lsass.exe system error

[sheana]

My brother has an hp computer running WinXP. He called me this morning
saying his system was giving him all sorts of problems, i.e. when he clicked
on Windows Explorer, it wouldn't open. He then tried to shut down and reboot
the computer, but got a message to the effect that " the system cannot shut
down because the program is locked". He tried Ctrl+alt+del and no results.
He then just pulled out the plug. On bootup, he got the following message
"lsass.exe system error...".

Can anyone help with this? Is is some kind of worm or virus? Thanks in
advance,

sheana

 

[Ron Badour]

It sounds like an infection. Since the PC will not boot, the drive could be
slaved to a working PC and then use that PC's antivirus and malware programs
to clean the infected hard drive. A good malware program is: MBAM
Anti-Malware 1.34, which can be downloaded from here:

http://www.download.com/Malwarebyte...l-10804572&subj=dl&tag=button&cdlPid=10997763


--
Regards

Ron Badour
MS MVP
Windows Desktop Experience

 

[sheana]

By "slaving" the drive to a working PC, do you mean installing it in an
empty drive bay and setting the jumpers to "slave" to the primary C: drive?
I've never done anything like this before, so that's why I'm asking for
additional clarification. Thanks in advance,

sheana

 

[Ron Badour]

The way I do it is to sit the PCs side by side with their side panels
removed. I remove the ribbon cable from the CDRom drives of the working PC
and plug it into the hard drive of the non working PC. If by chance the
ribbon cable is too short, then you can try hooking the ribbon cable from
the infected hard drive into the secondary ide port of the clean machine.
Then I take a power cable from the working PC and plug it into the hard
drive of the non working PC. By doing it this way, you do not have to
change the jumper pins as the hard drive will be a primary device on the
secondary ide port. Then boot the working PC and select the hard drive of
the non working PC as the one to run the AV/Malware checks on.

--
Regards

Ron Badour
MS MVP
Windows Desktop Experience

 

[sheana]

Ron,

Thank you so much for the absolute excellent lesson on slaving a drive. This
is great stuff.

Regards,

sheana

 

[Ron Badour]

YW. This procedure sure beats formatting a drive and starting over when you
think the "nasties" have won

--
Regards

Ron Badour
MS MVP
Windows Desktop Experience