fatal virus problem... need help desperately

[crazymonkey]

Ok, here's the deal. I somehow got a virus that has disabled regedit, taskmanager, cmd, most command programs, and some other programs. It keeps lauching limewire over and over, and I can't go into task manager to kill the process, because it has been disabled. I have tried going into safe mode and starting regedit but that didn't work. I've done at least 10 spyware scans and 2 virus scans, one in safe mode. I have tried two regedit enable scripts. I do not want to format, so don't tell me that. I just want to know if there's anyway to fix this.

I repeat.. I don't want to format.

Any help appreciated.

[orionlion82]

i am not an expert in this area, but first, please have a look at the stickies,

there is a way to boot from a linux CD and repair your system, but thats over my head, and not guarenteed. there simply may be no way out besides a proper reformat.
"limewire" and viruses go hand in hand. chances are if limewire was on the drive, and a virus was on the drive, there may be other unsavory things on it as well. :welcome: :welcome: :welcome:

[redduc900]

You didn't mention which virus scanner you used, but I'd suggest running the free online virus scan from Symantec here...

http://security.symantec.com/sscv6/default.asp?productid=symhome&langid=ie&venid=sym

Once you find out which virus you're infected with, you can download the corresponding removal tool (also from Symantec's site) here...

http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/tools.list.html

[crazymonkey]

I've figured out most of the virus now, but the only problem left is that every time I try and open task manager it gives the message that it's being used by another file. Now, I've used an alternate process manager to try and close task manager but it doesn't seem to be listed. What could be using task manager and how can I close it?

[redduc900]

The following links may be of some help to you...

Allows you to enable or disable Task Manager for the Current User...
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_taskmgrenab.htm

Enable/Repair the Task Manager (Line #113)
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm

Troubleshooting the Task Manager
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_t.htm#tm

[NsOmNiA91130]

By the way, my stepdad uses limewire, and as far as I know, there are no spyware/adware packages that come with it. I use BitTorrent anyways :D

[CyberFed]

i deal with these types of virus on a daily basis at work, first open up your hosts file and clear out all the entries, as it's probably blocking access to the antivirus websites. Use the new spybot to lock your host file so no changes can be made. Run an online virus scan to find out the name of the virus you have and download a utility to clean it out. Use can also use the new spybot to see what processes are running as you cant do ctrl alt delete. You can use safe mode or a live linux CD to access the drive, look for weird files in your \windows directory, 99.9% of the time a weird .exe is there which is your problem. These are all too common viruses and can be quite tricky to remove for the first timer.
Oh yeah download microsoft antispware and run that too.

Basically we have a "holy grail" of products we use to keep computers safe:
norton 9 corporate, mircosoft antispyware, ad-ware, and spybot.
With those you'll never have a problem unless you are really trying hard to screw up your machine.

Goodluck.
Oh yeah welcome to forums
:welcome: