Massive computer issues for me

CerebroJD

Join Date 01/2003

Massive computer issues for me

Yesterday I was surfing the net minding my own business, when all of the sudden I get a whole bunch of pop-ups. I began closing out of them, but one thing led to another, and somehow, I ended up installing something pretty dangerous I think. I think that because last night at 8 oclock our time, my computer decided to freeze up on my dad (while I was at work). So he restarted it, and now I cannot log into either of the two users on the computer. It simply freezes up before it has a chance to do anything besides display the "Loading personal settings..." dialog. Anyways, I tried to get in via Safe Mode to recover some of my data, but it still wont let me into my user. It will let me into the other user, but since all my files in my user are protected, I cant access or copy them to another computer on our home network. So this has left me in a fine situation. 1) No backups. (doh!) 2) No access to files. 3) Possible reformat on the horizon.

Oh yeah! I also ran three different virus scans from the other user, and all showed up with no results. Nothing new in msconfig that I could find, and when I did a system restore, nothing changed for the better.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what could have caused this monumental catastrophe? Any help would be appreciated. With luck, I will be able to figure out some way into the system, but things arent looking good at the moment.

CerebroJD crosses fingers

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Hey, don't like to spam but how do you edit a post?

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CerebroJD

Join Date 01/2003

If you have purchased a stardock product, then you should have a little piece of paper with a pencil on it in an icon beside the "quote" and "watch" buttons.

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CerebroJD

Join Date 01/2003

"The specific error code is 0x000006ba (The RPC server is unavailable.)."

I get an error when I try to run the file checker.

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Oh, thats why i can't edit. Heh.

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RPC Remote Procedure Call is supposed to be running automatically when XP starts. I don't know what it does but there is a whole zoo of components that depend on this service.

Background Intelligent Transfer Service
COM+Event System
COM+System Application
Cryptographic Services
Distributed Link Tracking Client
Distributed Transaction Coordinator
Error Reporting Service
Help and Support
Human Interface Device Access
Indexing Service
IPSEC Services
Logical Disk Manager
Logical Manager Administrative Service
Messenger
MS Software Shadow Copy Provider
Network Connections
Norton AntiVirus Auto Portect Service
Norton Personal Firewall Accounts Manager
Norton Personal Firewall Proxy Service
Norton Personal Firewall Service
Print Spooler
Protected Storage
QoS RSVP
Remote Desktop Help Session Manager
Removable and Remote Access
Security Accounts Manager
Shell Hardware Detection
Speed Disk service
System Restore Service
Task Scheduler
Telephony
TErminal Services
Unload Manager
Volume Shadow Copy
Windows Audio
Windows Image Acquisition (WIA)
Windows Installer
Windows Management Instrumentation
Wireless Zero Configuration
WMI Performance Adapter

If you can get to the Services Menu From the Adiminstrative Tools Menu you can manually start that service or if you can open Task Manager you can select a new task and enter %SystemRoot%\system32\services.msc /s. This will also get you to the Services Menu.

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this is the awesemest trouble shooting thread i've ever seen. good luck, i hope things work out for you cerebro..

i've had to go in under dos mode and manually move important data to another drive so i could reformate one and reinstall windows... i'll tell you, i'm real happy i just got this dvd burner for backups 'cause figuring out the folder structure with 8 character files names and abbreviations was hell to say the least.

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Boot into your bios settings and change the boot sequence, CD first, Floppy second and leave the system (or whatever) alone.
Exit bios, save settings to CMOS, place CD in drive and reboot system.
I should recover from there.
But being a pre-installed system anything could happen ..... and you really should have created a basic boot floppy rescue disc.
20/20 hindsight is always the best but I'd never buy any sort of box with an OEM system.
At least you can boot from the XP disc and run repair and recovery from there, as much as I dislike paying up a lard wad to Microsoft it does have some advantages.

