A call for help!

Photo Engineer · Apr 23, 2010

I am running Windows XP Service Pack 3 but not the Enterprise Edition.

On Wednesday, my computer downloaded the newest version of McAfee virus protection which had a bug in it. My computer crashed within an hour.

Now, McAfee has a fix which is beyond my resources to install, but the local "geeks" say they must reformat and I must reinstall all of my software and recover the book and DVD information piecemeal.

Everything appears when I restart the computer, but nothing "works". There is no Task Bar, and there are no system services.

The dealer insists that the problem is not as McAfee states and yet the behavior is as if it were and I am stuck with probably a month or more of "fixing".

Everything is backed up but it is the time that will kill my work schedule.

I'm asking if anyone out there has any suggestions for a repair.

PE

photomem · Apr 23, 2010

From reading McAfee's fix, they want you to remove the dat files without uninstalling the product. I would suggest the following:

Restart the computer.
Immediately upon the first screen going away, begin pressing F8.
When the startup menu comes up, choose Safe Mode.
A Basic version of Windows should come up. Uninstall McAfee.
Once that completes, restart the computer and reinstall McAfee. It should download the new Virus definition files.

If that does not work, it is completely botched up. Format and reinstall might be the only way out.

LyleB · Apr 23, 2010

My understanding from reading about this was that simply uninstalling McAfee will NOT fix this problem. You must laboriously follow McAfee's step-by-step proceedure on each and every computer affected. If it was as simple as uninstalling, they could do a batch, but the warning is that there is NO batch solution.

Sorry, but my understanding is that you need to find someone who can follow the proceedure outlined by McAfee. What I read said it should take about 30 minutes per computer to correct.

Linux rocks!!!

Photo Engineer · Apr 23, 2010

I have no internet connection with that computer and so I can do nothing.

I cannot even run most programs. Others that do run warn me that I have no permission to "change" them or save data. There is no task ownership.

And, the "geeks" say that this fix from McAfee will not work, but another company says they can fix it. IDK. I'm still working on it. More news later and thanks.

PE

Mike Wilde · Apr 23, 2010

For this very reason I keep a CD of knoppix hanging around.

I'm not very Linux proficient, but it can be very handy to configure the firmware to boot from the CD, and then sniff around.

My build likely does not support USB keys though, so perhaps this should give me the drive to update my boot backup.

wfe · Apr 23, 2010

Best thing to do is Ghost the machine prior to installing anything. That way you can fully restore it to the pre-installation state.

wclark5179 · Apr 23, 2010

Next time try Apple. They are great for photography.

Q.G. · Apr 23, 2010

There probably will indeed be a saved state of the machine prior to the installation that's not too old.
The question is how to persuade Windows to restore it.
And i'm sorry, but i don't know...

Photo Engineer · Apr 23, 2010

The saved state was there, but SVCHOST was disabled and the restore would not work. I had images and backups but nothing would work and it took special tools to overcome the problem.

A small local company fixed it in about 4 hours. I seem to be back up and running! A big company here wanted to just reformat.

Thanks all.

PE

WetMogwai · Apr 23, 2010

I fixed that yesterday on a client's system. They had a lot of other problems compounding it, so it took about 5 hours. The solution ended up being to delete the C:\Program Files\McAfee\VirusScan\DAT folder and copy the svchost.exe from %SYSVOL%:\Windows\dllcache\system32 to %SYSVOL%:\Windows\system32. It was really quick and easy once I had all the other problems fixed. It took about a minute to do it all from a command line in safe mode.

Photo Engineer · Apr 23, 2010

That is exactly what was done on mine. Microsoft and McAfee both had utilities to speed this up and also the services had to be re-enabled, as the original problem shut them all down. That was the big problem.

I have since found out that over 100,000 computers in the US were affected by this goof. There is quite a bit about the problem on the internet.

PE

Sirius Glass · Apr 23, 2010

Photo Engineer said:
That is exactly what was done on mine. Microsoft and McAfee both had utilities to speed this up and also the services had to be re-enabled, as the original problem shut them all down. That was the big problem.

I have since found out that over 100,000 computers in the US were affected by this goof. There is quite a bit about the problem on the internet.

PE

Obviously proper testing and regression testing are not part of Micro$oft's and McAfee's processes nor their work ethic. Probably the quest for money exceeds their ability to do an honest day's work!

Steve

Q.G. · Apr 23, 2010

It's McAfee who messed things up, Steve. Noone else.

Ed Sukach · Apr 23, 2010

I had the *SAME* problem - immediately after McAfee was unintentionally installed. EVERYTHING was lost ... most notably Photoshop Elements, which was bundled with my Epson V500 Scanner.
My DVD Read-Write drive is down - it will read OK, but NOT write.
Gathering drivers wherever I can...

I've printed the message from "WetMogwal". I'll try all that tomorrow.

bobwysiwyg · Apr 23, 2010

According to the newspaper here yesterday, half the UofM Hospital Computers bit the dust over this. They 'claim' McAfee accidently identified critical files as viruses. Note: Our paper doesn't always get the details right. In any event, I hope McAfee has their checkbook handy.

lxdude · Apr 23, 2010

I'm glad I don't have McAfee anymore. Whew!

