Topic: A friend has a problem.

[Shaz]

Hi all, :mg: Ive just been to my mates, his teenage son was messing around on yhe pc the other nite and since then its gone mad!!
Ok heres wots going on...
Hes running Windows millenium on start up he gets message RUNDLL Error loading C:/progra~1hotbar/hotbar/.DLL the system cannot find path specified.
He also gets numerous error messagess regarding shortcuts saying ' the shortcut...... refers to a location thats unavailable the location could be on a hard drive on your computer or other network etc.
His disc drive wont play cd roms and his printer scanner wont work  either ,message coming up..
This file does not have a program associated with it for performing this action create an association in the folder options.
To top it all when you try to access a lot of folders they wont open except in notepad with the message on the note pad'cannot be run in DOS mode'.
Im totally out of my league here, hes going on holiday on friday and is leaving the pc with me so ive got a couple of weeks to try and sort it all out for him, any one got any advice :help:

[Dack]

Virus(es). (Typical thing being the notepad problem)

Spyware.
e.g. http://www.pestpatrol.com/PestInfo/h/hotbar.asp

Possible registry corruption.

Download stinger from McCafee http://vil.nai.com/vil/stinger/ for a quick virus scan and Adaware www.lavasoft.defor the spyware.

Remember to perform both operations in Safe mode.

[Simon]

ive got a couple of weeks to try and sort it all out for him, any one got any advice :help:

Yes, don't offer to fix friend's PCs!  

I would imagine that the Hotbar thing was spyware, and someone has tried to remove it, which has buggered up other stuff.

My unprofessional advice would be to try running Ad Aware and Spybot first, to see if they can remove the remnants of Hotbar, then hopefully one of the techies can help with the rest.  

[Shaz]

Sorry guys forgot to say hes not on the net yet, so have to rule spyware out.

[Sandra]

Shouldnt be a virus or spyware if hes not on the net unless his sons had a dodgy floppy or cd in it  
Probably best thing to do would be a system restore to a few days back if it has only just started going weird  

[Simon]

You don't have to be on the net to get spyware, Shaz, but it helps!  You can get spyware and viruses by loading stuff from CDs, especially if they're not quite 'official', or perhaps he has a friend who has copied stuff onto CD for him, and kindly included a virus?

Edit:- beaten to it again.  I'll get me coat...  

[Dack]

e.g. http://www.doxdesk.com/parasite/HotBar.html

Bundled with Imesh and who knows how many other packages.

[Shaz]

MMM think hes had a couple of copied discs going, tried system restore sandra but it wouldnt let me restore any further back than teatime today, think i will wait till i get it here then can download some spyware programs onto it and see what comes up, thanks for the advice peeps ill keep you posted

[Hiatus]

If you haven't already solved the error on start-up, then it's probly because there's a program in the "Run" part of the registry.

Start, >Run, >regedit, go to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run

Delete anything that looks "suspicious"...

You should probably back-up ur registry b4 all this...just in case.

[measter]

if all else fails, ditch ME and get 98 or XP.

[Barra]

As a last resort, apart from a complete reinstall of window:-
If you have a ME restore disk rather than ME program disk, start PC, keep pressing f8 key until option screen appear. Select command prompt option I think it is.
Assuming HD is 'C',
type
c:windows\options\cabs\setup.
This will install windows over the old copy but leaves files etc intact.
I would mean updating windows, drivers etc as needed.
Hope this helps. A techie will soon tell me if I'm on the wrong track