Hello, I have had a virus called pws.agent.Q (it's in the file mdcms.exe, which i have deleted several times, but i guess it's a system file b/c it restores itself) on my system for months. I have tried every free piece of software i could find to get rid of this virus and i have yet to succeed.What can i do!? Thanks, Peter

Peter: Have you tried any online scanning services? They're kept right up to date. TrendMicro PandaScan Solarian

have you thought about purchasing norton 2004 or 05? it may cost you 40-50 bucks but it is well worth it, that should remove your virus and no that file is not a system file, if you don't want to use norton i would suggest searching your registry for that file, because what is happening is you delete the file, you restart your machine or there is a script on your machine that is causing it to come back, that could be hidden in the registry, to do this, start your machine in safe mode, go to start>run> type regedit & hit enter...make sure you backup your entire registry before making changes, highlight my computer and push ctrl + f and type that file name in there and hit find, when it locates something, delete that whole entry and press f3 to find the next entry until it can't find anymore in your registry, exit your regedit, go to start>search and search for that file, delete all entries of it and restart your computer into normal mode, see what happens...if that done work i suggest getting norton Complete Computer Service Inc. NW Indiana

http://www.computing.net/security/wwwboard/forum/13487.html also disable ,then reboot, then enable system restore.Disabling or enabling Windows XP System Restore symantec write-up

Another option that is, IMO, better than purchasing Norton AV would be to try Kaspersky's Free Online Virus Scanner - http://www.kaspersky.com/scanforvirus I currently use NAV but I plan to replace it with Kaspersky in the very near future. With KAV you get hourly updates vs. Norton's weekly update. Kaspersky consistently rates near the top of all AV scanners. Other free web-based scanners - http://www.broadbandreports.com/faq/9721#scan

is system restore on many viruses hide there and most antivirus soft wont touch a file in system restore disable system restore and try again

I have a program(moveonboot)that is supposed to get rid of unriddable stuff.I have not tried it yet but I could email it to ya if all else fails? Tt Lanfire nf7-s v2.0 XP-m 2500@211x11 SP 97 512mb pc3200 Jou Jye 550w psu FX5600 WDCaviar 160gb sata ;~}