System reboot...

[Rhyein]

Okay, my computer just got over the Sircam virus and I've had random restarting, and BSOD and random lock ups no matter what I'm doing. It was doing this before I got the virus and got worse after I got the virus, and now that the virus is gone, it still does it.

I have a pentium 3, 500mhz that's only about a year old. It just randomly restarts, and locks up, and gives me blue screen errors. I've tried Norton System Works, I've defragmented my harddrive multiple times, I've run system checks, scandisk, etc... The one thing that remains constant is that it always locks up whenever I try to run Norton Anti-Virus. It gets to about 8% or so and locks up or restarts itself.

It usually gets better for a while if I leave it off for a day or overnight or something, but then it lets me do whatever I want for an hour instead of for 10 mins. After about an hour it starts doing it again...


...Help?

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Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most.

[GBP]

A couple of things:

Are you SURE you squashed the virus? (I assume that you have downloaded the very latest data files for your virus program.) I just finished helping a friend fight the virus and he had to keep "disinfecting" his computer because the bug kept reinfecting his system. Do a clean boot from a safe floppy or CD and then run Norton.

One other thing. It is possible for Norton to be infected or corrupted by the virus. That means that you must uninstall and then reinstall Norton.

Start with what is obvious: You had a virus and you still may have one. Then look at any programs that may be running in the background (like Norton) that may be corrupted or infected. If you have a lot of programs running in the background, get rid of them, unless they are absolutely necessary. (In other words, Norton System works wants to put a ton of stuff in memory. Only allow the Anti Virus program to run in the background.) Make sure you do a Live Update in Norton to get the latest fixes and patches for System Works and Anti Virus. Hope this helps!

[MangMang]

i've had a similar problem with my current pc.

you didn't happen to use a partitioning program did you? cuz if u did - some of the errors which can occur from these windows based partition programs are HD errors, i.e. random shutdowns. if so, then your only option is to delete the current partitions and re-format your HD.

i hope it's not this though, good luck.



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Mark Burnett is the Devil...thank goodness.

[Paleo Pete]

OK, I agree that it's a good idea to make sure the virus is actually gone. Sometimes it becomes necessary to completely repartition, format and reinstall Windows to clean it up. I prefer to consider that a last resort, but keep in mind that it may be necessary.

The restarting problem existed before the virus, so I don't think it's caused by it, only aggravated by it. Spontaneous reboots are almost always caused by either heat or weak power supply, or both. Open the case and clean out all the dust bunnies, leave it open and run it with a small fan blowing inside. Make sure the CPU fan is clean and running. If it doesn't reboot after a day or two, you have a heat problem, start looking into cooling options. This can also be power supply, if it's an old machine and the fan in it is running slow. A second case fan might be a good thing too...

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[Rhyein]

My first reply didn't show up for some reason... but it said that my problem has been fixed. It wasn't the virus, it wasn't the power supply, it did have dust, but not enough to warrant this problem... No, it was the video card. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif I've replaced it and now it's working again. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif Thanks for the tips though.

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Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most.