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dell sends a good cd out with their pcs. I have one and it should work for you. Another thing that you should do is install the recovery console once you get everything back and running. Its just about the same as dos and it acts as its own operating system.

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you can make a bootdick that will read NTFS drives and if you have a second drive handy you can install it and copy over your graphics and such that your needing to keep... the do a restore...

bootdisk.com

http://www.bootdisk.com

read, read and read again... do exactly what it tells you to do and you will get your data back if not your system....

just think in linear though process and do things one logical step at a time...

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you can make a bootdick

Come,come, IP!

This is supposed to be a 'family' site ...

A "bootdick"??????
Really!!

Now ... that could be a really small boot or a very big .... Wombat bites tongue!
[Message Edited]

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ah, well if he messes it up he could be mmm, dinked

ok ok, mmmm IPlural reconsiders typing tutor on 5 1/4, now if I could only figure out where I might have put that drive?

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HG_Eliminator

Join Date 07/2002

+354

ok stop dinking around an les get back to the topic at hand....

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Alright, as much as i'de like to agree with you, i'm going to have to disagree. I heard recovery console takes like a day to do. Also, if you think for 1 minute that this guy unforteuntly didn't back anything up, he most likely doesn't have anything that important on his computer, if he does it will be a lesson to him as it has been to most of us atleast once. Now i know im being harsh here, and im sorry but for all we know seeing we don't know this guy in real life he may just not want to have to rebuild his hard drive and think's we will find him a way to fix it. I'm not even sure if he has recovery console, and i believe that the software is quite exspensive. If you send it out to a company, it's hundreds of dollars to fix.

So honestly, I have no clue what you have on your comp, but even school assignments can be redone.

Also, i'm sure you have a printer and have everything that you've probably done printed out.

As for having passwords on your computer, well that's just plain stupidity for the fact of being lets say backdoor trojanned. Anyway, I think you should just rebuild your computer, if you want to waiste time and try recover console go ahead, but honestly, even if it work's i doubt your gonna be able to save much work. Saving stuff in this type of a situation can take day's, and it might not be worth it.

Anyway, that's just my oppinion.

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I heard recovery console takes like a day to do.

you heard wrong. It takes about 25 minutes to install and once its installed you have the option to start into that insted of windows during boot. Recovery console is part of windows xp. you can install it from the disk. all it does is act like you had put in a dos boot disk.

And Çërêb®øJÐ how are things going?

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Huh, i may be confused but "a dos boot disk" alright, are we talking about recovery console to recover data from your hard drive, or reformatting.

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I think Justin is off re-loading his system...that's what I would be doing. I asked about a boot floppy earlier because I thought he may have corrupted his login system files and sure enough it gave him 'error code is 0x000006ba (The RPC server is unavailable)'. This error is for User authentication in any number of proggies...XP itself being one. Once that's cooked on a system, you're done. It will not let you do anything. The only way to transfer files to an un-used drive is thru Dos and then you will be transferring corrupted files as well. If he transfers the files back to the new install, he runs the risk of frying it again...

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yrag, yep it was noticed and part of why I've been mum. BootDisk.com will enable him to boot to the NTFS partition and also open a Dos based " Net /use " connection to one of the other systems, or to put a second drive in the system and pull what files he wants off of it.

Net /use is your friend....

http://www.computerhope.com/nethlp.htm
AVAILABILITY
The net.exe command is an external command that is available in the below Microsoft Operating Systems.

Windows 95
Windows 98
Windows NT
Windows ME
Windows 2000
Windows XP

----------

ABOUT NET

The net command is used to update, fix or view the network or network settings. Listed in the Syntax we have listed each of net commands for additional information and examples see our Syntax section

read, read, and read again...

[Message Edited]

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Odds are that he will need to re-format the system (IMO). Not sure if the utilites at bootdisk.com will allow access to the NTFS partition from DOS (didn't look that hard at the site).

