Hello: I have problems for a few weeks in my computer (SONY, Windows XP), including a lot of pop-ups, unwanted EliteBar, unwanted searchmiracles, computer very slow. Many websites can not be loaded normally and need to download Macromedia flash with a small popup window about Macromedia, when I pressed 'download', it could not do it and instead it showed a frame with an x sign on my screen (this frame with x sign don't go away unless restart my computer). Now I have even more problems, I switched the electrical power on, then computer started automatically (I used to power on first, then press the computer button to start the PC). The worst thing has come, the internet explorer frequently closed by itself when I was using it. ,,,, These may be different problems, however, it seems to me they all appeared since the time I got the spywares, adwares into my computer. How to get rid of them? I dowloaded the free Ad-ware SE and scaned my computer, but seemed it did not help much. Can anyone give some helps or give some suggestions on which software can effectively get rid of spyware/adwares? Thank you very much in advance. ask for help

Try System resore back to Pre December, then turn it off Run Spybot and adaware without system restoew on. Otherwise you have an extremely corrupted computer and you need to back up your data and rformat. SOrry

SpyBot, CWShredder and ccleaner will probably help dig out a few more pests... CWShredder is particularly useful in removing/disabling home-page (browser) high-jackers. All three utils are safe and have freebie (personal-use) versions. Do NOT install any util that appears to be AdAware or SpyBot and asks for cash. There is at least one util that masquarades as AdAware or Spybot, another that looks almost the same as SpyBot (the wrong one does not have the & symbol included in its name...) and it/they are not freebies. One of them actually appears to leave things behind too... After running those utils, run a "full" virus scan. If you have access to the www from the affected PC, perhaps run a "free" on-line scan courtesy of Trend, AVG, Fprot (perhaps run each in turn). Disable (temporarily) any on-board virus util you may have before running the on-line scans. A restore point (far enough back) may help circumvent the problems (you go back to before they arrived) but I have some doubts... SpyBot: http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download CWShredder: http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/downloads.html ccleaner http://www.ccleaner.com/

Turn off(stop and disable) windows xp built in messenger service. This is like having a huge barn door on your system where all the vermin are getting in. This will block a lot of unwanted popups. You close the door, they can't get in. But that's just one thing. Like was stated run good ad/spy ware removal programs. Now for the mysterious comming on when you flip the power switch. First of all only a couple of things really require you to flip the power supply kill switch to off. A thunder storm or it's being serviced. But then what you do with your system is up to you. Check the bios for a setting called> power on state. Or worded close to that. This when set to> former state < will power up the system as soon as you flip the kill switch to on. Either that or the power button on the case is stuck or the leads have a short in them. The wires could be chaffing on the hole where they go back to the motherboard. Some tape would fix that right quick. Back to the ad/spy ware problem. Before you run any type of removal tool in you case I personaly would disable the following> Restore points. The little blackards like to hide out in the restore points. Caution>>>>Disabling them will delete them.<<<< But in this case I think it would be best. Also run the maintaince program from safe mode. This doesn't give the bad things a chance to load. Makes them easier to find and swat down. It sounds like you're infested badly so have patenice. If you get stuck come back and yoller at us. We're around... I may be crazy, but I'm not stupid...

tiny bit off topic, but heres what i do. You could probably do this after following the other guys advice here. www.analogx.com He has something called pow, I install it and block the IE about:blank page... this prevents IE from opening period, with the ocaisional window.. all you have to do is add that page to the pow list and it Blocks it perm. now that ie is "disabled" (it sucks anyway) i go to www.mozilla.com and download the FireFox browser.. They stole my name and my log in proves it ! D:.. anyway its an awesome browser that prevent pop up and unwanted installs... its really effective in preventing the spyware from getting back on... plus all the added features just rock!

Thank you very much for all of the helpful suggestions. I will work for the problems on the computer based on the suggestions. I am very afraid that my SONY computer will get slower and slower and eventually has the same fate as my previous COMPAQ computer. My COMPAQ was slow and had several times of crashes before the final one (it has been dead since the final crash). RE system restore: I had a couple of times restoring the system to the state prior to the problems, but it did not solve the problems, maybe I did not restore it far back enough. Again thank you all very much and wish you a happy new year. ask for help