DOH, A Thousand Time DOH!
Our youngest is a college student working two jobs to support herself and still keeping her GPA up and boyfriend in line. Right after graduating high school she found an apartment and has been out on her own ever since. We are very proud of her!She lives in town, a few miles from us and we get to see her often which is a great comfort to us.
Another nice thing about her living so close is that when her laptop craps out Daddy is nearby. You see, Daddy has done courses in multimedia programming, desktop publishing, web design and PC repair. I even have a few years experience in IT and was webmaster for a major US Navy command for a couple of years. That’s right…….I is a educated redneck who started building and repairing computers in the early 90s and would still be doing so if it weren’t for the fact that you can buy a new laptop…….with a warranty…..for less than it costs to build a system these days.
Why am I rambling on like this?
Mini Boss lets her friends play with her computer. She has smart friends for the most part. However, even smart people do dumb things sometimes.
The MINI BOSS called last night to announce that her laptop is dead……..kaput…..tits up…..game over…….BUSTED! The system locks up during the boot sequence and a whole stack of error messages pop up!
What to do, what to do?
Bring it here, Baby Girl.
After fooling with it for a couple of hours I finally pulled up my Dell account, prepared to put another dent in my credit limit. Damn, I thought I’d get those people paid off some day! While I was going through all the options for a new Inspiron 1500 series it hit me………A THOUGHT!
Smart people do dumb things sometimes. maybe someone downloaded a virus that got through the security software……..
I saved the machine I was building online, ran a web search for “System Check”, the title on the error message bars, and I discovered that she has a malwarre infection………and the name of the malware is SYSTEM CHECK!!! I even found instructions for fixing the problem and links to download the free software I’d need. WOO-HOO! I’m saving at least $600!
But I still have the new Dell system order saved……..just in case.
This is me, on page 5 of 9 of the instructions (almost 3 hours in) taking a photo of a functioning laptop (my Toshiba satellite) which is staring at a soon to be functional…..I hope……. laptop (Mini Boss’s Dell). I’m bored out of what’s left out of my mind because, while I successfully installed the anti-malware software, the deep scan has been running for 134 minutes and I have to jiggle the mouse every 20 minutes to stop the Dell from hibernating. I’d turn the power saver off but I have to kill the malware before I can change the settings!
At least 512 malware objects have been detected and quarantined……..so far. I can’t wait to click that “REPAIR” button!
A word to the wise: NEVER, EVER ,EVER, EVER click a pop up that says ‘”Your computer may be at risk! Click here for a free System Check.” System Check is malware and it will screw your registry up worse that a soup sammich!
