Alright, so for quite some time (I believe it first happened after going on a spyware-stomping binge) I have been getting this lovely message upon startup: It is followed by two more - another from regsvr32.exe with different hex numbers, and then another one, same type, from Explorer.exe. Explorer proceeds to crash, restarts, and everything is hunky-dory from there. I notice no other problems aside from when the machine starts. After 3 hours of some much-needed computer tuneups, including spyware cleaners, tweaking, editing boot.ini, removing unnessicary components, etc., I am still greeted by the message upon startup - although my computer runs much faster now. Anyone know what the hell this is? I'm running Windows XP Professional with SP2 installed, if that helps.
regsvr32 is something with object linking/ hyperlinking or is tied to it at least...I got this error message after tinkering a few months back...I believe after I used a recent restore point it went away....it should restore the pathway.
Best bet, (works great too on XP, namely as theres no more msconfig :/) Get "Hijack This" , run it (if you havent already), and you can play around w/ all the startup stuff and goodies, unregister DLL's etc.. should fix your prob! But be careful, you can screw your PC up even more If you could, run it and post a log so we can sift thru it!
Well, I'm no priest, but I do fix PCs for a living. Hope that's good enough! OK, let's take this step by step.... regsvr32.exe - well, simply put, it registers OLE controls such as DLL files and ActiveX controls. If you want more info, look here. OK, so what is causing this? Well, it could be a number of things, e.g. An application loading on startup with a corrupted file A rogue application trying to register itself on startup Faulty RAM I would say its most likely a rogue app. We could of course test this theory by turning everything off in startup to see if it still happens, but using msconfig on XP isn't always a good idea. Instead, go into safe mode (hit F8 before the Windows XP splash screen on bootup). Does it do the same in safe mode? Here's my favoured method of spyware/adware/other rogue removal: Part 1: Ad-Aware SE Ad-Aware is a great tool, so always start off with that. 1. Download it here. N.B. if you already have Ad-Aware 6 or Ad-Aware SE prior to version 1.5, still download it, and allow the installer to uninstall the previous version. 2. Start Ad-Aware and update (if it doesn't come up with a dialog box asking you to, click "Check for updates now" then "Connect", and allow it to download). 3. Run a full scan. Hit "start", then select "Perform full system scan" and hit "Next". 4. Once the scan has completed, your computer will fart (seriously)! Hit "Next" and it will show you a list of objects found. Right click, and choose "Select All Objects" and hit "Next". Allow it to remove the objects (it quarantines them in case you want to restore them). I recommend running Ad-Aware as often as you like. Weekly is a good minimum, but people often choose to do it daily, or more frequently. Always update before scanning, and do a full scan. Part 2: CWShredder Unfortunately, Ad-Aware still doesn't recognise all variants of CoolWebSearch. If you have a strange search toolbar in your browser (other than Google, Yahoo etc.), you may well have CoolWebSearch. 1. Download CWShredder here - the bottom download, for CWShredder on its own. 2. Click "Check For Update". If it finds one, allow it to install, and restart. 3. Click "Fix". The process is automatic, and will tell you whether anything was detected. Part 3: Downloaded Program Files Cleanup I assume you use Internet Explorer here - I don't know how this works for other browsers. 1. Go to the "Tools" menu and select "Internet Options..." 2. Hit "Settings..." 3. Hit "View Objects". 4. Here's the random bit. Look to see if there's anything you KNOW you don't need installed. Delete it (right click, select "Remove"). Anything that shows as Damaged, remove. Anything that shows as unknown is likely to be not important or rogue, so remove it (unless you know what it is). Part 4: HijackThis HijackThis can be an extremely helpful tool in the right hands, and an extremely dangerous tool in the wrong hands! Read the following carefully: 1. Download HijackThis here. Do not try to run it yet!! 2. Create a directory in the root directory of your hard drive. I recommend something like C:\HJT or C:\HijackThis 3. Open the ZIP file you downloaded (you will need a ZIP archive manager if you are running an older version of Windows e.g. Windows 98, such as WinZIP or WinRAR). In there is a file called hijackthis.exe - extract this file to the folder you just made. 4. Close all open browsers, Explorer windows (e.g. My Computer or any folder) and any copies of Notepad, then run HijackThis from the folder you created. 5. Hit "Scan". The main window will fill up with a list. DO NOT tick anything or try to fix anything yet!! 6. Hit "Save Log". A normal Save dialog box will come up, so choose where to save. OK, at this point..... GreatSaintLouis, you can send me the log file. PM me for my e-mail/msn address, or find me in IRC. Or, you could post the file in a reply/PM here ;-) If anyone feels adventurous, they can submit their log file to www.hijackthis.de and it will guide them on what may be good or bad. N.B. USE ANY INFORMATION FROM THAT SITE AT YOUR OWN RISK!! I find it good, but you never know... esp. as it has user submitted comments. If this doesn't work for ya GSL, we can try something else ;-)
Awesome. I had AdAware 6 running, but took your advice and upgraded to SE. My 0 malicious objects found skyrocketed to 428 upon my first scan with SE, but upon the reboot the messages were gone. Thanks!
I laughed at the thead's subject I can relate. It couldn't hurt to additionally try Hijack This too, it's one of my favorite tools.
Nah, I can do all that in less time than it takes to reformat ;-) Oh, I forgot... I run antivirus software after that if things still aren't ok/if I see something suspicious running with HJT. If Norton (or other AV app) won't open, or crashes or something, then I'll scan for virii first.
Yeah, antivirus came up good. And believe me, spending a bit of time downloading anti-spyware apps and rebooting a few times was a LOT less hassle than finding some way to back up all my important files (especially as I'm out of CD-Rs), refortmatting the drives, reinstalling Windows, drives, and applications, performing all my system tweaks, and putting all the documents back on. I know I'm due for a reformat sometime soon, and I cringe at the thought of having to set aside a day to do it.
I really don't get these people who think re-formatting their HDD is remotely easy option, or a mandatory annual task. The only times I ever did it was when I fooked up the partition table. Be warned - if you want Win95/98/DOS and Win2k/XP (+optional Linux) on the same PC, install the older one BEFORE, not after the new one! Ohh, that was not fun... I think yearly re-installs of Windows is also going too far these days. I know you kinda had to do it with Win95/98/ME (well, you probably should have just burnt ME on a stake) because something was bound to go seriously wrong at least once a year anyway, but with the newer ones, if you just keep up-to-date with anti-spyware programs, patches and AV, and try and keep the registry from going totally arse-ways, you should be OK indefinately. Just hope to God the new service packs don't break it! Are there any good programs around for sorting through all the crap that ends up in the registry?
Yeah, I could use a nice registry-cleaner program as well - when I was looking through there trying to sort some crap out, I noticed entries from programs I uninstalled nearly a year ago. Only problem is that most of the registry cleaners I'm aware of are commercial :smt009 - anything good in freeware land? And I'm not one to reformat every time something goes wrong, but I find it's a decent thing to do about once every two years or so - no matter how vigilant you are with spyware and such, you will invariably end up with spyware bits that cleaners don't take out, or leftover files from legitimate installs, or stuff windows leaves lying around from updates... You should see my college's IT department though. Comprised mostly of lazy students there on workstudy (which in this college is synoymous for "The school is giving me free money to do a half-assed job that students deemed to not be needing workstudy could do 10 times better"), they have the policy that rather than install effective antivirus programs (we have some ghetto program that I've never heard of that appears to not even be functional) or firewall software, they'd rather just reformat and reimage computers when there is a slight problem. :angry
