Techie help please

[vector]

If you are a light user, ie, someone who uses the computer to surf the net, play a few games, check email and that kind of thing, you aren't going to need a heavy duty IT grade antivirus and firewall. The average user probably has a better chance of being struck by lightening than being hacked, and really you just need something that scans incomming files and email for viruses, trojans and that kind of thing.

Oh, thank god somebody else has said it! Too many people are too frightened of what's going to happen to them without a firewall or antivirus running 24/7.

I regularly turn the whole shebang off if I'm playing games, and the only thing that's ever happened is my computer... runs a bit faster. Terrifying.

[Jelenedra]

Really? I just got Avast and it said I had one of them too. 

[veilchen]

Same here Blue. Avast found several things that McAffee overlooked. I guess it was busy popping up on my screen every five minutes telling me the trial expired and I should really now go and buy the premium download for upgrading purposes.

One of those trojans was found in the 'windows' file, and I'm worried about just pulling it. I wish I were a little more computer savy, sigh.

Trepie, I didn't have any problems with zone alarm. It does have an issue with avast, but avast gives you a work-around tutorial that is pretty easy to follow. Believe me, if I can do it, you most definitely can. If it starts annoying me and becomes the devil in disguise, as Liegenschonheit says, I will yank it out again, but so far so good.

I just checked my spybot because I was curious about immunized spyware numbers to-date. I was quite shocked when I saw that it had blocked 8500+ problems so far. Those trackers might not be dangerous, but they should stay the hell out of my computer.

[BlueSoup]

Yeah, I am pretty positive it came with an Internet Optimizer, which I had a horrible time trying to remove but I was finally able to with Microsoft Antispyware.  I was aware of this program in my Program Files, but it would never let me delete it and none of the programs ever said anything about it, so....STUPID BLUESOUP!    This program won't seem to be deleted, so next it's disconnecting the Internet and running all the programs again.

Veilchen, I know next to nothing about this stuff, it's a wonder I can even turn it on.    But nectere is helping me (gotta love her).

[veilchen]

Blue. If I knew as little as you claim you know, I would still be ahead of the game by miles.

Maybe it would be a good idea to get in line behind you. ...ahem...Nectere?

I ran the avast program as a boot scan, and it found several nasties. The last one was a trojan in the windows files. When I chose the "put into chest' action, a window popped up saying "this is a windows file, are you sure you want to remove it?"

Don't say that to me, because it intimidates me. I had visions of my whole computer exploding should I touch this infected file (well, not really, but you know what I mean ). So for now, the infected file is where it was. I don't like the idea though, I want my computer to be clean. Especially because I do a lot of work on it, should I lose that, I shall cry. I do save regularly to a storage hard-drive, but I can easily picture doing hours of research just to have the computer go wonky on me and lose all of it.

[BlueSoup]

I ran it as a boot scan too, and that's when it found this program.  HVAI.exe it's called.  It wouldn't let me choose to delete or escape or anything, so finally I just disconnected the computer and rebooted.  I do know that I got it from Internet Optimizer, and I do know that it's been on there a long while, since long before I was a regular on the Internet.

[Dark Trepie]

I found one is System Volume Information/_Restore/Whatever and yanked it like the rest.  Though I might be a little leary to go yanking stuff out of the Windows folder myself.

[Renatus]

When you know the name of a suspect file, it's a good idea to put that through a google search to find out what it is, both by itself and in conjunction with the name of the virus. You can find out a lot about what things do and what may or may not be safe to move, or if the file is just masquerading as an important windows file. I did that a lot when I repaired computers when I needed to know just how to fix particular problems.

[liegenschonheit]

Blue, it might have a self-replicating dll which means it will come back no matter how often you uninstall it. Those are always such good fun. It is important not to let yourself get too frustrated with it and do something hasty, like reinstalling your OS. That may be an option, but only after you've explored all others.


If you do a google search, you should be able to get some information and step by step instructions for a manual uninstall. I don't know how much you know about these kind of things, so I'll give you a warning just in case: if it says to go into the registry, read the instructions carefully and doublecheck filenames before you delete anything. And also, don't delete anything other than what the instructions say, even if it looks suspicious. It is always best to backup your registry before starting, just in case.

