General Gaming Article

General Gaming Article


How to Remove Windows Malware for Free

Posted: 06 Apr 2015 01:25 PM PDT

FixReturn a bug-infested PC to pristine condition

Your smartphone begins to vibrate. Not the quick vibration that would indicate it's an incoming text message, but a longer one associated with a phone call. Yes, people still communicate via voice, and thanks to Caller ID, you know it's your parents on the other end. It's been a few weeks since you've heard from them and a funny feeling begins to fill the pit of your stomach. You know what's coming next.

A plea for PC help. You listen intently as your folks describe hijacked web searches, a toolbar they don't recognize, and sluggish behavior. Oh, and there are pop-ups. Lots and lots of pop-ups. The list of ailments goes on like a kid reciting a Christmas list to Santa Clause. Only instead of toys and candy, it's rogue programs and malware. It's a good thing you installed TeamViewer because trying to fix the problem over the phone is a time-consuming process that always ends the same way—"I'll be over in the morning."

Or maybe you didn't install TeamViewer and you really will be over in the morning. Either way, the task at hand is to rid a system of malware. Perhaps it's your own system, especially if you let little Billy and sweet little Suzy hop on for a spell. Whatever the case may be, don't panic. Removing malware, while seemingly daunting, isn't all that difficult. Like anything else, you just need the proper know-how and tools, both of which we'll provide here. Be sure to read the entire guide before embarking on your malware removal journey.

Scrub the Browser(s)

Toolbars, hijacked web searches, and pop-ups are often the result of malware, adware, and or other unwanted-ware that was either installed without permission, or sneaked in through a legitimate application through the fine print, usually when installing a free program. That Spongebob screensaver pack that little Billy installed from a site he can't remember? Yeah, we're guessing he mashed the "Okay" or "Next" button throughout the process, at one point agreeing to change your browser's settings. Cut him some slack, the kid still eats his boogers.

Luckily, these are usually easy fixes. Here's what you need to do.

Internet Explorer
Let's start with Internet Explorer. Click the Gear (Tools) icon in the upper-right corner and select Manage add-ons. On the left-hand side is a column of categories: Toolbars and Extensions, Search Providers, Accelerators, and Tracking Protection. It's the first three that are of interest, starting with Toolbars and Extensions.

See anything you don't recognize? Maybe something like "DealBuddy" or some other descriptor that's a clear giveaway? Click it and select Remove or Disable. If it's an entry you don't recognize, look it up on Google or your search engine of choice. In most cases, however, unwanted entries will stick out like a pimple on prom night.

IE Manage Add Ons

The same goes for the Search Providers category. The only thing you should see is Bing unless you've added another search provider, like Google. We're making this up (we think), but let's say the default entry is "CouponPal." The option to remove is grayed out, but that's only because it's the default search option. Click on one of the other options—Bing, Google, Yahoo, etc.—and punch the Set as default button, then return to CouponPal and click Remove.

Now let's rinse and repeate for the Accelerators category. Is there a rogue entry? Remove or disable it. When you're finished with all these, close out the Manage add-ons window. Return to the Gear (Tools) icon and select Internet Options. Navigate to the General tab if you're not already there and look at the Home page section. Oftentimes adware will replace the default homepage with its own entry, which will load each time you fire up IE. Highlight the hijacked entry and change it to whatever you want, like http://www.maximumpc.com (c'mon, show us some love!) and click Apply. Now hit OK, close IE, and reload it. If you haven't missed anything, it should work as new again. And if not, you may have a deeper malware problem, which we'll get to in a moment.

Chrome
The steps are similar in Chrome. To check if the default search engine's been changed, click the three horizontal lines (Chrome Menu) in the upper-right corner and select Settings. Under the Search heading, click Manage search engines. Hover your mouse over whichever one you want to be the default and click Make default. Next, hover over the rogue entry and click the X button on the right to remove it.

Chrome Extensions

Also in the Settings menu is an On startup heading with three options: Open the New Tab page, Continue where you left off, and Open a specific page or set of pages. If your homepage has been taken over, click the Set Pages hyperlink next to the Open a specific page or set of pages option. Go ahead and delete the rogue entry and/or enter whichever page you'd like to load at startup. Alternately, you can use one of the other options.

Go back to the Chrome menu and select More Tools > Extensions. Here is where you'll see a list of installed add-ons, like Adblock (which we hope you've disabled on Maximum PC—we've gotta eat!), Google Play Music, or whatever. See any entries that shouldn't be there? Click the trash icon to dispose of them.

