Help! My son's laptop has gone to the dreaded blue screen!

[MamaSheepdog]

Techno-Peasant MSD here...

Can any of you guys talk my son Firstpup through what to do to fix his computer?

If he tries to open Firefox or his email (or whatever) it will start to load, but after a couple of seconds it goes to the blue screen.

 

[MaggieJ]

Sorry I can't help... I'm a Techno-Peasant too!

 

[MamaSheepdog]

:choir: "I'm a Peasant, he's a Peasant, she's a Peasant, we're a Peasant. Wouldn't you like to be a Peasant, too?" :choir:

Okay- probably not. :roll:

But I now have a catchy knock-off jingle to keep me amused.

 

[LauraNJ]

So it starts up, works but when he tries to go online, it reboots?

That may be a virus. Tell him to restart in safemode with no networking and do a virus scan, the long, complete scan of everything. See if anything comes up.

 

[Frosted Rabbits]

I found threatening with a sledge hammer works.....

 

[Miss M]

So it starts up, works but when he tries to go online, it reboots?

That may be a virus. Tell him to restart in safemode with no networking and do a virus scan, the long, complete scan of everything. See if anything comes up.

:yeahthat:

If that doesn't clear it up, it may be a corruption in the browser. Is he able to use Internet Explorer? He could download a new copy of FireFox, uninstall the old, run CCleaner, and install the new.

CCleaner: http://www.piriform.com/ (These programs are awesome, and free. I use their defragmenter, too!)

If neither of these suggestions solve the problem, I would recommend he go to the MajorGeeks Malware Removal Forum: http://forums.majorgeeks.com/forumdisplay.php?f=35

Go to the Sticky called "Read and Run Me First". Do exactly what it says. Then post in the forum with the logs he gathers, and any information he can give. An excellent volunteer will respond when it is his turn in line, and will walk him through the rest.

__________ Fri Apr 26, 2013 7:06 pm __________

I found threatening with a sledge hammer works.....

:lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[mystang89]

My advice runs along the same lines as Frosted :comperror: :komp_cr:

 

[Miss M]

Sooooooooooo... any updates on the computer?

 

[TMTex]

I agree with Miss M's advice above.

But first, see if it's an addon that's causing the problem. Firefox has a "Safe Mode" and a "Reset Mode" that you can try.

Invoke the special modes by holding down the Shift key and opening Firefox. You'll see a pop-up window with both options. Try Safe Mode first and if that doesn't work, reset Firefox.

If both of those fail, you can download a new Firefox from a separate computer and copy it over with a thumb drive.

Good luck.

 

[Miss M]

But first, see if it's an addon that's causing the problem. Firefox has a "Safe Mode" and a "Reset Mode" that you can try.

Invoke the special modes by holding down the Shift key and opening Firefox. You'll see a pop-up window with both options. Try Safe Mode first and if that doesn't work, reset Firefox.

Cool! I have learned something new today! I knew about FF's other modes, but not about that way of getting there. Very useful info! Thank you!!

 

[palmettogirl]

If all methods fail, there is a way to take it back to factory settings. It will wipe out everything on the computer and will be just like you first bought it. I had a reboot problem once and tried all the safe mode and virus scans, and taking it back to a previous ck pt. etc. and this was the only thing that worked. It is one of the F keys. Can't remember which one but if you google how to take computer back to factory settings then you will find instructions. It actually was kind of nice except for having to reload Word, etc. but I had bought my daughter a new laptop and took hers as a hand me down (she surfs far more than I do) and I liked having all her junk off my computer so was not an issue for me to wipe everything clean.

 

[MamaSheepdog]

Hey everyone Firstpup here,

First off I would like to thank you all for your help so far.

So it starts up, works but when he tries to go online, it reboots?

That may be a virus. Tell him to restart in safemode with no networking and do a virus scan, the long, complete scan of everything. See if anything comes up.

There is another problem that I forgot to tell Mom about.
It is - and this applies to the second part of your post LauraNJ - that the scanning Process for McAfee has been disabled for 6 or more months. When I enable the task in "Windows Task Manager" it runs fine but when I select "run scan" in McAfee it shuts down the task, and says something like "Scan encountered an unexpected error". I haven't been able to scan my computer at all (the same thing happens when I boot in "Safe Mode").

If that doesn't clear it up, it may be a corruption in the browser. Is he able to use Internet Explorer? He could download a new copy of FireFox, uninstall the old, run CCleaner, and install the new.