I did a quick search and found these instructions. It looks like your internet optimizer is adware.

With anything you guys are unsure of yanking, Renatus offered the best advice ever. There are databases out there that list what a dll is and what it does, so you know for sure it isn't important before yanking it.

[BlueSoup]

Thanks for all the links guys.    It *appears* that the file is gone, after 4 different scans and a reboot with no Internet connected.  I do know where the file was kept and I looked and it is indeed gone.  Whether it comes back or not is a different story, but I have never been able to get this file folder to disappear before either.

I'll definitely keep this link bookmarked in case it does come back.

Edit:  I also looked through the link you gave me, Motoki, and followed along with the instructions and the files it said I would have with this are not there. 

[nectere]

I think it might have been calling to the internet, I have had some replicating trojans that do that, nasty buggers. Its always best if you can disconnect the internet and run your scans, boot scanning is best if you have a virus scanner that supports it. Blue follow the instructions to get avast and Zone Alarm playing nicely together, and that microsoft anitspyware is a pretty good product, I have good success with it. (remember that trojan I got not long ago...)

I did do a search every where I could think of for the exe file Blue mentions and couldnt find anything, she went through the steps that I know and are known through searches and it looks like it worked. Once you get all your security programs set up to play together and you keep them turned on while at least you dl some program, it will stop the spyware tag alongs from coming in, in the future. Although, actually I didnt have to reconfigure anything to get avast and zonealarm to play together, it just works although avast isnt showing up in ZA's list of virus protection, but it isnt broke so I am not going to try to "fix" it. lol

[cwykes]

If I'm looking for techie info on PC cleanup jobs like this, I usually go here for info www.majorgeeks.com  I think this is a great place, so if anyone has any bad XP there, I want to know!   Reading that support forum has helped me a lot.  Like "what is all that crap in startup?".  searching on hvai.exe  didn't find anything there nor on www.symantec.com which is where I go for virus info.

I've got a cable connection with a firewall in the router.  I use AVG free version and I'm very happy with that. Plus I run sypbot and adaware occasionally.  My ISP provider is also doing a virus scan for me and keeps sending messages saying they've saved me from an e-mail virus.

[simmiecal]

I put Avast in and was quite amused when this popped up - alarms ringing and all:

[MistMeUK]

If your carefull and only download from places you know and trust then their isnt actually any need for a Anti Virus application at all.   Im a heavy internet user but I dont have any virus protection on my computers at all and I havent received any viruses trojems in a very long time, I havent even got any addware or spyware.   so, If your careful you dont need one.

and as for firewalls,  if you use any type of router setup you should be OK as nearly all have a better firewall than you can have on your PC anyway.

PS.  If you use any of the P2P programs such as KaZaa or Limeware or whatever then ignor what I sed because you definatley eed a virus scanner if you use them.

[vector]

I put Avast in and was quite amused when this popped up - alarms ringing and all:

I learned that system mechanic really doesn't like .package files. It deletes them wherever it finds them, while it's running through its "remove junk and obsolete files" stage. Heh.

Some pictures of what my game looked like afterwards:

Brandi Broke with her funky 010101 hairdo and mesh clothing.
Marylena Hamilton and her trendy black gloves and tights.

Plus all my textures crapped out on me. Deleting everything from my clothing downloads folder fixed the problem, which was odd since the problems were showing up in a clean game with no modifications directly applied to any of the characters. Just the presence of the (now corrupted) clothing files in the downloads folder make the textures freak out.

It *is* quite amusing that System Mechanic thinks the package files are obsolete junk, in much the same way Avast! thinks that the game's a trojan. The makers of these programs are clearly trying to tell us something.

[Sleepycat]

*giggles* SimmieCal I had it respond that way to zoo tycoon 2's exe on my other computer

If you haven't done it already - you can set it to ignore that "so called trogan"  - right-click on the icon in the taskbar/Program Settings/Exclusions (then Browse and select the .exe)