Spyware Warrior

[Mayan]

After several days of intensive online research I decided to jump in and try to put some anti spyware on my system. I was directed to the Nestia website from the safer-networking.org site to download Skybot S&D 1.3. Immediately following the download, when attempting to Open the program, I got an error message that said the Setup files were corrupted and to obtain the program elsewhere (or something similar.)

I am a newbie making an initial attempt at trying to clean up my system. Needless to say, this message pretty well freaks me out. Does this mean I have a bunch of corrupted files on my system now, on top of everything else?

Do I have to uninstall Spybot before I can attempt another installation, or is it OK to try another installation elsewhere. Is it Skybot's setup files that are corrupted or something else internal to my system set-up files. I'm running Windows XP Home 5.1 SP1 Version on a Dell Dimension 8300 that is approximately 6 months old. How corrupted can it be? Please HELP
_________________
Dude, where’s my country?
~ Unknown

[TeMerc]

Hi Mayan, and welcome to the forums.

Here is a link to Spybot Search & Destroy FAQs. See if your answer is there.

I would first try the uninstall and reinstall. Its possible, tho, not sure how likely, you have malware on your system which has possibly corrupted the install.

Let us know how that works out.

And here is a link to the Official Spybot Forums if you feel the need to get a more direct line of support.
_________________

Ultimate Countermeasures Page
Calendar Of Updates
Malware Advisor Blog

[Mayan]

To TeMerc

Hi,

Thanks for steering me towards uninstalling Skybot after I received the message that files were corrupted on the download.

I uninstalled, and then downloaded Skybot from the Shinobi Resources website (which had a lot of other very interesting software available). This installation seemed to be more successful, and several of those stinkin’ Gatorware buggers showed up along with the usual DSO stuff, all of which were deleted. I left on files related to Wild Tangent and something called Alexa, until I know more about what those are.

However, since loading Spybot, I have noticed that when I boot up now, I get a message (from Windows, I quess) that says, “Can’t run 16-bit Windows program. Insufficient memory to run this application (but no application is specified). Quit one or more Windows application and try again.” Only, I just booted up. There’s nothing to quit. I believe this is a 32-bit machine (at least). I’m working on a Dell 8300, (P4 w H/T) with 512 MB Ram, and 63 GB free space on my hard drive. How can I be out of memory?

So far, I’ve just been ignoring this message, and things seem to be perking along OK. But what is my machine trying to tell me? Any ideas
_________________
Dude, where’s my country?
~ Unknown

[TeMerc]

OK glad you got Spybot problems figured out.

Read about Spybot S&D DSO problem here..


Now, about your other message, its possible you have a corrupted Dll file somewhere. Sadly, I am not very good at these sort of technical problems, but we do have another member of our admin team, 3162, and he is a whiz. I will direct him to this thread, and he will get you sorted out ina jiffy.

But please verify, I'm gonna guess your running Win XP, but Home or Pro, and XP SP1 or XP SP2? This info will help 3162 with diagnostics.
_________________

Ultimate Countermeasures Page
Calendar Of Updates
Malware Advisor Blog

[3162]

Just out of curiosity, what are your monitor settings?

R-click anywhere on a clear part of desktop, then click Properties.
At the top of the "Display Properties" applet, click the Tab for Settings.

What setting do you have for Color?
_________________
Proud member of the Chest Zipper Club!

[Mayan]

To: TeMerc & 3162

I have to say I’m blown away by you folks being so helpful. I’m extremely grateful!

I had read some about the DSO bug, so wasn’t surprised when it showed up on the SSD problem log. I think I’ll download the DSOStop2 program and Ad-Aware next week when I’m not quite so under the gun with work deadlines, and will have more time to deal with any further unexpected OOP’s.

To answer your questions, I’m running Windows XP Home Ver. 2002 SP1 (with most of the current updates, I think, but not SP2. I’m a little gun shy with that one—but that’s another issue.)

