82 yr old Mom's computer

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Milehigh

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 18, 2004
Messages
246
Hey all, need some troubleshooting advice...

I built a computer last year for Mom, decent rig running Win 10, Asrock motherboard, an SSD and fairly standard other stuff. Recently, a family member (male, 30 or so) moved in due to life hardships. Every since he began using the computer, it has been acting up. At a point in the last 3 weeks, I suggested to Mom setting up his own account on the system and did so, hopefully not too late, but apparently so. At that time, I did flash her BIOS to the latest version, and it was working fine after that.

At any rate, Mom calls up early this week and her mouse doesn't work, so I go over and she is right... the WIRED usb Logitech mouse isn't moving the pointer, though it lights up underneath. I tried moving the mouse to another usb port, same problem. I managed to fumble through a couple reboots via the keyboard, and that is when things got even more weird. Trying to move around in the device manager looking for failed hardware, the tab key caused the window's background to flash from white to black alternately.

Another reboot, and I attempted to access the BIOS menus... no go, the delete key nor the F8 key would allow access and the computer while powering up seems non-functional. I almost suspect the motherboard might be hosed, but not ready to gut it yet without further exploration.

Now, this nephew "claims" that his wife's family is tracking him via the internet, his cell phone and has some evidence to back this up. At the last house he stay at (his sister), all the electronics exhibit weird behavior and issues after he stayed at that location. I want to believe him, and he even told me that family sent him a video of him taken through the cell phone camera unknown to him, and corroborated by his sister who saw the video. Seems like too much of a tinfoil hat scenario to me, and he may have mental health issues being as paranoid as he is.

Bottom line, he has used this computer on the admin account, the computer is hosed and I'm not sure what is the best method moving forward to fix it. Can a virus from a questionable site hose the bios? If it won't boot or allow bios access, is a full gutting of the box the only solution? Insight definitely appreciated :)
 
first step is to clear the bios. ive heard of virii that can hose a uefi bios, so possibly. or maybe he is like my friends dad and just his touch kills any electronics that he uses. computers die starting with the mouse, cant wear watches, drain batteries stuff like that. its something to do with their bodies natural electrical field, their "aura".
 
First off, smack this jackass family member upside the head.
Second, you may need to clean out the system and scrub the UEFI.
I would recommend setting both your mom and this idiot cousin up with limited accounts and reserve the admin account to yourself.
Then setup AV and Antispy stuff.

If the cousin wants to do something, he's up shit creek unless he wants to buy his own box to destroy. If he doesn't understand just the implication, sit him down and tell him in completely unadorned (i.e. rude, blunt speech) that he's not allowed to do it PERIOD because anything he fucks up keeps your mom from being able to access her computer and the Internet whenever she wants.

Then offer to help him shop for a machine.
 
There's probably no way to keep the nephew off the computer. If not him, someone else later.

I'd reset the bios to the defaults and password protect any future changes. I'd probably start over, but I guess it's worth a try to run malwarebytes, superantispyware, and ccleaner first.

Once you get the computer back up, create an account for your mom(or add her acccount) as a regular user, an account for the nephew(or add his account), then make your account the admin. There isn't any reason why your Mom needs to run as admin and it sounds like that for the nephew as well.
 
Thanks for the tips guys, after checking, it is an Asrock H170 Pro4 motherboard. It does have a CMOS clear function for the UEFI.

Chas, when you say "scrub" the UEFI, you mean the same as clearing it via the jumper, right? If worst case there is some type of virus on the UEFI, would that clean it? I should mention that 2 weeks back, I ran a full set of scans, Avast, SuperAntiSpyware, Spybot, MalwareBytes and CCleaner... most of what was found were tracking cookies and such. Any recommend any other tools?

euphoricd00m, yes, it is a USB mouse... I'll see if I have an old mouse laying around.

Again, to repeat, on my last few attempts, it would not boot or even allow access to the BIOS. So I need to cross that hurdle first, and I have both last versions of the BIOS on a flash drive once I can access the system.
 
Milehigh said:
Now, this nephew "claims" that his wife's family is tracking him via the internet, his cell phone and has some evidence to back this up. At the last house he stay at (his sister), all the electronics exhibit weird behavior and issues after he stayed at that location. I want to believe him, and he even told me that family sent him a video of him taken through the cell phone camera unknown to him, and corroborated by his sister who saw the video. Seems like too much of a tinfoil hat scenario to me, and he may have mental health issues being as paranoid as he is.
Click to expand...

Sounds like a friend of mine that has more burner phones than fingers.

If your nephew isn't dealing (even then), he's probably disturbed....

As for actual advice, swap the USB port, swap the mouse etc. If that doesn't work, Lor' only knows what crud that kid infected your moms computer with....

BIOS is def not the issue but a format could be in your future.

Oh, and after re-reading your last post, try "adwcleaner", it's a long shot but that's the only cleaner you didn't list that has saved me a few times.
 
Milehigh said:
Again, to repeat, on my last few attempts, it would not boot or even allow access to the BIOS. So I need to cross that hurdle first, and I have both last versions of the BIOS on a flash drive once I can access the system.
Click to expand...

Were you swapping BIOS revisions already?

That might be why it doesn't boot properly.

Yank the CMOS battery and pray.

Hopefully you didn't make it worse flashing the bios mem with something bunk....
 
Horrorshow, yes, he has addiction issues for sure but recently got a decent job, hoping that turns him around. Early stages of a divorce too, so life kind of sucks for him now. The BIOS was flashed with the latest version through Asrock, so don't think it was bunk. What does pulling the battery do that flashing via the jumpers won't?
 
It's like when [H] said my motherboard wouldn't support a 960.

I pulled the battery and bam, it worked.

It's def something I'd try.

Secondly, an H170 mobo has a jumper? Shiiiii.....

I haven't even heard the term for over a decade. It sounds like your fiddling with the wrong stuff man.
 
Yeah, the CMOS Clear jumper right near the battery... does the same thing I would assume. Manual says it will flash back to defaults.
 
Well, just an update. Erasing the CMOS and pulling the battery did nothing... RMA for motherboard in process.
 
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