Antivirus Problem that Will Scan a Non-Bootable Computer?

[Sam]

I have a neighbor who has a Dell Dimension 8250 computer with windows XP Pro
installed, using the NTFS file system. Sunday, he was unable to bootup his
computer, something about an error, press any key to reboot (he could not
give me the exact error message). I asked if he had a floppy in A: drive
and he said no. I strongly suspect that he has a lot of virus, spyware, and
trojans on his computer because it has been very unstable in the past few
weeks or so. Unfortunately his antivirus program definitions (NAV 2004) are
at least a month or more out of date (I suspect more like five to six months
out of date!!).

Are there any free or commercial antivirus programs available on a floppy or
CD (that can use current virus definitions) which are able to scan and fix a
windows XP Pro computer that cannot bootup into windows? Thanks for any
help, Sam.

 

[David W. Hodgins]

I have a neighbor who has a Dell Dimension 8250 computer with windows XP Pro
installed, using the NTFS file system. Sunday, he was unable to bootup his

If you scan this newsgroup, or alt.comp.virus, using google groups, you'll
find lot's of discussion about trying to scan ntfs file systems, from
a boot disk. Short answer is "may work, but good luck!".

See http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;305595
for info on creating an xp boot floppy. This should help determine if
there's anything left to recover.

Consider the possibility, that this may just be due to a dead cmos battery,
with the resulting loss of correct parameters for the hd. I'd check the
cmos settings, as well.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

 

[Robert Green]

I have a neighbor who has a Dell Dimension 8250 computer with windows

XP >Pro installed, using the NTFS file system. Sunday, he was unable
to >bootup his computer, something about an error, press any key to
reboot >he could not give me the exact error message). I asked if he
had a >floppy in A: drive and he said no. I strongly suspect that he
has a lot >of virus, spyware, and trojans on his computer because it
has been very >unstable in the past few weeks or so. Unfortunately
his antivirus >program definitions (NAV 2004) are at least a month or
more out of date I >suspect more like five to six months out of
date!!).

Are there any free or commercial antivirus programs available on a
floppy or CD (that can use current virus definitions) which are able

to >scan and fix a windows XP Pro computer that cannot bootup into
windows? >Thanks for any help, Sam.

At this point you really want to find out why it won't boot. The
partition will not be capable of being mounted for scanning, if there
is a problem with the partition tables, NTFS boot sector or Master
File Table - any of which is possible based on the information you
have given. Anyway, this kind of problem is virtually never
virus-related.

If you want a quick diagnosis on the booting problem, you can do this:

At the site in my sig download the FreeDOS version of the BootMaster
rescue disk - it is a self extracting floppy disk image - (the eval
version is free). Start your neighbor's computer with it. At the menu
take item 7 - Run BootMaster Diagnostics. Select the hard drive
involved and "Quick" mode. The diagnostic scan will create the file
A:\BM20\BMD00.TXT. Paste the contents into your reply.

Bob

Robert Green
BootMaster Partition Recovery
http://bootmaster.filerecovery.biz

 

[Larry Sabo]

I have a neighbor who has a Dell Dimension 8250 computer with windows XP Pro
installed, using the NTFS file system. Sunday, he was unable to bootup his
computer, something about an error, press any key to reboot (he could not
give me the exact error message). I asked if he had a floppy in A: drive
and he said no. I strongly suspect that he has a lot of virus, spyware, and
trojans on his computer because it has been very unstable in the past few
weeks or so. Unfortunately his antivirus program definitions (NAV 2004) are
at least a month or more out of date (I suspect more like five to six months
out of date!!).

Are there any free or commercial antivirus programs available on a floppy or
CD (that can use current virus definitions) which are able to scan and fix a
windows XP Pro computer that cannot bootup into windows? Thanks for any
help, Sam.

In addition to the other advice, test for bad RAM, too. Memtest86 is
good for that. The power supply can also be implicated in the recent
instability. I would also try a repair install using the CD.

Larry

 

[Sam]

TO: David, Robert, and Larry, thanks very much for your replies and
excellent information.

I just talked to my neighbor on the phone and he is taking his computer to a
computer shop for repair. He is very frustrated, so I guess I can't blame
him. I hope their techs are proficient because he does have some important
data on the primary HD he wants to keep.

Robert, made a brief visit to your web site and will definitely keep the URL
in my emergency repair folder, in case I need such a program in the future.
I have been very fortunate in the past, used Drive Image for backups, and it
did not fail me when needed (knock on wood!!). Now use PowerQuest V2i
Protector Desktop Edition. I think my neighbor will be much more interested
in current computer security protection and a data backup program when he
gets his computer back from repair! Thanks again, Sam.

 

[Conny]

I have a neighbor who has a Dell Dimension 8250 computer with windows XP Pro
installed, using the NTFS file system. Sunday, he was unable to bootup his
computer, something about an error, press any key to reboot (he could not
give me the exact error message). I asked if he had a floppy in A: drive
and he said no. I strongly suspect that he has a lot of virus, spyware, and
trojans on his computer because it has been very unstable in the past few
weeks or so. Unfortunately his antivirus program definitions (NAV 2004) are
at least a month or more out of date (I suspect more like five to six months
out of date!!).

Are there any free or commercial antivirus programs available on a floppy or
CD (that can use current virus definitions) which are able to scan and fix a
windows XP Pro computer that cannot bootup into windows? Thanks for any
help, Sam.

To solve all future problems about virus scanning, partitioning, access to
NTFS and Linux ext2 - ext3 filesystems and so on.....

Make bootable Windows-PE Boot CD, go to:

http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/

You can almost include any program you want, the boot-cd I have at the
moment contains McAfee Virusscan, McAfee Stinger, Partition Magic, MS
Explorer, Network support ( ehternet and ADSL ), Filemanager, Automatic
RAM-disk size, AD-Aware, Paint, Calculator, hardware probe programs, access
to NTFS, ext2, ext3, FAT32 filesystems, Nero Burning Rom, USB- Support,
VNC-Viewer, WinZIP, ..............it goes on

Can be burned on CD-R or DVD-R.

 

[Sam]

Conny, thanks very much for the web site URL. I just had a brief visit to
the web site and the Windows-PE Boot CD appears to have a lot of potential
advantages. Your CD has a lot of good programs on it! Thanks again, Sam.

 

[Conny]

Conny, thanks very much for the web site URL. I just had a brief visit to
the web site and the Windows-PE Boot CD appears to have a lot of potential
advantages. Your CD has a lot of good programs on it! Thanks again, Sam.

Yes there is some downloading to do from different sites, but in the endit
works great.

 

[FromTheRafters]

I have a neighbor who has a Dell Dimension 8250 computer with windows XP Pro
installed, using the NTFS file system. Sunday, he was unable to bootup his
computer, something about an error, press any key to reboot (he could not
give me the exact error message).

Two of our Dell computers (less then 1.5 years old) had harddrive
failures today. The tech, called in to troubleshoot and repair them,
told me that they have been dropping like flies. This is probably just
a coincidence, but your neighbors problem could be a harddrive
failure.

 

[Sam]

Thanks for the information, will pass that on to my neighbor. Sam