My ASUS 1000 H XP laptop running XP Home SP3 is infected and Avasti was not man enough to stop or cure it. Luckily I have limited access to the internet from an ancient desktop. I found advice that Stopzilla would cure the problem and downloaded it onto an external hard drive using this desktop - uploaded it to the laptop, installed it and managed to partially update the virus library from the web while running in safe mode. Unfortunately the programme will work to some extent but clearly is not loaded properly.
I could download and upload email using Microsoft Outlook but not achieve internet access because - so the new IE told me - I could not download HTP - I think. After some browsing on this site I took some advice and looked at hidden devices - under "non-plug and play" drivers I discovered one called "serial" is not working properly and am cautious about updating in on the web as it might do anything! I did take another look at the other hardware and discovered that my ethernet controller was disabled - by a virus I suspect, so I switched it on and lo and behold - I had internet access again.
After reinstalling stopzilla I discovered my internet access had gone again and this time there were two hidden drivers Serial, as before and now PartMgr but this one won't ley me look at it's properties.
I feel I'm on the track of a solution but don't yet see what it is, can anyone help?