Remember to close Chrome and reload it.

Firefox
In Firefox, click the three horizontal lines (Firefox Menu) and select Options. Under the Search tab, you'll see a pull-down menu with your default search option, and under that a list of search engines. Highlight any rogue entries and click Remove.

Firefox Options

Next, navigate to the General tab to make changes to your homepage. If it's been taken over, you'll most likely see the address here. Change it to whatever you want, or click the Restore to Default button.

Firefox has long supported extensions and plugins. To access them, go back to the Firefox menu and select Add-ons. Remove any rogue extensions, or if you're unsure, click the disable button to see how it affects your browser. You can always come back and remove it.

Following the above steps will help restore your browser(s) to the way it was operating before adware dug its claws in. However, it might not remove the root cause if there's a deeper malware infection. Let's move on.


Just Uninstall It

Not all malware is highly sophisticated. Many of them can be uninstalled just like any other program, so before you go any further, bring up the Control Panel and head over to Programs and Features. Scan the list for any signs of adware, toolbars, or anything else that's obviously unwanted software and simply uninstall it. Is your system back to normal? If so, then great, you got off easy! If not, blurt out a few curse words (you'll feel better) and then continue reading.

Fight Software with Software

One of our favorite and most reliable anti-malware programs is Malwarebytes. There's both a free and paid version, the latter of which adds proactive protection like real-time monitoring and conveniences like scheduled scanning. For removing existing malware, the free version is sufficient.

What's neat about Malwarebytes is that it scans for a wide range of rogue software, like spyware, adware, some viruses, and even rootkits. Be advised that Malwarebytes isn't intended as a standalone antivirus program, but as a supplement. Or, in this case, as a cleanup tool.

Malwarebytes

The first thing you should do when running Malwarebytes is to update the database so that it can scan for the latest threats. Just click the Update Now now link and let it do its thing.

See that big Scan Now button at the bottom? Don't click it just yet. First, click the Settings option and navigate to Detection and Protection. Even though Malwarebytes scans for rootkits, you first have to enable the option, and this is where you'll find it—check the Scan for rootkits box.

Now, go to the Scan heading and select Threat Scan, which is the recommended option. This will run a comprehensive sweep of your system and could take a long time to finish. Find something else to do for a bit—ride a bike, catch up on some reading, make love, play a console game, grab some lunch, or anything else you can think of that's more fun than watching a system scan. When it's finished, audit the list of threats for any false positives and uncheck them, then click Remove Selected.

Solicit a Second (or Third) Opinion

As much as we like Malwarebytes, there's no single program out there capable of detecting and removing every piece of malicious software. For a machine that's in particularly bad shape, it pays to run multiple spyware sweeps. Which ones? There are several out there, and one that we still like is Spybot Search and Destroy.

Spybot

As with all of these programs, be sure to update the definitions database first—just click the Update icon. The first update can take a few minutes, even on a fast Internet connection, so be patient. Once it's finished, click System Scan and let it sweep your system for junk.

As you can see, these programs are pretty self explanatory, so rather than walk you through each one, here's a list of software we recommend running on badly infected machines:

There are others out there, and if you have a favorite, feel free to add it to the list. Remember, it might not always be necessary to run several different programs, but for a machine that's in really rough shape, it doesn't hurt to blitz the opposition using multiple tools.

Better Safe Mode than Sorry

In some cases, you may not be able to run or even install the aforementioned malware removal software. Some of the more sophisticated malware will block them outright, and if that's the case, you should try booting into Safe Mode. The same is true if a piece of malware manages to reinstall itself after you've already removed it.

To boot into Safe Mode, shut down your system, turn it back on, and start tapping the F8 key. Instead of booting into Windows, you should see an Advanced Boot Options menu. Select the Safe Mode with Networking option. This will load just the essential Windows drivers while also giving you Internet access so that you can download, install, and update anti-malware software.

MSCONFIG

If you're having trouble booting into Safe Mode, another way in there is to boot into Windows as you normally would. Click the Start menu, select Run, and type msconfig. Select the Boot tab and under the Boot options heading, check the Safe boot box. Mark the Network radio bubble and click Apply, then reboot your system.

Scan for Viruses

Microsoft's built-in Windows Defender in Windows 8.1 (separate download in prior versions) does a good job overall of detecting viruses, and if that's what you're rolling with, update the database and scan your system. Otherwise, do the same with whichever antivirus software you're using. If you're not using one, either enable Windows Defender or seek out a free AV such as Avast, AVG, Avira, Bitdefender, Comodo, or Panda, to name a few of the no-cost options. Be sure to install only one, as multiple AV programs can conflict with each other (though it's okay to run them with malware removal tools like Malwarebytes).