I keep a boot disc handy to run from, if the machine's boot files are compromised. A friend has been telling me I should get a disc with Ubuntu or something so I can boot and run from a non-Windows disc.

WetMogwai · Apr 23, 2010

I typed that from memory. It isn't exactly right. Here is the page I got it from.

http://service.mcafee.com/faqdocument.aspx?id=TS100969

OldBikerPete · Apr 23, 2010

PE. Now that your computer is running as you want it. Get a copy of Norton's Ghost. This makes a complete sector-by-sector copy of your hard disk as it stands NOW. The ghost image has to be written onto a drive which you probably should use for nothing else and is visible at boot time. I suggest a USB drive of sufficient capacity. Part of the 'Ghost' software is a bootable CD which starts up a primitive operating system- just sufficient to restore the ghost image to your hard disk.
Once you have a ghost image and the means to restore it, you are bullet-proof. You can restore your pristine system anytime you need to.
You then only need to decide how you will protect changes to your system after the date the ghost image was created. Write a new ghost? Make a backup of the changes? Generally, if you install new programs (or uninstall them) you should write a new ghost image. New data should be backed up. Oh, and it's a good idea to write a new ghost image onto a different disk to that containing your current ghost image - for a number of reasons.

And, yes ditch McAfee antivirus, this is not the first horror story i've heard involving them. I use Trend Antivirus.

Peter.

WetMogwai · Apr 23, 2010

Ghost is easy to use, but Clonezilla is much more flexible for disk to disk copying and free. I like Ghost when I want to make a CD or DVD image of a system, but when I want an image file or a duplicate drive, I use Clonezilla.

Sirius Glass · Apr 24, 2010

Q.G. said:
It's McAfee who messed things up, Steve. No one else.

Both are guilty of pushing products out the door without fully testing. Let's keep the thread on track, though.

Steve

Worker 11811 · Apr 24, 2010

Mike Wilde said:
For this very reason I keep a CD of knoppix hanging around.

I'm not very Linux proficient, but it can be very handy to configure the firmware to boot from the CD, and then sniff around.

I vote with Mike on this one. Knoppix or any version of Linux or even any operating system on a bootable CD/DVD. You can pop it in your drive and boot off the CD drive instead of the internal hard drive.

From there, you can either rescue your important data by copying it off to a USB hard drive then wipe and reinstall or you can attempt to fix the problem by hand. Once you are done, you remove the Linux (or other) CD and reboot the computer back into Windoze.

A lot of people seem to be afraid of reinstalling their operating systems but I don't mind. It can be a pain in the a$$ to do but, for me it's the only sure way to know that you have licked the problem. I usually do a backup, wipe and reinstall of my entire computer once every year or two, just as preventative maintenance.

Since you said you already have all your important data backed up, you shouldn't have too much trouble.

Just wipe the drive, reinstall and be done with it. This way you are 100% certain that McAffee isn't going to screw you up again.

Q.G. · Apr 24, 2010

Sirius Glass said:
Both are guilty of pushing products out the door without fully testing. Let's keep the thread on track, though.

I was trying to get it back on track, Steve.

Photo Engineer · Apr 24, 2010

OldBikerPete said:
PE. Now that your computer is running as you want it. Get a copy of Norton's Ghost. This makes a complete sector-by-sector copy of your hard disk as it stands NOW. The ghost image has to be written onto a drive which you probably should use for nothing else and is visible at boot time. I suggest a USB drive of sufficient capacity. Part of the 'Ghost' software is a bootable CD which starts up a primitive operating system- just sufficient to restore the ghost image to your hard disk.
Once you have a ghost image and the means to restore it, you are bullet-proof. You can restore your pristine system anytime you need to.
You then only need to decide how you will protect changes to your system after the date the ghost image was created. Write a new ghost? Make a backup of the changes? Generally, if you install new programs (or uninstall them) you should write a new ghost image. New data should be backed up. Oh, and it's a good idea to write a new ghost image onto a different disk to that containing your current ghost image - for a number of reasons.

And, yes ditch McAfee antivirus, this is not the first horror story i've heard involving them. I use Trend Antivirus.

Peter.

Peter, thanks. I have a copy of Ghost and I used to use Norton but had more problems with Norton than McAfee until this one. In fact, I have met Peter Norton personally at COMDEX and I have talked to him on the phone several times. Since Kodak was a big customer of Norton, we could get through to him until his time became too limited to "chat" with us. Nevertheless, his Anti Virus caused a lot of problems.

The problem in this recent case though was that USB services were cut off by the actions of this problem. So, Ghost would not have helped. The only thing that ran was the hard drive and the DVD. They apparently had to do everything manually. The desktop was there but either programs would not run or would not allow you to do anything to data.

There was no easy solution to this one!

I wonder what McAfee is going to do to make up for this goof. Maybe they should pay for my repairs.

PE

Ektagraphic · Apr 24, 2010

wclark5179 said:
Next time try Apple. They are great for photography.

How efficiantly do they process film?

Changeling1 · Apr 24, 2010

Here's one solution-

P.E.-

GET YOURSELF A MAC!!!

A call for help!

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