Tries to connect

[mike12]

I am trying to clean up a friends computer. She had 11 infected files, 195 spyware files that Ad-Aware caught, 145 spyware files that Spybot S & D caught, and about 45 invalid registry items that Easy Cleaner found. I have eliminated the infected files, and removed everything that Ad-Aware and Spybot found. I have done full scans with AVG and at Housecalls, everything is clean. The only anoying problem is once in a while I get the dial-up screen to dial into the internet, when I just have the computer running. Is there something else still wrong, or is it just something that she needs to tolerate ? I have also un-enabled AVG from trying to automatically update, I thought that might be the problem. She is running Windows 98. All suggestions are greatly appreciated.

[rightcoast]

You didn't say whether the user uses broadband or dial-up, but if the user has broadband you can set IE to never dial a connection.

Start Internet Explorer. From the Tools menu, select Internet Options. Select
the Connections tab. Select the Never Dial a Connection option. Apply, OK.

[rjfvillarosa]

Have a look in the start up list in "msconfig" check what programs are starting when windows starts and try unchecking the boxes one at a time. Despite all of your scans it is still possible something was missed.

[mike12]

rightcoast--she has dial-up
rjfvillarosa--the only items that are checked there are: scanregistry, task monitor, system tray, load power profile, and 3cmlink, for the modem. I have been doing many virus scans the last two days, that is when the dial-up menu appears. Maybe doing that scan causes the popup ?

[glc]

She can set IE to never dial a connection as Rightcoast says, even with dialup.

Open the Dialup Networking folder and drag a shortcut to her connection out to the desktop and/or the quicklaunch bar - use that to manually connect when she wants to go on line before opening her browser or e-mail app, whatever. I always do this (have been since Win95 came out) and highly recommend this as a security issue anyway.

[mike12]

Thanks glc for the info. I think I found the problem. There was a setting in OUTLOOK EXPRESS to check mail every 5 minutes even if not connected to the internet. I guess it was trying to connect to check for messages. Have changed that setting to only check for messages, IF CONNECTED. Hope that solves that problem. Again, thanks to everyone who offered suggestions !!