Using LiveCD for Virus Removal

[ozzy24]

Okay, I am pretty sure someone will say, "why didn't you use the search engine?" Well, I have been and have gotten no solid answers. I am troubleshooting a Windows Vista machine for a friend of mine. I want to know if I can just pop a LiveCD in and (for instance) have clamAV on a USB flash drive, mount the USB stick and run clamAV that way Can clamAV be installed and ran from a LiveCD? I need to be for certain that the method described above won't change or screw with the Windows partition. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

[mick55]

This site has a bunch of rescue CD's from various Anti-Virus companies.
Download the one of your choice, Kaspersky and BitDefender are top notch
antivirus softwares.The rescue CD's are free.

http://www.askvg.com/download-free-boot ... nd-others/

cheers
mick

[DrHu]

I need to be for certain that the method described above won't change or screw with the Windows partition. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Well checking for viruses with any program will include deleting those viruses or suspected viruses that the program detects
--that may very well cause a problem, if the virus detection is a false positive, otherwise it is fine
--you can, of course always quarantine a virus, move it into a specific directory (folder)

As such any anti-virus program can be run against the windows OS from any media that can be activated for windows: usb, CD etc

[rippedcb]

I've always found that to get rid of some of those stubborn viruses in windows.. i always boot into windows safe mode and run the antivirus from there and it makes it alot easier to get rid of them. My friend had one few months ago which just kept on replicating and was almost impossible to get rid of in normal mode, thorough scan after booting in safe mode (which took almost an hr) i was able to get rid of it. Good luck

CB

[lagagnon]

ozzy24: systemrescue cd has clamav already installed on it. http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page

[dequire]

+1 for SysrescueCD - It's a really good liveCd and has ClamAV plus tons of other great programs. Another utility on it that I like is the DiskShredder. I use this on a new install to eradicate the old drive data. Even non-linux users should have a copy of this CD or the thumb drive equivalent because sooner or later (sooner w MS Windows) you will need something like this.

Here is everything included on the CD.

[dawgdoc]

+1 for SysrescueCD - It's a really good liveCd and has ClamAV plus tons of other great programs. Another utility on it that I like is the DiskShredder. I use this on a new install to eradicate the old drive data. Even non-linux users should have a copy of this CD or the thumb drive equivalent because sooner or later (sooner w MS Windows) you will need something like this....

Here is everything included on the CD.

Another good liveCD to have on hand is PartedMagic, though it has no AV. It has multiple partitioning tools, file system tools, bootloading tools, GUI utilities and console utilities. A full list of programs is here. Here

Four discs that I keep with me are
1) Mint live CD
2) SystemRescue CD
3) PartedMagic
4) OpenDisc (selection of high quality open source software on a disc for Microsoft Windows users.) The project Wiki a way I've started transitioning several people not yet ready to switch

[dequire]

Thanks for the OpenDisk link. I was un-familiar with the project.

[ozzy24]

Okay, I am pretty sure someone will say, "why didn't you use the search engine?" Well, I have been and have gotten no solid answers. I am troubleshooting a Windows Vista machine for a friend of mine. I want to know if I can just pop a LiveCD in and (for instance) have clamAV on a USB flash drive, mount the USB stick and run clamAV that way Can clamAV be installed and ran from a LiveCD? I need to be for certain that the method described above won't change or screw with the Windows partition. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

i tried several rescue CD's with no luck

[markcynt]

Many antivirus vendors make Linux versions of their programs.

You could always install some of those in Mint, update the definitions, then Make a Remastersys Live CD/DVD to use that to scan the offending Windows system.

http://www.google.com/search?aq=f&sourc ... +for+linux