My 8 year old daughter downloaded an email attachment (she thought it was from her best friend) with the W95/MTX.gen@M virus onto her computer. She is watching her computer slowly being ate up by this nasty virus and is
devastated. She has never been a healthy child and is being home schooled. This computer goes a long way in making her often lonely life easier to bear, it would be an understatement to say her computer is very important to her. A friend just lost her entire harddrive to this virus and advises us to scrap the harddrive entirely. My daughters existing harddrive is only 2GB and is what was explained to me a clone. Lucky for me another close friend of ours just bought a new computer and has very kindly offered us the 8GB off of his older one which he says is in fine condition. This greatly appreciated offer sounds like the only solution to this harddrive eating virus and my daughter could surely use the extra harddrive. I know nothing about changing a hard drive but my daughter's need is enough to make me want to learn as soon as possible since time is running out for this computer. Please help. I desperately need step by step instructions and guidance to change harddrives. Is there
any hope for us?

Thank you,

Stephanie's Mom

I checked out the virus at the Symantec Anti Virus site and it didn't indicate that the virus does any permanent damage to the hard drive. I would work on getting rid of the virus and very likely you can restore her system without replacing the hard drive. Later, maybe you can add the other hard drive.

Go here:
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w95.mtx.html

This describes the steps to get rid of the virus.

Go here:
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w95.mtx.html

This describes the steps to get rid of the virus.

It appears your information is faulty in regards to destroying a hard drive, assuming of course this is the correct virus.
Here is a bit of info from McAfee.
In the meantime I'll continue to search for the removal procedure & can you tell us if there is a virus program on the system?
Update - September 19, 2000:
McAfee AVERT has raised the ARA for this virus from Low to Medium based on customer samples received to date.
Removal of this virus requires 4095 DAT files. This virus was discovered by McAfee AVERT Aug 23, 2000.

This is a 32bit PE file infector for Windows 9x/NT systems. This virus modifies WSOCK32.DLL in an effort to hook SMTP traffic as an attachment. This virus searches for available shares through Network Neighborhood in an effort to transfer to host systems.

W32/MTX@MM is a combination of a Virus, Worm and Backdoor.

-Worm/Backdoor part: As it has mailing capabilities users may receive an e-mail with a file attachment, the name of the attachment is variable, but it may be like: I_am_sorry_doc.pif, or zipped_files.exe etc. Regardless of the deceiving filename and extension, the attached file as such is in fact a 32 bit "pe" file. (Portable Excutable file, common on win9x/winNT).

-Virus part: the virus also modified 32 bit pe files, like .EXE and .DLL, in the windows folder. It might search local mapped drives for target files.

After having read the Symantec page (an excerpt is below) I would format the hard drive, which of course will wipe out all the data on it, & reinstall W95.
If there is data on it you don't want to loose then take it to a professional for recovery.

What version is the OS? w95a-95b or w98?
Is the computer a brand name model, if so what make & model?
Removal:

How to repair

This is a complex and difficult virus to remove. It alters system files and on some systems these files cannot be repaired. In some cases, after attempting to repair the virus, you will not be able to start Windows until you restore the needed system files from the original Windows installation CD. This document assumes that you are familiar with basic Windows and DOS procedures. If you are not, we suggest that you obtain the services of a qualified computer consultant.

If you go to the left of the main forum screen there is a section on "HowTo's" it will show you. Also try this link. Go to Tom's Hardware Guide.
HTH,
wcr3d

And while you are at it try spending as much effort seeking out the solutions to the problem as you spent writing to play on the emotions of kind hearted people whom are attemtping to help you in the above posts (God bless them) or if you are selling out your daughter and her illness why not just ask for money.
The option to your post could have been "I have this specific virus can anyone guide me to the solution." There is no relationship between the computer having a virus and your daughter being ill. The people here will help regardless. I believe there is a name for the syndrome.

I would have both Hardrives in because then you end up with 10 GB. If you have 95 or 95A it won't be able to use the 8 GB disk in one partition and would have to break it down into 2 GB partitions. 95B and up have FAT32 support which supports disks above 2 GB. The brand/model of your computer would be useful to know, along with the version of windows.

The easiest thing to do:
1. get a bootdisk bootdisk.com. I would recommend agaist making it on the infected machine.
2. have your windows install CD.
3. Boot of the floppy and format the drive.
4. install windows .

And just a note with regards to the emotions. I've seen a few people that have done simular things. They post a message and say "it's for my sick son" or what ever. It doesn't effect how willing people are to respond and it's not a detail that affects the solution.

I'm not suggesting that it's fake, I believe you when you say your girl is sick, but that doesn't effect the solution to fixing the computer.

Dear Linda:

The best way to deal with stupid, offensive responsive is to click on the bar "Report Offensive Follow Up For Removal". This takes you to a second screen where you type in "confirm" in the box (lower-case letters) and click OK.

Addressing your original concern, if, as you say, your daughter is home schooled, my question is, is this done under the supervision of a local public school? If it is, they often provide free, on-site technical assistance for students who use computers as part of their study program. You may want to check this out.

In the meantime, reassure your daughter that the computer virus will not harm her PC, itself, only the data and programs that were on the hard drive. Software can always be reloaded.

Take care, and to both of you, A Happy Thanksgiving.

Roger, Peer...

I think that post #10 is a fake. There's a sick guy/girl who's been writing nasty responses, using other people's names. I spotted quite a number over the past few days.

Is it April 1st already?

I never heard of a "hardware eating virus" before. I'd like to watch this.

Why would you say my post was a fake or are you referring to a response that was removed?

Bob, the response (original #10) was removed, and the others renumbered in sequence.

I wish there was a way to preserve the original numbers of the posts. It can be confusing when an offensive post is removed and others that refer to that specific post (by number), remain.

Oh well, time to knock off and go home. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!!

I was refeering the the removed one. I agree that they should be preserved as the message numbers are. and if you notice it's post 9 that says post 10 is fake

I celebrated thanksgiving on october 9th.

munchouser or something like that.
Sorry your daughter is ill, i would not wish it upon anyone. hope your problems get resolved.

I don't know much about virus. But I wish you the best and it sounds like a lot of other people do have that expertise. I pray you daughter is doing well and you too.