup I was only recently aware of.

So about 4 hours into it, I'm exhausted & I accidentally gave the ok for EA to install origin on the lappy. I uninstalled it without any problem, however, I am unable to either install OR uninstall the stuff pack that I was installing at the time of this stuff-up. Despite having apparently successfully uninstalled it on several occassions, it seems to return from the bowels of my lappy to infuriate me.

The stuff pack (master suite stuff) was an impulse buy I have rapidly come to regret.

Is there any way to extract myself from this problem without an expensive visit to the nice people who sold me my lappy to return it to factory settings?

Try rummaging through the registry to nuke anything pertaining to the offending malfunctioning stuffpack. Maybe it will end up in a state that it recognizes nonexistence and lets you reinstall. But honestly, if you're talking about "returning to factory settings", you've already screwed up. Any new computer should always be wiped clean before use, not used as "factory spyware-infested settings". With lappies, you may even have to wipe the entire BIOS, because they install some Compujack tracer that lets them track anywhere your computer goes.

There's a step by step manual uninstall on EA's website, it's mostly registry clean up stuff. It's worked for me in the past.

Now that's interesting. I will investigate. If you just flash the bios as part of normal maintenance, does this get rid of the tracer?

The advice was useful. After much digging around in the bowels of the registry, I was able to eliminate the problem. Insert appreciative bleating.

http://www.freakyacres.com/remove_computrace_lojack

Make sure whatever Lappy you're getting isn't infested with this particularly insidious malware.