Malware & Safely Remove Hardware issue

I am attempting to clean up a friends HP PC which is running Vista 32 bit SP2.

I believe she has contracted a piece of malware by clicking on a photo in facebook (Is this a picture of you?). One of the symptoms is preventing the computer installing updates for Vista and Defender. I have downloaded the Malicious Software Removal tool from MS and I am running full scans on Malwarebytes, AVAST and spydoctor.

However, when booting up the taskbar icon for safely removing hardware always shows multiple drives attached (F,G,H,I,J,K,L) which all safely eject. I am wondering is there a way of preventing this occuring on boot up?

Also any experience of the malware issue would be very useful.

Hi-- Do you have Sata Drives ? Except for the virus, it sounds like an issue between your Sata and Nvidia Nforce Chipset causing your external USB to read internal (Something funny in the motherboard) :Try click on "System" in the control panel and click on "Device Manager", click on "hardware" tab, you should see SATA Drive under "Disk Drives". Click on the SATA Drive name. Click on the "Policies Tab". and you will see two radio buttons that could be ticked. If the top one is ticked, you won't have the USB Icon in the Tray because it is set for quick removal. If you have the bottom ticked, it is set for performance and you will see the USB Icon. You can do whatever you want however, SATA should already give you performance.....

Check to see if you have all your updates: Bios, Chipset

Hope this helps

However, when booting up the taskbar icon for safely removing hardware always shows multiple drives attached (F,G,H,I,J,K,L) which all safely eject. I am wondering is there a way of preventing this occuring on boot up?

that's an common occurrence with SATA HDD's running in AHCI mode aswell as if you have a card reader either built into the PC or via the printer ( with those drive letters I'm prety sure it's an memory card reader )

[QUOTE=Red;145486][SIZE=2]I am attempting to clean up a friends HP PC which is running Vista 32 bit SP2.

I believe she has contracted a piece of malware by clicking on a photo in facebook (Is this a picture of you?). One of the symptoms is preventing the computer installing updates for Vista and Defender. I have downloaded the Malicious Software Removal tool from MS and I am running full scans on Malwarebytes, AVAST and spydoctor.

However, when booting up the taskbar icon for safely removing hardware always shows multiple drives attached (F,G,H,I,J,K,L) which all safely eject. I am wondering is there a way of preventing this occuring on boot up?






Webroot Internet Security Essentials is supposed to be very good. They have a free trial available. A long time ago I had a simple version of Norton installed along with Webroot Spysweeper. Webroot Spysweeper filled in with additional scans to back Norton up. When the two ran together it wasn't a bad combination. Webroot has its own Antivirus it comes with recommendations from--PC Magazine, Network Administrators.

However, when booting up the taskbar icon for safely removing hardware always shows multiple drives attached (F,G,H,I,J,K,L) which all safely eject. I am wondering is there a way of preventing this occuring on boot up?

Could these be software generated virtual drives ? e.g. alcohol, daemon tools, etc.

You should scan your entire system, preferably with several different scanners. In case if this is malware, I would reformat the hard drive and reinstall the system.

@ Red which model HP are you fixing as there are several models that come with built in Card readers which show up as removable drives

@ Celestra Norton is crap sorry if this bursts your bubble but that has been my experience over the last 20yrs of fixing PC's if you want to recomend a anti virus/malware program then I'd suggest red uses Microsoft Security Essentials from Microsoft it's free and is one of the top 5 performers

@ Athlonite,

Celestra is talking about a combination used long time ago from now:

Originally Posted by Celestra

A long time ago I had a simple version of Norton installed along with Webroot Spysweeper. Webroot Spysweeper filled in with additional scans to back Norton up. When the two ran together it wasn't a bad combination

She does not claim Norton is the best security system. From my own experience, no security system can safeguard you 100%, and therefore any single security system can be called "crap". Even if it is Eset Smart Security 4 that I use now.