Bring Out the Big Guns

At this point, you've scanned for viruses, run multiple anti-malware programs, rooted out any rootkits, and cleaned up your browsers, yet your system is still acting up. That's bad news, but don't go throwing in the towel just yet. Instead, download HijackThis.

HijackThis
HijackThis is a simple little utility that audits your registry, browser settings, and system services. It only takes a few seconds to run, however, it doesn't discern between good and malicious entries, so don't go deleting entries willy-nilly.

There's no installation required here—just fire up HijackThis and select the top option so that it saves the results to a log file. In a few seconds, you'll see a long list of entries. Scroll through them and look for any obviously malicious entries. For example, if you know you've been infected by a particular piece of malware and you see references to it in the HijackThis results, check the box.

HiJackThis

Most of the entries will be safe, so be careful what you check. You could even break functionality of a legitimate program or cause other problems by checking certain entries. This is where the log comes in handy. When the scan finished, it should have populated a Notepad file with the results. Highlight the entire text and copy it to your clipboard.

Now head to I Am Not A Geek, paste the contents in the box, and click Parse. Potentially malicious entries will be highlighted red, but before you click the check box in HijackThis, look up each one in Google so that you're sure of what you're removing.

There are several other online analyzers, such as HiJackThis.de Security and HiJackThis.co. Try using at least two, and if you still need help, solicit advice from a forum such as Bleeping Computer.

ComboFix
As a last resort before wiping your system clean and starting anew, there's ComboFix, an aggressive program that hunts for persistent infections and attempts to remove them. It was developed by the folks at Bleeping Computer and they recommend not running it unless specifically requested, so keep that in mind. It's also worth noting that ComboFix doesn't yet work in Windows 8.1 or Windows 2000, though it does run in Windows 8, 7, Vista, and XP.

ComboFix

If it's finally come to this, follow the instructions in Bleeping Computer's guide and when it's finished running, see if your system is back to normal. Should problems remain, post a copy of the log ComboFix generated into the forum thread where it was recommended that you run it.

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Newegg Daily Deals: Intel 730 Series 240GB SSD, EVGA GeForce GTX 970 Superclocked, and More!

Posted: 06 Apr 2015 11:41 AM PDT

Intel 730 Series

Newegg

Top Deal:

Did you know that adult human skulls are made up of 22 bones? They consist of eight large, flat bones from the cranium and 14 bones that form the face. Here's something else you won't find in a Snapple cap -- you can buy real human skulls online. If that's a little too creepy for your tastes, then check out today's top deal for an Intel 730 Series 240GB Solid State Drive for $120 with free shipping (normally $150). It's not made of bones, but it does sport a skull graphic on the front because, well, why not? Even better, it's data center DNA combined with fast NAND flash memory combine for a speedy and reliable storage solution backed by a 5-year warranty.

Other Deals:

Samsung 850 Evo 2.5-inch 500GB Solid State Drive (SSD) for $190 with free shipping (normally $210 - use coupon code: [EMCARAT22])

EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB Superclocked ACX 2.0 Video Card for $330 with free shipping (normally $350; additional $15 Mail-in rebate)

Corsair Carbide Series Air 540 Black Steel/Plastic ATX Cube High Airflow Cube Case for $100 with free shipping (normally $130 - use coupon code: [EMCARAT25])

Seagate 4TB 5900 RPM 3.5-inch Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive for $130 with free shipping (normally $140 - use coupon code: [ESCARAT23])

Nvidia Releases GeForce 350.05 Hotfix Driver to Alleviate DirectX Crashing Issues

Posted: 06 Apr 2015 10:24 AM PDT

Nvidia LogoHotfix addresses annoying game crashes

Back around mid-March, Nvidia released its game ready GeForce 347.88 WHQL driver, the recommended driver for Battlefield Hardline players, which coincided with the release. At the time, Nvidia also launched its new flagship graphics card, the GeForce Titan X. Everything seemed to go to plan, except that some gamers began complaining that the new drivers were causing crashes in Battlefield Hardline and Dragon Age: Inquisition. If you're one of them, you may find relief in Nvidia's GeForce 350.05 hotfix.

According to Nvidia, the hotfix addresses crashes in Battlefield Hardline that spit out a DirectX error message on some systems, and a TDR (Timeout Detection and Recovery) crash in Dragon Age: Inquisition. The hotfix is available in 32-bit and 64-bit form for both laptop and desktop systems -- you can find all four versions here.

