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XP Pro SP2 Device manager problem

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XP Pro SP2 Device manager problem

Submitted by m0nty on Wed, 2005-11-23 14:47.
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since yesterday, i have had a problem with my computer.

I 1st noticed the problem when i went to move some files from my pc to my 2nd pc via network.

The network connections have disappeared and no matter what i try, i am unable to get the network enabled.

Device manager is showing just a plain blank window with nothing displaying.

I have checked on microsoft site and their solution failed.. the solution they say is because plug n play is disabled. I have checked in services and plug n play is set on automatic and is running, disabling it and rebooting, then enabling it, failed to rectify the problem.

(i might add here, that i do not have system restore enabled)

booting into safe mode, the device manager works fine and shows all the devices as working without problems.

does anybody else have any ideas as to what mayb the cause or what my recover it?

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m0nty's picture

Joined: Apr 2005

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m0nty said:
Submitted by m0nty on Wed, 2005-11-23 16:23.

after a few hours searching the net, i finally found a solution to this horrible issue that disables networks and system devices

after checking security permissions and IUSR accounts and everything to no avail.

the problem was caused by a new Spyware/malware program.

i might add that I had run ad-aware with latest updates, spybot s&d, norton AV & AVG virus checks and non of them detected anything!

the malware in question is called ContextPlus and can be uninstalled in most cases through the add/remove programs. It also installs a few other spywares on your pc, non of which the most widely used anti-spyware packages detected.

It's damn annoying and is the 1st time i've known spyware to infiltrate a system like this and disable many functions..

so users be alert! at all times.

4 hours with Microsoft tech support failed to diagnose this aswell, their advice was to re-install windows.. something i wasn't prepared to do unless absolutely necessary (too much work to lose that i was unable to backup due to this problem)

I'm glad i didn't have to because losing all this work now would have meant a wasted 6 months..

Brashquido's picture

Location: Melbourne, Australia

Joined: Sep 2003

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Brashquido said:
Submitted by Brashquido on Wed, 2005-11-23 23:36.

Sounds like quite a drama there m0nty. Any idea how the spyware/malware got to be on your system? I recently put Norton Internet Security 2006 on a Windows XP SP2 machine, and it totally screwed the system. The uninstall process did not work, and I was unable to kill any of the Norton processes and just got an "access denied" message when I tried. Hunted the net and there are loads of people with the same problem, and Norton even have a dedicated tool on their website to remove this software which still didn't work for me. In the end I was wasting too much time on it and had to bite the bullet and reformat my system disk. Lucky I keep all my data on a second disk by habbit!

m0nty's picture

Joined: Apr 2005

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m0nty said:
Submitted by m0nty on Thu, 2005-11-24 01:22.

only thing i can think of is from visiting a website.. don't know what website though, i haven't downloaded any files except php files and a couple of movies.

with regards to norton, yeah it can be a real b*tch.

i never use norton internet utilies or anything other than the standalone version of antivirus.. i always had problems with utilities and norton firewall back in the days of version 1 - 4 and i never bothered with it since..

but standalone norton AV is pretty good at its job.

removing utilities however can be a long process.. usually the best way i find is to disable it, shut anything norton down (use uninstaller to remove as many parts as possible if it works.. lol), you may have to disable it from services in windows safe mode though. (it isn't loaded into memory during safe mode, so no awkward file in use errors)

then open regedit and do a search for everything related to symantec and norton and delete any of those keys found.. (except keys that are reference for ms firewall in sp2)

once the registry keys are gone, you should be able to just remove the files and be gone with it..

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