The following app allows you to boot in DOS and access an NTFS partition.

http://www.soft411.com/company/Active-Data-Recovery-Software/Active-NTFS-Reader-for-DOS.htm

This will allow you to back up any data you need (as yrag and IP mentioned, you should not attempt to back up and restore any system files). I've had to use it once...and it was a life saver.

Oh, and it's free.

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ah well

I just hope he gets what he is needing in the end so I'll keep me fingers off the keyboard for this one...

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I was bumming around on the internet looking to fix a little problem of mine, and ran across some information about how your rpc could have been hacked. It looks like the safest thing to do is reformat. If you don't there is a good chance that the virus is elsewhere on your system and will come back. You could try to save some of your files, but you run the chance of the virus being in them too. Since you said that you had all of the popups at once, I think that a) you didn't have your firewall on or

somebody bypassed it and got into your system. A likely culprit is windows messenger if you hadn't shut that off. So back where we started, I'd say that if anything on your computer isn't vitally important I'd just reformat and then reinstall windows. And when you install make sure you aren't connected to the internet so you can get all of the security stuff (like turning on the firewall and disabling messanger).

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gets what he is needing

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And when you install make sure you aren't connected to the internet

I agree and when you do....update firewall definitions and anti-virus software first

disabling messanger

disabling the messenger service (another must do)....has nothing to do with Windows or MSN Messenger which you can still use

all of the popups at once

http://www.panicware.com/product_psfree.html Pop-up Stopper. It's Free

http://www.safer-networking.org/index.php?page=download Spybot Search and Destroy. Also Free

http://www.lavasoftusa.com/support/download/ AdAware. Again Free

Also go to http://www.grc.com they've got a couple of little proggies to plug up some bad holes, you can test your firewall there, and they've got directions on the right way to configure your network so that you aren't leaving yourself vulnerable with file sharing and printing

Another thing you can do if you are using IE6 is set it up to ask whether you want to save cookies or not. Goto Internet Options-->Privacy-->Settings-->Advanced.
(Check) Override automatic cookie handling
First-Party Cookies (Accept)
Third-Party Cookies (Prompt)
(Check) Always allow session cookies
My preferences....someone else may use other settings.

Most of the Third-Party stuff tends to be spyware crap. You could have it (Block) all Third-Party Cookies, but when I go to a site, I like to see what kind of stuff they're involved with and I don't buy, sign-up or use sites with lots of pop-ups and third-party cookies, unless I'm ready to get lots of spam.

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CerebroJD

Join Date 01/2003

Hmm. I managed to get into my Event Viewer in Administrative tools. Apparently, when those pop-ups showed up, some aspect of the Remote Desktop Connection was activated. Thats looking to be the source of my problems possibly.

you didn't have your firewall on

We have a router with a built-in hardware firewall.

somebody bypassed it and got into your system. A likely culprit is windows messenger if you hadn't shut that off

So....how do I disable this?

Travis, your suggestion is to back up and reformat? Is there any way I could avoid this? I dont want to lose all the skins I've d/l from here.

If you believe this to be the best course of action I will do it, but I would like to avoid it if at all possible.

ps: Sorry about being gone for so long. Saturday was really busy and I dont get on the computer on Sundays.

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I believe that backing up is the best source of action, but I am sure there are alternatives. However since it appears that somehow your system has been messed up whatever happened before has a higher chance of happening again if you don't reformat and reinstall. Right now I am in the process of reformatting and reinstalling. Luckily I do have access to windows and nothing serious is wrong, just a buch of annoying little things. I have been making backup cds for almost a day now so I can save all of the stuff like skins and music that I want to. My suggestion is for you to take the same course of action. If you can't move stuff onto cds, you should at least find a place that you can move them to and they will be safe from the reformat.

You can shut off Messenger in a couple of ways. The easiest is when you are installing windows, but once you have windows installed you can disable the messenger service.

And no firewall is complete safety, unless you have an industrial cia issue one.... with a normal one its very possible for someone to break through...its just a lot more difficult than if there wasn't one.
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