I have a user with a laptop who is trying to install XP Home. When he boots from the CD he says he gets a message saying bad sector, virus detected. He even put in a new hard drive and is getting the same thing. Shouldnt formatting take care of finding any bad sectors? Ive never seen this message before and dont have access to the laptop so figured I would ask here first. Any ideas?
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Bad sector, virus detected message while installing XP
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He is going to check the BIOS for the virus setting. Im having him take a picture of the screen. He says it only does it when he boots from the CD. He says it does it with the XP CD as well as ME and 98 although I dont see how he is booting to ME & 98. It doesnt do it without the CD in there. Ill post the picture when I get it.
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Here is a pic of his screen. Looks to me like its part of the laptops BIOS settings to me. Im going to see if he can get in there and check for an antivirus setting.
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He says he cant see anything in setup about onboard virus protection. It says its a ami hiflex bios 1.30.
The photo doesn't look like a Bios screen more like the ME Setup program. He will have to press the correct key (DEL, F1 etc.) at bootup to enter the Bios.
If he has tried different hard drives, and it is a genuine virus, he could be re-infecting himself via inputs from infected floppies?
If he has tried different hard drives, and it is a genuine virus, he could be re-infecting himself via inputs from infected floppies?
I am sure there is no virus and he only should press Y to allow write to boot sector.
I have seen such messages many times. This is BIOS built-in boot sector write protection (I am almost sure there is no antivirus software in BIOS at all, only boot sector write protection) and, as I can see in this picture, it asks for permission to write in boot sector. Writing in boot sector is normal issue in Windows setup process.
It is recommended to disable this protection before Windows setup. But, if you cannot find where it is in BIOS setup or simply forgot to do it, usually there is no problem, except in some computers where this Yes/No dialog is not shown on screen and setup hangs without messages.
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Karlis
ECDL; MCSA
I have seen such messages many times. This is BIOS built-in boot sector write protection (I am almost sure there is no antivirus software in BIOS at all, only boot sector write protection) and, as I can see in this picture, it asks for permission to write in boot sector. Writing in boot sector is normal issue in Windows setup process.
It is recommended to disable this protection before Windows setup. But, if you cannot find where it is in BIOS setup or simply forgot to do it, usually there is no problem, except in some computers where this Yes/No dialog is not shown on screen and setup hangs without messages.
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Karlis
ECDL; MCSA
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