More than just a simple hotfix, Chinese-language website Expreview claims (and Anandtech has confirmed) that Nvidia quietly slipped in OpenCL 1.2 support. It's an interesting addition, as Nvidia has chosen not to support OpenCL 1.2 up until now. Whether or not that means Nvidia will be more committed to the standard and is working on support for OpenCL 2.x remains to be seen.

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Bill Gates Reflects on 40 Years of Microsoft, Says Computing Will Evolve Even Faster in Next Decade

Posted: 06 Apr 2015 09:11 AM PDT

Bill GatesMicrosoft celebrates its 40th anniversary

It was on April 4, 1975, that Paul Allen and Bill Gates founded Microsoft. Gates hadn't even turned 20-years-old at the time, and Allen wasn't much older at 22. Yet what they created changed everything. In reflecting on the past 40 years of Microsoft's existence, Gates talked about the shared goal he and Allen had of seeing a computer on every desk in every home, a rather bold vision for the time. They pretty much accomplished that goal, but it's Microsoft's 50th anniversary that has Gates particularly excited.

"Today though, I am thinking much more about Microsoft's future than its past. I believe computing will evolve faster in the next 10 years than it ever has before," Gates stated in a letter to employees, which ended up on Twitter. "We already live in a multi-platform world, and computing will become even more pervasive. We are nearing the point where computers and robots will be able to see, move, and interact naturally, unlocking many new applications and empowering people even more."

These days Gates is very much involved in philanthropy through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. However, he still makes time for Microsoft as a technical adviser to Satya Nadella, who stepped in the shoes of CEO after Steve Ballmer's farewell tour. Gates says he's impressed with what he's seeing from the company under Nadella's leadership, things like Cortana, Skype Translator, and HoloLens.

Gates also passed on a philanthropic message to current Microsoft employees, imploring them to think about what they can do to make technology more accessible to everyone, and to make personal computing available everywhere.

"We have accomplished a lot together during our first 40 years an empowered countless businesses and people to realize their full potential. But what matters most now is what we do next," Gates said.

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Gmail Acting Funky Over Easter Weekend? Try It Again

Posted: 06 Apr 2015 08:29 AM PDT

Gmail LogoExpired security certificate caused Gmail to wig out

Procrastinating kids trying to email the Easter Bunny on Saturday using their Gmail account may have run into some trouble getting their messages sent. That's because a "majority" of Gmail users, or hundreds of millions, were affected by a problem that Google later identified as an expired security certificate on the server that's responsible for handling outbound Gmail messages.

"We're aware of a problem with Gmail affecting a majority of users. The affected users are able to access Gmail, but are seeing error messages and/or other unexpected behavior," Google noted in a service update. "We will provide an update by 4/4/15, 3:00 PM detailing when we expect to resolve the problem. Please note that this resolution time is an estimate and may change. smtp.gmail.com is displaying an invalid certificate."

Authority G2, which is Google's in-house certificate issuer, sent a valid certificate around three hours after the trouble began, fully restoring service by 3:46 PM on Saturday.

The timing of the outage initially raised eyebrows, as it came only a few days after Google and Mozilla both started blacklisting China's main domain name registry and certificate authority, China Internet Information Center (CNNIC), ZDNet reports. Google made the decision after the CNNIC handed out a certificate that could allow a hacker to impersonate a Google site.

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Leaked Windows 10 Build Includes New Mail, Calendar Apps

Posted: 06 Apr 2015 05:05 AM PDT

Windows 10 Build 10051 Calendar AppBuild 10051 is here

Another day, another Windows 10 leak. So what if it's not even been a week since the release of the last official Windows 10 Technical Preview build (10049)? It's never too soon for a build leak. But you're going to have to lower your expectations a touch  this time as build 10051 — the one that has just leaked — isn't much farther along in the development cycle than the last official release.

There are a couple of notable changes nonetheless; namely, the build features updated Mail and Calendar apps. According to Neowin's Brad Sams, who has spent some quality hands-on time with the build, the apps differ from their previous versions mainly in the looks department.

The apps have undergone a complete visual overhaul and come out looking less "Modern" and more modern. Overall, the interface of these new universal apps looks quite minimal and is quite similar to the one that adorns Office touch apps.

An unofficial changelog can be found at this link.

