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eMachine, has virus, need reformat, considering Linux.

pepsi71ocean

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Nov 7, 2007
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Location
The Peoples Republic of New South Jersey
System Name The Grand Phoenix Clusterflop
Processor AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Deneb @3.4GHz
Motherboard ASRock 870 EXTREME3
Cooling Xigmatec S1284 (Lapped)1x200mm, 4x120mm
Memory Muskin Silverline 4GB DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) 9-9-9-24
Video Card(s) eVGA GTX 470 SC Edition 1280mb RAM (C/S/M)(640/1280/1705)
Storage 2x500GB Seagate, 32MB Cache 1xWD 40GB UMD IDE Hdd.
Display(s) SAMSUNG 22" LCDTV HD Monitor and Samsung 24"
Case COOLER MASTER RC-690
Audio Device(s) USB 2.0 Sound (USB out to my Stero System)
Power Supply Thermaltake XT TPX-775M 775W
Software Windows XP Home SP3
ok, well the eMachine i have been using lately turns out has a bad virus, and the computer os has been severely compromised because over the last 4 days it has been crippling the computer to the point where it doesn't recognize the CD drives, and sometimes even has trouble accessing the internet. I believe that the virus entered the computer through Firefox, and avast didn't detect it either, but then again the computer was out of date on windows update, so i guess its partly my fault for not updating the computer when i first acquired it from cold storage.

Anyways, it is a fairly new computer, 2.8GHz CPU, (was512), but now its 384MB of RAM, some sort of integrated graphics. Now my new question is since it is a brand computer does this mean that if i wipe off the OS and write zeros to the hard drive (i plan to nuke and wipe this drive multiple times) will linux work on this computer, and work properly? does the puppy linux work on a system os, like NTSF or FAT, or does it have its own file system? Second i plan to boot from the CD, and make a CD-RW with the Puppy linux and everything it needs to run on that CD.

Outside of that i plan to make it a business computer at some point, and im hoping that the fact its running Linux will help reduce the likely hood i will acquire a virus in the future. If im wrong with that assumption feel free to let me know.
 
It'll run Linux. I had linux work on a Pentium 2 350MHz, and 256MB RAM. (Ubuntu)
 
linux works on like almost every comp..

btw, can you post a hijackthis log? i'm a hijackthis analyst and can look through your log and see if i can find anything.
 
linux works on like almost every comp..

btw, can you post a hijackthis log? i'm a hijackthis analyst and can look through your log and see if i can find anything.

will post a list when i get done working in an hour or so.

Also, are their any anti-virus programs like avast that work on linux?
 
You won't need antivirus software for Linux. There are pretty much no viruses for it, and actually getting one is rare. My download box has Ubuntu, and I don't use a A/V.. No problems yet :)
 
should work just fine........if u do go linux use ubuntu pretty easy to use :)
 
linux works on like almost every comp..

btw, can you post a hijackthis log? i'm a hijackthis analyst and can look through your log and see if i can find anything.

As per your request.

I hope you can help solve this problem. And sorry for the lateness, nothing goes as planned when updating business computers, lol

Im not sure if this will help but i get advertisements when i go to myspace, only on myspace however and its just on this emachine. that and the missing cd-dvd drives in windows and shakey internet coverage.
 

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Ubuntu 8.10 is being released i nthe next week or so, but I'd stick with 8.4 until any bugs get ironed out of 8.10. Ubuntu is really easy to install, configure and setup... theres loads of tutorials and step by step guides online and on youtube.
 
Rising anti virus is the best free AV http://www.wikisend.com/download/507700/ravfree(1).exe
Puppy can install on NTFS but I couldn't make the boot loader to see it.
Ubuntu will work perfectly with it. Else you can give Xubuntu a try.

I was thinking of running the puppy OS off of a CD drive. what do you mean by boot loader?


Ubuntu 8.10 is being released i nthe next week or so, but I'd stick with 8.4 until any bugs get ironed out of 8.10. Ubuntu is really easy to install, configure and setup... theres loads of tutorials and step by step guides online and on youtube.

what are your thoughts on Ubuntu?


Do you think something like Puppy Linux would be safer security wise then something that is more popular like Ubunt?
 
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