Un-official Software Help Thread

[xcrissxcrossx]

Post any software problems you have here and i will help with it. anyone else is allowed to help too.

[MSG]

I gots the ishost.exe virus how do I get rid of it without having to pay money for antivirus

[spoon]

Avg free edition is great, and takes up less system resources than commercial av packages (*cough*norton*cough*).

[LeonardtheDog]

There are many free, very very good anti-virus software suites available for your use. Due to the fact that I am using Linux, most viruses don't really affect my system. The ones that do, don't effect it very much, or for very long, as with Macs. I do know, from using windows, however, that if you Google for a free virus toolset, you will more than likely be satisfied after a small trial-and-error phase. I would recommend a specific toolset, but I have not used Windows in a while, and I do not wish to provide you with flawed information. One program that may help, in general, is a program called Ad-Aware SE Personal Edition. It is free, for personal use. I am not sure of its virus removal capabilities, but it does a good job *preventing* new ones. I know this was probably not the quick fix you were looking for, but I want you to find a solid toolset that will help you in the future. They are available, and many of which are free, totally. I hope this helped in some way.

[Kaniaz]

I gots the ishost.exe virus how do I get rid of it without having to pay money for antivirus[/b] Ctrl + Alt + Del > Processes > Select ishost.exe > End process

[MSG]

Ctrl + Alt + Del > Processes > Select ishost.exe > End process [/b] theres like 5 other processes and they all keep each other alive ... >_<

[Ynot]

Sysinternals have a program called Process Explorer http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilitie...sExplorer.html it's far better than the default windows process viewer as it will show you all the processes currently running and what they are doing (what other processes and files they are linked to)

[Kaniaz]

I love System Internals. They were bought by Microsoft, actually, and I say it&#39;s probably one of the best purchases they&#39;ve made with their bottomless pockes for a long time. theres like 5 other processes and they all keep each other alive ... >_<[/b] Try the Process Explorer. You will be able to kill them. Alternatively get Windows OneCare trial or something (sorry that I don&#39;t support Norton-Slow-Your-Computer-Down-In-The-Name-Of-Paranoia or Symantec&#39;s We-Are-Still-A-Company software packages, but hey).

[spoon]

Umm.. what will killing the process do? If it's a virus it'll just reload itself automatically, and if it's spyware it'll still be there when he turns his computer on/off.

[icuurd12b42]

I use avast! http://www.avast.com/ The home version is free and very effective. For viruses and addwares.

[Leixor]

AVG Free is what I use. Also if you are concerned about rogue processes/spyware/viruses transmitting information back over the internet (which you should be) then you should be running a firewall. Windows XP SP2 has one built in, though I cannot attest to it's effectiveness. I use ZoneAlarm (which is free) and have for years. If you were running ZoneAlarm you could go into the program control module, select the ishost.exe process and deny it access to all forms of internet communication. This doesn't solve the problem of having a virus, but it does prevent the program from phoning home, possibly stealing important information for the purpose of identity theft, or downloading more viruses. As for AVG, I really like it. The resident shield function which prevents viruses from infecting in the first place can be a life saver. I'm pretty tech savvy myself and I know when something is suspicious. I'm not the only one that uses my PC though. With a range of good free software security options available, it's really quite silly that people don't protect themselves. Lastly if you just want to run a virus scan without installing anything there are some free online scanning options available on the internet. TrendMicro has one and so does Symantec, as well as other companies. If you want specific information on any of the software I have mentioned I can provide it, but right now it's late and I am going to bed.

[Kaniaz]

If it's a virus it'll just reload itself automatically[/b] Code can't "run itself automatically" if it wasn't running to run itself, if you get where I'm going with this. It's really simple to do with Process Explorer - find ishost.exe in the list, "End Process Tree", it's killed with no chance to kick back in (although you can have hours of fun just clicking "End Process" and watching it spawn a new program), then browse to C:\Windows\System32, delete ishost.exe and ismon.exe and away ye go! Although you should probably look into why ishost.exe actually found its way onto your computer.

[spoon]

Code can't "run itself automatically" if it wasn't running to run itself, if you get where I'm going with this. [/b] Yeah it can. Look up tsr (terminate & stay resident) and resident viruses. Ending a viruses' process never stops it from working. Either its already embedded in memory and reloads itself automatically or it reloads itself upon reset. Even if you delete the files a decent virus will just reload them from somewhere else.

[Kaniaz]

Once again, no. Your antivirus companies might want you to think that it requires magical tools to kill a virus (and it does a lot of the time, which I'll get to) but not always. To "restart itself" it has to be running in some fashion somehow, which really means it hasn't even ended. Whether it's in your memory or a file or whatever doesn't matter - because if it's in any of those, it's pretty much guarenteed to be running and it isn't stopped. Viruses that 'infect' in some way don't even have processes in the "hello, i'm virus.exe in your task manager" sense. They are embedded in the OS, kernel, files etc. As far as I know, ishost.exe is pretty amateur and doesn't know how to infect files so it can 'run alongside'. At some point you had to actually run some program that had it. So when you kill it's process it isn't going to automatically reload itself because it's stopped - unless it's in your startup directory or there's another virus (which does happen) that will download it and run it again free of charge. Then it's a problem. To say it never stops a virus from working - although like you say it's a pathetic virus that does when you end the process - is just plain wrong. You could call a virus that runs in an .exe more like spyware or whatever, but what's the difference?

[MSG]

well foolish MSG was trying to crack some warez then the warez crack turned out to be some other fun program but I'll try the System Internals thang

[Tsen]

Yeah, Sysinternals=Good. It's one of my favorite programs on my flash drive. Another thing you might look at is HijackThis. It's a bit more labor-intensive than your average antivirus/antispyware program, but it's much more versatile. Anyway, I'd just listen to Kaniaz--close the process tree via Sysinternals, then go delete the .exe files. Get a good antivirus (Spybot Search & Destroy is good, Adaware by Lavasoft is good, and AVG is good. All of those are free, and I'd recommend downloading more than one--sometimes one picks up something the others miss).

[badassbob]

Does anyone know any good tutorial sites? I want to find one that will explain how to make forums in Dreamweaver.

[TweaK]

Does anyone know any good tutorial sites? I want to find one that will explain how to make forums in Dreamweaver. [/b] 1. Sadly, this is in the wrong topic. 2. Forums in Dreamweaver? Do you even know what you're talking about? Before you ramble random stuff like that, learn about HTML's capatibilities, and then stuff like PHP.

[badassbob]

1. Sadly, this is in the wrong topic. 2. Forums in Dreamweaver? Do you even know what you're talking about? Before you ramble random stuff like that, learn about HTML's capatibilities, and then stuff like PHP. [/b] 1) I saw a topic titled "Un-official Software Help Thread". I thought that this was a place that I could get help on using software (i.e. Dreamweaver). 2) No I don't know what I'm talking about, and I don't need to know. I basically wanted to find out if there was any way it could be done without learning everything there is to know - I thought that there may be a step by step tutorial that I could follow easily like the tutorials that have been made to learn action script in Flash MX. I had to start somewhere and this seemed like a good place, at first. So, thanks for the helpful advice.

[MSG]

o.o; http://www.crayola.com/ , my good sir. but yeah its kinda complicated... I've been learning php for over a month now and I'm not even close to knowing how to make forums. If you want an easy solution just install phpBB ... (ps: don't use dreamweaver)

[TweaK]

2) No I don't know what I'm talking about, and I don't need to know. I basically wanted to find out if there was any way it could be done without learning everything there is to know - I thought that there may be a step by step tutorial that I could follow easily like the tutorials that have been made to learn action script in Flash MX. I had to start somewhere and this seemed like a good place, at first. So, thanks for the helpful advice. [/b] You definitely need to know, sir. Don't think I was attacking you or something, sorry if I came off rude. If you don't know, you will get stupid replies like mine But err, no. Dreamweavers is kinda.. shitty? Yeah.

[Ynot]

don't mind tweak, he's Dutch where are you hosting your site? some isp's offer pre-installed forum packages are you lucky enough to be with one of these isp's? if not, do they have some sort of server-side scripting? (php, asp, cold fusion) if you don't know, ask them

[TweaK]

Yeah, don't mind me.. I'm just Dutch. *Stares at Ynot*

[badassbob]

Well thanks for the replies, but I've sort of given up for now. I might go back to MS Frontpage - it's just you can't make a site that really looks good with Frontpage. I never got round to hosting it though. Maybe I'll try phpBB like MSG said. Thanks for the help anyways.

[TweaK]

Well thanks for the replies, but I've sort of given up for now. I might go back to MS Frontpage - it's just you can't make a site that really looks good with Frontpage. I never got round to hosting it though. Maybe I'll try phpBB like MSG said. Thanks for the help anyways. [/b] You can't make a pretty yet efficient site with any application that creates HTML code for you. The best option is to learn HTML and type the code yourself.