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I am cleaning up a computer for a friend. A newbie, obviously they have
downloaded anything offered (ie. spyware ...).
Major indications of the problems were slow (512 ram, 2.6 cpu), endless
popups and browser hi jacking.

Their anti-virus subscription was obviously expired for some time.

My steps:
- installed norton AV - scanned, removed/quarantined all viruses
indicated, repeated with several other AV and other viruses removed (35+)
- installed search and destroy and ad aware and all indicated problems
removed (150+)
- ran hijack this and indicated problems removed (20)
- manually removed ebates, moneymaker ...
- removing "errorguard" next

Is there a simplier combined process to clean a desktop that is a total
mess?
I know I could have wiped the hdd and rebuilt ... except the newbie would
need to buy an operating system (compaq - restore disk only). This desktop
is only ~1 year old, scrapping and buying a new one is not a reasonable
option either.

Suggestions appreciated!

Burn anything he wants to disk and use that restore disk.

"someone" <> wrote in message
news:ySzBd.10650$ce6.8938@lakeread07...
> I am cleaning up a computer for a friend. A newbie, obviously they have
> downloaded anything offered (ie. spyware ...).
> Major indications of the problems were slow (512 ram, 2.6 cpu), endless
> popups and browser hi jacking.
>
> Their anti-virus subscription was obviously expired for some time.
>
> My steps:
> - installed norton AV - scanned, removed/quarantined all viruses
> indicated, repeated with several other AV and other viruses removed (35+)
> - installed search and destroy and ad aware and all indicated problems
> removed (150+)
> - ran hijack this and indicated problems removed (20)
> - manually removed ebates, moneymaker ...
> - removing "errorguard" next
>
> Is there a simplier combined process to clean a desktop that is a total
> mess?
> I know I could have wiped the hdd and rebuilt ... except the newbie would
> need to buy an operating system (compaq - restore disk only). This desktop
> is only ~1 year old, scrapping and buying a new one is not a reasonable
> option either.
>
> Suggestions appreciated!
>
>
>
>
>