The LOL NO DLL story.

[zontore]

I built my own computer 2-3 years ago and never had a problem with it until about 2 months ago. I changed my video card from a ti 4400 to a 9800 pro and took out the 512 pc 2100 ram, adding 1 GB of 3200 ram. I then reformated my computer and everything ran great. It was freshly reformated and only had steam with half life 2 installed. Two weeks later I got shafted. I came home late at night and logged on to see a flashing black box on my monitor, with red text that said LOL NO MORE DLLS!!!!!! I figured it was a pop up ad so I closed it out, then i got about 10 million missing dll file errors and my pc crashed. I didn't know what would cause it because I hadn't downloaded anything and I use firefox for internet browsing.

Here's the problem. I boot cd from bios, deleted the old partition, and begin installing windows. When im installing windows it gives me errors CAN NOT INSTALL SHELL.DLL OLE32.DLL and hundreds of other DLL's it can't install. I put in a new hard drive, same problem. I put in my old video card, same problem. Somone help :(

[korpse]

Wow...sounds like a CMOS virus... I know they exist but they are very rare...

[End7]

is your OS cd scratched at all? it could just be a conicidence that your windows dll's got deleted and your xp cd got scratched when you went to reinstall. if the cd isnt scratched at all, i have no idea, sounds really crazy to me.

[zontore]

I thought that at first also, but I borrowed my friends windows xp pro cd and well.. it does the same thing.

[iNViSiGOD]

Damn, that does sound bad. Have you tried installing an alernate OS like Linux, 98 or anything else besides an NT based OS? Might want to try getting a linux distro made to boot entirely from CD and see what happens, or if you have a flash deviced try booting something small from that. :confused:

[zontore]

I don't have the first idea on how to use LINUX :( nor do I have a cd for it. I have only tried installing windows xp home and pro editions. Would buying a new motherboard solve this... becuase I currently have a xp 1800 processor and I want to upgrade to a 939 mobo with athlon 64.

[Mister Natural]

Sounds like somebody hacked you bad.
You might have a corrupt MBR or could be the bios got hit.
Reflash bios, repartition, fix mbr, unplug network line and try a clean install. Also check for mystery partitions on the drive.

[zontore]

^ ^ ^ ^ I have no idea how to do that.

[zontore]

Would popping the battery out of my mobo possibly kill it....?

[Mister Natural]

^ ^ ^ ^ I have no idea how to do that.
Then I suggest finding a knowledgable computer tech to assist in the mystery.

[zontore]

Then I suggest finding a knowledgable computer tech to assist in the mystery.
I believe that would cost more then getting a new motherboard.

[Phoenix86]

OK, someone set you up the bomb...

I think it's going to be a given here but, "I say we dust off and nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."

So first thing is disconnect it from whatever network you have. Next step is to try to delete the partitions (again?) and reinstall windows. I'd recommend creating a slipstreamed SP2 CD from your original disk.

Possibly this is bad hardware, after all:
I changed my video card from a ti 4400 to a 9800 pro and took out the 512 pc 2100 ram, adding 1 GB of 3200 ram. I then reformated... Two weeks later I got shafted So let's not discount bad RAM, possible run Memtest86 for several hours/overnight.

http://www.mentallyretired.com/h3/index.cfm/u_45754 (http://www.mentallyretired.com/h3/index.cfm?a=doMyStats&u_id=45754)

[nylint]

You might try a bootdisk from www.bootdisk.com (http://www.bootdisk.com) .

Do an FDISK /MBR to reconstruct your master boot record. Then delete all the partitions you see. Let your Windows setup recreate the partition.

Edit: Booting to a boot disk and running FDISK /MBR to me would be faster and easier to a neophyte than booting to the XP disc and running fixmbr, btw.

[zontore]

Thanks, I'll be working on fixing it tonight :D

[BallerX]

[LOL NO MORE DLLS!!!!!!]


that's no error message I've ever seen. not unles MS decided that it was no longer funy watching us run around like headless chickens trying to patch boxes. so, they added some nice messages making fun of us about it. chances its a bois virus are slim. they ussually leave you completely bootless. make sure you have no other drives pluged in and that all the removable media drives are empty. and for sure unplug it from any network your on Like others have stated. i think you should start there.

[zontore]

Ok. so heres what i did.

I replaced the motherboard, processor, video card. I have switched cd drives, i switched hard drives, i switched windows cds, ram, everything.

I STILL GET THE SAME ERRORS.

MISSING DLLS. how can this still be happening after i have replaced all these parts. help :(

[Phoenix86]

Can you post a screen shot?

[Badger_sly]

Ok. so heres what i did.

I replaced the motherboard, processor, video card. I have switched cd drives, i switched hard drives, i switched windows cds, ram, everything.

I STILL GET THE SAME ERRORS.

MISSING DLLS. how can this still be happening after i have replaced all these parts. help :(
Did you put in the new hard drive and new motherboard at the same time? If not, try that.

[Tangent]

Yikes, I'd really like to know what would cause that much havoc... This was at least a good reminder to update my virus definitions though. :eek:

[Steel Chicken]

sounds like an old persistent virus thats not only on the MBR but in the BIOS
anytime he switches out one piece of hardware, off it goes

[djnes]

I haven't seen any mention of swapping the optical drive and/or cable it's connected with yet.

On a side note, if you don't know how to flash the BIOS, repartition, fix the mbr, and the other steps Mister Natural is suggesting, you probably shouldn't be building a clone system, unless you have knowledgeable friends to assist you in person. Those are basic concepts.

[Mister Natural]

After rereading the original post I think the bios got hacked. There's either something in the bios, or there's something floating around on a hard disk.
Also be sure to unplug your network cable until you get things running and firewalled. Bios flash, then boot with a clean win98 boot disk which is write protected. Run fdisk and go to option 4 to view partition information. Then go back to the main screen and delete all partitions including non-dos partitions. Then exit the fdisk screen and at the DOS prompt type FDISK/MBR.

[skinegibbs]

What about just clearing CMOS and taking out the BIOS battery?

[Mister Natural]

What about just clearing CMOS and taking out the BIOS battery?
Certainly worth a try.

[Tangent]

I thought he said he replaced the motherboard entirely though? Allthough if he installed a new motherboard with the old infected hard drive I suppose he might have just toasted 2 mobos...

[xXaNaXx]

i have had something like this happen when i went to reinstall windows before, it tells me that certain files are not found or corrupted.....it turned out to be dirty/scratched cd media in some cases, and in other cases, it turned out that my memory settings in BIOS were set too aggressively....once i turned them down, it installed fine

[Badger_sly]

I thought he said he replaced the motherboard entirely though? Allthough if he installed a new motherboard with the old infected hard drive I suppose he might have just toasted 2 mobos...

That's why I suggested that he swap the motherboard and hard drive at the same time, with some that haven't been tried yet. If he does, and gets the same problem, then it's a guarantee that it's not a virus, but something else causing it.

[cmpsr2000]

I agree with most everyone who's suggested bios/mbr virus. If it was a disk error you wouldn't get an error message in windows.I would do the following in this order:

Remove hard drives from system, unplug from network
Flash BIOS
Flash Video Bios
Reinstall hard drives.
Low Level format all hard drives.
Run Windows install.
Install antivirus/firewall/whatever protection you need/want
plug back onto the network and update.

If you run into problems doing any of that then you need to find a tech to help out, or convince someone on the forum to give you their phone number :D