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Future Microsoft Browsers Won’t Have ‘Do Not Track’ Enabled by Default

Posted: 06 Apr 2015 02:16 AM PDT

IE 10The Redmond-based company finally relents

Microsoft won plaudits from privacy advocates when it released Internet Explorer 10 in 2012 with the Do Not Track (DNT) option enabled by default. For obvious reasons, the move didn't go down well with advertisers, who saw it as an act of overbearing unilateralism on the company's part. Microsoft, though, remained steadfast ... until now.

Microsoft  is altering its implementation of DNT to better reflect evolving web standards, its Chief Privacy Officer Brendon Lynch announced in a blog post Friday. What this means is that the upcoming Project Spartan (codenamed) browser will not have DNT turned on by default.

In his blog post, Lynch acknowledged both the praise the software giant got and the controversy it stoked when it first embarked on this course, ignoring "discussions underway at the time to establish an industrywide standard for user tracking preferences." It was criticized at that time by angry advertisers for imposing its own choice on users.

He blamed the volte-face on the current World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) draft specification for tracking preferences. Lynch  specifically cited the following excerpt from the latest draft:

"Key to that notion of expression is that the signal sent MUST reflect the user's preference, not the choice of some vendor, institution, site, or network-imposed mechanism outside the user's control; this applies equally to both the general preference and exceptions. The basic principle is that a tracking preference expression is only transmitted when it reflects a deliberate choice by the user. In the absence of user choice, there is no tracking preference expressed. (Emphasis added.)"

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Microsoft Pulls Plug on Kinect for Windows Sensor

Posted: 05 Apr 2015 11:24 PM PDT

Xbox One Kinect sensorThe dedicated PC sensor had become redundant

Production of the Kinect for Windows v2 sensor has now ceased. Coming some nine months after the $200 PC-compatible variant of Xbox One's powerful motion-sensing camera first began shipping, Microsoft says the move is designed to allow it to "consolidate the Kinect for Windows experience around a single sensor": the $150 Kinect for Xbox One camera.

In a hugely unpopular move at the start of the Xbox One's life cycle, Microsoft tried hard to shove the sensor down console gamers' throats by inextricably bundling it with the console. But once it became clear the move had backfired rather hopelessly, the company backed down and decoupled the two in June 2014. The availability of a cheaper, Kinect-free Xbox One caused an immediate increase in the console's sales.

Nonetheless, the Redmond-based firm insists demand for its Kinect sensors, especially among the developer community, remains strong and has reached "unprecedented" levels in recent months. It's just that the dedicated Windows sensor had become redundant following the launch of the Kinect Adapter, a $50 add-on that allows an ordinary Kinect for Xbox One camera to interface with a Windows 8/8.1 PC.

In a bid to make things simpler for developers, Microsoft is now going to focus solely on the adapter, the company said in a recent blog post, adding however that it remains dedicated to supporting existing Kinect for Windows v2 sensors.

"Microsoft remains committed to Kinect as a development platform on both Xbox and Windows," the company reassured Kinect developers. "We are excited to continue working with the developer community to create and deploy applications that allow users to interact naturally with computers through gestures and speech, and continue to see the Kinect sensor inspire vibrant and innovative commercial experiences in multiple industries, including retail, education, healthcare, education, and manufacturing."

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Intel's PC-on-a-stick Device to be Available on April 24, 2015

Posted: 05 Apr 2015 10:59 PM PDT

Intel Compute StickE-tailers begin taking pre-orders for the Intel Compute Stick

ARM had the whole PC-on-a-stick market to itself not that long ago, but that changed in October when a Chinese company began selling what was an otherwise ordinary looking HDMI dongle, save for one glaring oddity: the iconic "Intel Inside" logo. Soon Intel itself joined in the fun, announcing the Bay Trail-powered Compute Stick at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in January. That device now has a release date.

It is up for pre-order from Newegg and Amazon — and possibly a few other e-tailers — with the former listing the release date as April 24, 2015. However, the vendor selling it on Amazon won't have it in stock until May 5.

The palm-sized device will be available in both Windows and Linux flavors, both of which will come with an Intel Atom Z3735F processor (Core M version in the cards), HDMI output, full-size USB 2.0 port, microSD card reader, microUSB port (for power), Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n, and Bluetooth 4.0.

Back in January we were told that the $149 Windows 8.1 with Bing-running model would ship with 2GB of RAM and 32GB inbuilt storage, while its Ubuntu-running brother would be limited to half that memory and storage. The Newegg listings, however, show the same amount of RAM and Flash storage for both variants. This is in all likelihood an error because the specs listed on other sites are in line with the original announcement.

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