CCleaner: http://www.piriform.com/ (These programs are awesome, and free. I use their defragmenter, too!)

If neither of these suggestions solve the problem, I would recommend he go to the MajorGeeks Malware Removal Forum: http://forums.majorgeeks.com/forumdisplay.php?f=35

Go to the Sticky called "Read and Run Me First". Do exactly what it says. Then post in the forum with the logs he gathers, and any information he can give. An excellent volunteer will respond when it is his turn in line, and will walk him through the rest.

I think that you are right with your "corruption in the browser" hypothesis, but I also believe that it is only part of the problem, because of the disabled scanner.
I am on majorgeeks now and following the info in the sticky. I hope that it will fix my computer, I will make sure to post the results here when I'm done.

If all methods fail, there is a way to take it back to factory settings. It will wipe out everything on the computer and will be just like you first bought it. I had a reboot problem once and tried all the safe mode and virus scans, and taking it back to a previous ck pt. etc. and this was the only thing that worked. It is one of the F keys. Can't remember which one but if you google how to take computer back to factory settings then you will find instructions. It actually was kind of nice except for having to reload Word, etc. but I had bought my daughter a new laptop and took hers as a hand me down (she surfs far more than I do) and I liked having all her junk off my computer so was not an issue for me to wipe everything clean.

That was in the manual that came with my computer. I followed everything that the manual said but sadly the final section wasn't in my computer. I would like to wipe all of the unnecessary programs and junk that have accumulated over the years as well.
I'll search online and see if I can find it, depending on the majorgeeks results.

Thanks again,

Firstpup<br /><br />__________ Mon Apr 29, 2013 10:59 am __________<br /><br />MSD here-

Miss M was getting an error report when trying to post in this thread, so posted it in the Mod Forum instead. I have copied and pasted her advice here:

Wow, Firstpup, you are right, this does very likely indicate an infection.

Good luck with your MajorGeeks scans! The volunteers have really helped me in the past. Most of the time, I'll do what I need to do on a computer, then I'll go through the Read & Run at MajorGeeks just to make sure I have gotten the computer clean.

Hopefully, TMTex or another IT pro type member will chime in again here... I recall being very unimpressed with McAfee's security, and with Symantec's program. And their security. Symantec, at least for a while, built up to this giant program with its tentacles everywhere. If you wanted to remove it, you had to treat it almost like a virus. It also bogged the computer down, hogging system resources. McAfee just didn't seem to stop much of anything.

It's been a while since I've had real experience with either, though. Hopefully, someone has more current information.

I have used Avast antivirus and Comodo firewall for years now, and have had no virus problems on any of our computers since I started using them.

If you do end up replacing McAfee, run CCleaner after you uninstall it. It cleans up all the leftovers left behind from the uninstalling of the program. These leftovers can interfere with the installation or the running of new security software.

 

[OneAcreFarm]

That your McAffee scan won't run tells me that you have some kind of Malware that is preventing it from running. Most malware targets McAffee and Norton, since those are the most commonly installed ones with PC's that you buy.

 

[Bill]

I found threatening with a sledge hammer works.....

I found actually using the sledge hammer and beating it into pieces makes me feel better, then order a new one!

 

[Miss M]

Testing....<br /><br />__________ Mon Apr 29, 2013 10:05 pm __________<br /><br />Haha... so I can post that, but not what I want to post. :?

 

[MamaSheepdog]

Hey everyone FirstPup here,

I have been on MajorGeeks forums and one of the admins is helping me. We have cleaned out a lot of stuff and my computer has stopped going to the "blue screen of irritation".

This morning I looked at McAfee's bandwidth usage pie graph and I found two new programs that were eating up a lot of bandwidth. So I shredded one of them and then tried shredding the other one (Because they had highly suspicious names and a lack of data in their properties). The first one shredded fine, the second one on the other hand refuses to go anywhere.
The name is "afbealg.exe". I posted all of the data on majorgeeks and am waiting on a reply.

 

[Miss M]

Hi, FirstPup!

Glad the blue screen is gone! :bouncy:

I did a quick search on that file name, and got... NO results! This is unusual, as I can normally find out about any obscure file on my computer. At the very least, I can find out what program it is associated with.

So getting no results is suspicious. I would think that it is malware or malware-related, but has assumed a random name in order to hide itself.

I'll be interested to see what the MG admin you're working with says!

opcorn: