Symptoms of a virus infection:

If your system has been infected by virus you may see some of these symptoms.

  • Your system might be too slow. You can realize this easily.
  • Some error messages occur frequently or your system might restart automatically
  • Some programs may hang when opened.

These are some of the things you will notice. If you notice these it doesn’t always mean that your system is infected.

So I will discuss how to cleanup your system. This is a general cleanup method, you can do it once in a week or month.

Tools:

All the above tools are free, and constantly updated to catch threats. You can download, install and use all at the same time. You should not have any problems.

Note: Spybot S&D has a resident protection function called teatimer. It might interfere with your antivirus or make your system slow a bit. I normally disable teatimer.

How to Cleanup ?

1. Backup all your important data. This is the first step because, if incase anything goes wrong your data will be safe.

2. Physically disconnect your computer from internet.

3. Use ccleaner to cleanup all your unwanted files in temporary folders. Ccleaner is a very small effective tool. Cleanup all files in windows temporary folders and your browser cache. [many viruses live in these folders]

some tutorials:

http://www.removingspywareforfree.com/article.php/Ccleaner_Tutorial_Page
http://www.ccleaner.com/help/tour

4. Turn off system restore. This is important because, if you cleanup malware ’system restore’ has a copy of it in its own hidden folder [system volume information]. So the malware is still in your system!

Turn off system restore for XP

Turn off system restore for Vista

5. Boot your computer in safe mode.

Restart your computer
Press F8 key repeatedly
A menu with a black background will appear
Use arrow keys and navigate to Safe Mode and press Enter

http://www.computerhope.com/issues/chsafe.htm

6. Do a full system scan with your antivirus in safemode. Also do a full system scan with MBAM, SAS and spybot S&D. Hopefully all viruses in your system will be removed!

7. Reboot windows in normal mode and create a new system restore point.

Advanced:

This method is for advanced users. If you are a newbie please do not try this. These tools are used my many users to find some hidden viruses or the ones which doesn’t show up in normal AV scan.

Tools:

How to ?

1. Do not use the above tools if you don’t know how to use it. Each tool has its own method. It is strongly advised to use these tools under guidance.

2. HijackThis [HJT] is an excellent tool. It shows a log from which you have to find out malware infections. It shows a list of startup entires, winsock entires, browser helper objects [BHO] , services etc.,

You have to google for the process name and find it whether it is legitimate or not.
These sites might be helpful for analyzing HJT logs.

http://www.hijackthis.de/#anl
http://www.systemlookup.com/lists.php

Here is a very good tutorial on understanding HJT entries:
Bleeping Computer

3. SDFix and combofix are powerful tools. use it properly under guidance. I think SDFix is not updated, but combofix is used in many forums. It is a very good tool.

4. GMER is a very powerful rootkit detection tool.

5. If you are interested in trying these tools, try them in a Virtual PC. I always do these tests in my Virtual PC because i can play as i wish.

Where to get help ?

For advanced troubleshooting of virus issues, you can get help from online forums. There are lots of forums doing it.[you can register for free and get help]

They provide a step by step removal instructions.

Here are some sites i like:
Bleeping Computer Forums
MajorGeeks Forum
MalwareBytes Forum

You can also get help from your respective AV forums. Kapsersky has a tool which collects system info and you can get help from experts in kaspersky forum.

I didn’t explain about each and every tool because there are already good and detailed tutorials on it.

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