Just for a few days ago, I have been wrestling with my notebook Lenovo 3000 Y400 Type 9454-25A. I suspected that there were some undetected viruses/worms inside it which were not cleaned or identified by AVG 8 though I still believed AVG product is still one of the best freeware anti virus/spyware. I think this is a good time to test some other freewares out there. See my previous post at yousaytoo or my other blog as well.

Firstly, I picked HijackThis (a freeware) to reveal what is inside the box. After inspecting the log file, I deleted some items inside which I considered to be dangerous :-) Hijack is one of the best that I have ever known before because it just scan your PC and shows you the long-listed lines of registry entries that should be evaluated or judged by yourself based on your knowledge and others. If the line seems suspicious, you may delete it. You can still recover from false choices because it still keeps the deleted ones for undoes. It is nice and free. Still learning from it, I haven't got any solution yet.

Then I downloaded another 2 anti spywares recommended by bloggers, ie: SuperAntiSpyware and Spybot Search & Destroy. SuperAntiSpyware did not detect anything whereas Spybot were too intrusive which made my windows system a bit unstable. Unloading both and scanning again and again with AVG 8, it seemed OK. I remembered an info from a friend of mine who told a freeware that could improve or help malware prevention, ie: Spywareblaster. I installed it on the box and believed to be just fine but unfortunately AVG 8 detected many malwares afterwards. At that time, I did not suspect that Spywareblaster might cause that. Then I forced removing the malwares by AVG. Later on, the Windows XP Home Edition on the notebook seemed to be going more suspicious than before, until I could not start it up again. I tried to fix it by going to safe mode as administrator but It failed to give a login. It hung after selecting "safe mode"... :-) I suspected the intrusive Spybot S&D. I also noticed Spywareblaster changed or modified many files and system registry during installation and setup. But I still could be wrong...

A thought popped up to reinstall Window XP again. A very big job. After reinstalling the system, I found the system files structure become a mess with many leftovers. I still tried to reinstall both Spywareblaster and AVG. Surprisingly, AVG still detected the same malwares as before. So there was a strong indication that Spywareblaster could possibly have malwares in it or those were false signals from AVG detection. Dead end?

No... I backed up all necessary and important files, then clean installed Windows XP Home Ed SP2 :-) hard job! After installing all the necessary drivers and testing the end result, I believed the system is OK :-) of course... At that moment, everyone who had the same kind Lenovo, would use its magnificent "One-Key Recovery" (which previously I had not ever used). You must use the entire partition of the hard drive for Windows XP if using this feature. The entire partition was backed up onto a hidden image by "One-Key Recovery". I could restore Windows XP back to where it had been just with one easy touch... Very convenient, guys!

After updating the system to SP3 and more, I found it very satisfying. Learning from the past, I tried to find a good freeware for firewall because I knew Windows Firewall was not good enough as mentioned in many sites and blogs. Forget ZoneAlarm, because it is too intrusive and give me pain in the ass. Forget Threatfire because it bogged down the system although i like it much due to its simple setting and "behavioral detection" which is claimed to detect unknown new malwares. At last, I found and installed a freeware, Comodo Firewall Pro 3 with Defense+. I think the setup of rules is more logical and easier than ZoneAlarm and the rules are quite complete. I set the firewall mode of network defense to 'safe mode" and proactive defense+ to "clean pc mode". If you want to use this "clean pc mode", you must be sure that your clean install of system is free of malware from the beginning.

Cut to short, I introduce only one new wonderful freeware that may make my notebook experience more comfortable, ie: Comodo Firewall Pro 3. I will update the freeware list at my other blog and do some revision there plus the steps I will take if I have a new PC / laptop. It's been a hard week for me wow.... At last, I am alive again :-)