Game over...

[Jenks]

Just in time for Christmas - the one time of year where I would have had some time to go flying - a nasty little virus has sneaked in and destroyed my PC. Not only got rid of all the data, but actually physically destroyed the hard drive as well

I had the latest, 2007 version, of good anti-virus software and it was completely up to date with all the latest definitions, but apparently even that is not enough these days. The virus bypassed everything and 'ate' the hard drive before we even knew it was there. Happened when we were at work and no-one was even using the PC - put it down to 'always on' broadband I guess

The supreme irony is that I can't even warn people what to look out for, as it destroyed the hardware to such an extent that even the PC fixit guys can't get anything from it. Their best guess from its characteristics is that it was a variant of the 'smitfraud' virus, although there seem to be a lot of variations from the reading that I have done.

In a nutshell, FS has ceased to exist for the time being - along with the software itself all my customised AI, modified airfields and a fair few in progress paints have been lost, plus all the tweaking that had been done to get FS running sweetly. At least I can download my completed paints again easily enough.

Maybe VOZ AI plus GNZLAP 1 through to 4 and it will all be sweet

Luckily I also use an Apple Mac for a lot of repainting work, so that work has survived. Long may Macs remain immune to viruses

So please back up any critical files that you have guys, as this little nasty may be visiting others in the near future. It doesn't propogate through emails, so I'm not sure exactly where it does come from. Hopefully this heads up will save someone from suffering the same fate as me.

Steve

[Zöltuger]

destroyed the hardware? i'm a bit sceptical, sounds like a dying hard disk rather than a virus to me.

[Jenks]

No problem, feel free to be sceptical Zoltuger - I'm just repeating what the 'Geeks on Wheels' guy told me. I don't claim to be an expert myself on PCs and their innards.

I have heard of this happening to others recently though, so there's just as much chance that IS what actually happened. The morons who write the viruses are more than capable of causing this sort of destruction.

It's always been my experience working with our Macs that 'dying' hard disks give fair warning before they actually expire, and I've never heard of one expiring when it was not even switched on

Take your chances if you wish!

[Jimmy]

Weather it was a virus or a dying harddisk jenk's advice is very important! I have many many disks of stuff downloaded (extra good when your on dial up as re downloading osmething may take days). And also backing up certainly makes movin to a new pc alot easier

Its is very sad to hear that has happend, I hope you manage to get your sim back together soon....

[Codge]

I had a 3 gig hard drive die on me just the other day and it gave no warning at all. I do have a 20gig HD in my main PC as a spare and it is getting a bit noisy sometimes and I am considering this as fair warning.
Also if you use Firefox as your browser this helps, only helps though as most of these a-holes write their viruses for IE cos most people use IE. Of course they may well target every type now but you do what you can don't you?
Personally I think virus developers should be either shot or given some super boring task to do that will take years so that they never want to even see a PC ever again!
Sorry to hear of your dillema Jenks, it brings to mind the advice given in one of the 'Tips and Tricks' PDF's that says to back up your whole sim preferably on one of those USB type plug in portable hard drives. Hind sight I know, I have my sim backed up on another PC, my old 900Mhz one, but I also have 2 FS installs on my main PC. One with GNZLAP and the Retro project and totally dedicated to NZ and the other one has VOZai and all the rest of the world stuff on it,and that one takes a while to load due to all my brilliant scenery addons.
I'm using AVG anti virus and have just updated it as required by them by January 15. I have Norton too but don't use it anymore as I was given advise by a clever clogged dude who says Norton gets too deep inside the system and slows everything up too much, especially Flight Simulator and is a common contributor to the dreaded stutters and lockups!.
I did find when I switched from Norton to AVG that I did indeed have a good boost to the performance of my sim. I also use that Ultimate Disc Defragger and that makes it's wee contribution too.
Regards and Merry Xmas guys, Codge

[gokanru]

It shows the importance of always backing up your data doesn't it.I had a customer who had a 40 gig Maxtor installed in their computor.IT was running as sweet as a nut here and they were wrapped with it.They got it home and on swtiching on got the message master disk fail.No noise no nothing.The electronics had failed and you don't hear that going.A mechanical failure will give you some hint that something is wrong.Fitted another 40 gig HD and everything was sweet.If a virus hits the MBR of a hard drive it will corrupt the WHOLE drive,go to the website of the drive maker and you can usually download a small utility that will do a low level format.The drive data will also be rewritten to the MBR.In doing this,you lose EVERYTHING on the drive,but it does save you from having to buy another drive.

[creator2003]

there is a program call easy recovery made buy programers at nasa when they where trying to recover data from the discovery blackbox ,this as long as you got some one with a good harddrive can simply plug your one in and recover your drive ezy ,,it will even go back as far as three formats ago "yes that good"belive it or not ,,to stop viruses i use a sygate firewall ,windows firewall, netscape browers, no adware,avg, Ultimate Disc Defragger ,spybot,zonealarm,you name it i run most of them to keep those little buggers out ,remeber but that avg free is one month behind on the latest updates ,unless you have the pro version ,but saying that i havent had any viruses for ,well long time ,
i hope that all gets sorted before the end of you holidays jenks

[Jenks]

Thanks for all your suggestions guys, but I am struggling to believe that we all know more than the professionals who recover data/hard drives for a living...

Natas, that 'easy recovery' sounds good so I'll give that a go and let you know how I get on.

But there is always a silver lining...

...reinstalled FSX on my new HD and it not only runs better than before(?) but it now doesn't need a disk to run If I put in disk 1 it just tries to reinstall every time and if I put in disk 2 it doesn't do anything. Put in no disk at all and it runs

[Kelburn]

I'm confused. Is this a virus or not?
And what is the risk of getting it? (I use Firefox and Thunderbird and my computer also has AD-aware 6.0 installed)
Though all of this talking has made me decide to back up all of the important computer files on the computer.

[Zöltuger]

reinstalled FSX on my new HD and it not only runs better than before(?) but it now doesn't need a disk to run

FSX doesn't need a disk to run, it uses authentication like windows xp
it will be running faster because you haven't installed any background programs and the hard disk isn't defragmented.

[ardypilot]

What an unfortunate start to the Christmas season Jenks!

A few years ago, I took my PC down to the shop to get some stuff fixed, and when I got it back a week later, my HDD's had been wiped and a fresh new copy of Windows had been installed. I had lost all my FS2004 program and addons, which made me so angry I punched a hole in a door and broke a window!

From that day on I have always backed up data- all the best in getting it sorted mate.

[ronindanbo]

I'm confused. Is this a virus or not?
And what is the risk of getting it? (I use Firefox and Thunderbird and my computer also has AD-aware 6.0 installed)
Though all of this talking has made me decide to back up all of the important computer files on the computer.

no... There is no such thing as a virus which can physically destroy a peice of hardware

[Jenks]

'physically destroy' or make 'completely unuseable' - same thing in the end...

...just semantics really.

I'm currently reformatting the new HD for the second time as Windows managed to screw itself up first time around... Windows/MS really sucks.

...typing this from my Mac, for which I have a whole new respect for after this debacle.

[ardypilot]

All the same Jenks, I hope you get it sorted mate.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you

[Jenks]

Thanks Trolly - Merry Christmas to you too, and to everyone else as well.

I've given up on fixing it though. Windows failed to install correctly again, so I'll have to leave it to the professionals next year sometime.

So no flying for me for a while - have to find myself a good book instead