Interesting experience

[rlg118]

I was running a virus scan on an old Compaq Presario today, checking the C drive and the D drive (which contains the swap file). I use Avast because it's the only AV program that I could find which would still work with 98SE. (This machine simply does not have the juice to run anything else.) After the scan finished, a number of interesting things happened.

First, all of my Quick Launch icons disappeared.

I used a small program to replenish the icon cache, which gets fouled now and then, after which all of my icons disappeared! (Start Menu, Desktop - everything.)

I went to reboot using a desktop shortcut which I have used for years, and the system opened the shortcut in Notepad instead.

Then I tried to use a "favorite folders" program (FastOpen) to go to the Windows folder, where the Reboot program is located, and was informed that "The folder C:\Windows does not exist."

Oy gevalt.

Well, nothing to do for it except to lean on the power button. The Scandisk log file showed one lost cluster on the C drive, and free space being reported incorrectly on the D drive.

Any thoughts? 

[Lisandro]

Man, what a mess... are you sure your computer is not infected? Seems malware behavior.
I suggest you run a scandisk on both drivers and a full avast scanning.

Sometimes, display errors, glitches and freezes could happen due to poor Windows 98 memory management.

[mkis]

one lost cluster on the C drive

This is enough to suggest that you can no longer expect true readings from your drives.
If you also have an infection, then situation is pretty much hopeless until you rid yourself of the drive with the lost  cluster. Sorry, but you will need a clean scan from your system drive before expect anything reliable from your computer.

[Mr.Agent]

I used a small program to replenish the icon cache, which gets fouled now and then, after which all of my icons disappeared! (Start Menu, Desktop - everything.)

Open command prompt and type explorer on it. I did see this on a video so i dont know if its really work or work for 98SE.

[Mike Buxton]

Hi,

To recover the missing icons just reboot. I do not think the other items are related so run Scandisk.

I did publish a workaround to the icon problem about a year ago but not a single person was interested.

Search using "hewee" and/or  "icons" if you want to find my workaround for the Win98 icon problem.

My regards

[rlg118]

The full scan showed nothing at all except a possible problem in a DOC file which was sent to me six years ago. When I had AVG, I scanned every night, and since I did a full reformat/reinstall three months ago, and haven't opened that particular document since 2003, I think we can eliminate that as a cause for concern.

I had similar problems while installing Avast (the icons disappearing, the shortcuts opening in Notepad), so I wasn't entirely surprised.

After rebooting, everything was normal again.

[Mike Buxton]

Hi again,

Upon first installing Avast it is wise to do a full scan and to repeat this after a month or so.

Thereafter, with active protection using the Standard and Web shields a context menu scan may be sufficient. I explained my thoughts in a response in this forum only a few days ago.

My regards

[Lisandro]

I had similar problems while installing Avast (the icons disappearing, the shortcuts opening in Notepad), so I wasn't entirely surprised.

I used Windows 98 with avast... but I can't remember such a bad experience... for sure it's not the general case.

[mkis]

The Scandisk log file showed one lost cluster on the C drive, and free space being reported incorrectly on the D drive.

Do you mean surface scan of hard disk?
If so, and you have lost cluster or bad sector readings, then all sorts of errors can be returned to screen when trying to run 9x systems.

[normishmael]

"Oy gevalt."

A Kopvaitk!