My Monitor & Color settings include:

Plug & Play Dell monitor
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 AGP 8X, 128 MB; IRQ: 16
Color quality setting: Highest (32-bit)
Screen refresh rate: 75 Hertz
Screen resolution: sorta towards LESS, set at 1024 x 768 pixels

Advanced:
Display: Normal size (96 DPI) Driver: M/S 5.1.2001.0
Adapter Info: Integrated RAMDAC; 128 MB memory size
Bios Ver: 4.34.20.22 BF
Compatibility: Apply new display settings without restarting
Hardware acceleration: None
Hides modes that this monitor cannot display: Checked
Enable write combining: Unchecked Color profiles currently associated with this device: None listed

See anything that looks suspicious? Seems like my old machine had some RGB color profile listed, but that was on quite a dinosaur, so I’m really not sure what may be normal settings on a machine actually manufactured in this decade.

Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions you may have to try to figure out the mystery message: "Can't run 16-bit Windows program. Insufficient memory to run this application."
_________________
Dude, where’s my country?
~ Unknown

[3162]

OK good, we appear to have ruled out your monitor.

However, just to be sure, R-click My Computer, Click Properties and then TAB Hardware.
In the new applet, click DeviceManager.
Expand each one, using the + option, and see if any of them have a yellow ! on them.

If you see an error, let me know right away, before doing anything else I suggest!

First:
Try increasing you paging file as follows:

Click Start > Control Panel > System
TAB to Advanced
The first option in the new applet, click Settings
In the Window Performance Options, TAB to Advanced

In the section Virtual Memory,
the system shows the total size
of the Paging file, which you can
increase with the Change button.

increase the Initial Size of the Paging file. A rule of thumb is to set Maximum Size to TWICE that of Initial Size.
Increase yours by 50% and see if that works to resolve this problem.




If that doesn't help, and none of the items in Device Manager show a warning, I would try this:

Make a note of precisely which version of your geforce card is installed, and update the driver.
You should be able to get a compatible update from here:
http://www.driverguide.com
You'll have to know precisely what your OS is, and the details from your geforce. You 'may' have to open your box up and write down the numbers off the card, if you don't have the manual handy.

Do the same for your monitor.

For each, if it makes matters worse for you, you have the option available to Rollback the driver to a previous version (which would be the one you had before trying this).

Do them one at a time! See if that sorts you out. If not, move on to the next one.

Let us know
_________________
Proud member of the Chest Zipper Club!

[Mayan]

Hi Guys,

Sorry it took me awhile to get back. Thanks for your latest suggestions. I checked my Device Manager--No yellow ! on any devices. Yea!

I increased my paging file 50%, then 100%--No change, still get my 16-bit message after rebooting.

Downloaded a couple of updates from MSN. I have all the recommended updates installed--except , of course, SP2. No change.

I think I used the Installation Wizard to check for driver updates to GeForce FX 5200. Said there were none.

I went to driverguide.com and looked around and thought MAYBE there MIGHT have been an update to GeForce, but wasn't sure. I was kinda weirded out by their big red warning signs that said I would be downloading at my own risk, as well as on-site statements that they had not tested their downloads. I figured I was in enough trouble and better stick to safer entities, so didn't try to download anything from there.

I was thinking about uninstalling Spybot S&D 1.3 and see if the message goes away, since that's when it starting showing up--after I loaded Spybot. What do you think?

Then, the thought occurs to me (being a newbie, I may not have a clue what I'm talking about) that if either the first or secnd installation erroneously crunched an unsuspecting register to create this little problem, will uninstalling reset the registers back to where they were?

I did save the register settings during the second Spybot installtion, and I also have a current copy of the System State on my desktop which I made about 24 hours before I installed spybot--just in case--although the thought of actually having to use it to reset the registers kinds makes me go green all over.

Maybe you could tell me I'm waaay off base, and not to even worry about having to reset any of those nasty system registers and such....


P.S. Is there a reason I couldn't backup my System State onto a CD? I was using the the Backup Utility with Backup/Restore Wizard. Is it a data formatting thing? Or just that I couldn't figure out how to do it?
_________________
Dude, where’s my country?
~ Unknown

[3162]

[New Raider]

It says right on the site, "This is a work in progress," so yes, the last version has to be uninstalled first.
The latest final version is 1.2, but it can't be updated.

[New Raider]