I'm trying to help a friend with her Windows 8 laptop and I need some generic advice.
Her PC had been running great until she attempted to download some silly game a couple of days ago. The game took hours to download and install and ever since she's had problems - lots of pop-ups and strange things running constantly. I helped her using Malwarebytes and AdwCleaner, which seemed to take care of pretty much everything.
Two problems remain:
Windows Defender which is her real-time protection refuses to run. She's been using Defender for a few years and ran a full scan just a week ago, and no malware was found.. Now, it gives us the following message for which I've found very little help. She is running basic Windows 8 and no group policies are running.
AFAIK she has never had any other antivirus on the laptop.
The second problem is one I came across in trying to solve problem 1. Opening a command prompt as an administrator and running sfc /scannow always brings up the DOS message that it cannot be run because I have to be an administrator.
Since everything else on the laptop seems to work just fine, and she can play all her other silly games and read her email she didn't want to part with it. So I'm looking for some ideas on what to do to fix these issues when I see her next.
Her PC had been running great until she attempted to download some silly game a couple of days ago. The game took hours to download and install and ever since she's had problems - lots of pop-ups and strange things running constantly. I helped her using Malwarebytes and AdwCleaner, which seemed to take care of pretty much everything.
Two problems remain:
Windows Defender which is her real-time protection refuses to run. She's been using Defender for a few years and ran a full scan just a week ago, and no malware was found.. Now, it gives us the following message for which I've found very little help. She is running basic Windows 8 and no group policies are running.
AFAIK she has never had any other antivirus on the laptop.
The second problem is one I came across in trying to solve problem 1. Opening a command prompt as an administrator and running sfc /scannow always brings up the DOS message that it cannot be run because I have to be an administrator.
Since everything else on the laptop seems to work just fine, and she can play all her other silly games and read her email she didn't want to part with it. So I'm looking for some ideas on what to do to fix these issues when I see her next.
My Computer
System One
-
- OS
- Windows 8 home premium
- Computer type
- Laptop
- System Manufacturer/Model
- Dell Inspiron 3521
