[fiascoh]

Alright. I need some serious help with my computer, and I think I might have come to the right place.

I have some sort of nasty virus or bug or whatever, that's infected my computer. I'm fourteen, and I'm pretty good with computers, but this bug has been a REAL pain in the neck.

I constantly get pop-ups, mainly for so-called "virus removal" websites. Among these supposed 'removal' pop-ups are Windows Defender, Antivirus 2009, and Shield Deluxe. Of course, I simply close them and ignore their warnings. There have also been popups for white pages, horny matches (x__o), and several others. The virus-removal ones are the worst, though.

I ran a virus scan with Mcafee, and it detected nothing other than two Generic PUP's, which I simply removed.

And here's where it gets ugly. I'm not sure if this is possible, perhaps my computer just doesn't support it. But whenever I try to run a OneCare scan, it ironically freezes up at the screen where it begins the scan. I've used the Safety Scanner several times before, and have been pleased with its service. This time though, it would not run the scan.

This morning, I found an article on 2-spyware about removing the Antivirus 2009 bug. I did not find anything in my processes on the task manager, so I went to remove the file manually by going into My Computer and running a search. In the middle of the search, my desktop toolbar turned black, then returned a moment later but the window in which I was conducting the search had instantly disappeared. I opened back up My Computer, to see that the search was no longer there.

This has been very annoying for me, and the other users of this computer. If there is anyone who knows how I can remove this bug, I would greatly appreciate it. I am looking for the easiest, most efficent, and hopefully free way to remove it, so please recommend what you think is best.

Here is some additional information:
My browser is Internet Explorer 7
I have Windows XP, my hard drive is HP
I have owned the computer for 5+ years
My virus removal software is McAfee
I do not have a HijackThis log, but I can get one and post it if necessary.

Once again, any sort of help is very, very much appreciated.

[jmgraven]

Have you tried MalwareBytes Anti-Malware? It's what I use to remove Antivirus 2007/2008/2009 from computers. It's free. Download it, install it, update it, and then run a scan. Should work fine. The only downside is that it doesn't offer realtime protection unless you upgrade for $25.

You can get it here.

[fiascoh]

I actually found out about Malware Bytes a few hours after I downloaded, and it worked great! Thanks for the suggestion though. (: