How to Clear a bad system

Ok im seeing lots of posts on virus/malware/trojans and spyware so im going to write this up.

If you believe you have one of the previously mentioned programs on your pc you should follow the following steps.

1. Download:
Spybot Search and Destroy, http://www.safer-networking.org/index2.html
AVG http://www.grisoft.com/ or AVAST http://www.avast.com/eng/avast_4_home.html
Adaware, http://lavasoft.com/
Trojan Remover, http://www.simplysup.com/tremover/download.html

2. Install and update all programs.

3. restart the PC and boot into Safe Mode, to do this press F8 on boot up and you should be greeted with a menu, Safe mode will be at the top.

4. Run the programs in the Following order:
Spybot
Trojan Remover,
Adaware,
AVG or AVAST

5. This should clear out your system, restart your pc and everything should be back to normal, if your still having trouble there are other tools you can try,

run the Registry cleaner from "TuneUp utilities portable" http://softwareportables.blogspot. [...] 07999.html

this should fix any miscellaneous registry entries.

if problems persist then its a good idea to get a Hijack this log, you can find hijack this here: http://www.majorgeeks.com/download3155.html

run hijack this and copy the log into a post on this forum, hopefully we will be able to point you in the right direction, i cant write a guide for this since there are so many different variables involved.


6. Ok now for the good bit protect yourself in the future, you should run your favourite free antivirus in the background at all times. Spybot's immunity feature should help protect you from bad websites and to expand on this you should also grab spyware blaster found here: http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html

This will automatically protect you from bad stuff in the future and i would also recommend Spybots teatimer feature, which will prompt you if a program tries to make changes to the registry.