[mjwkjw]

Good morning out there,

I have been searching the internet awhile now and came across your site. I noticed back in June 2007 that another person was receiving help on this same topic, however, I do not have some of the software that person had. I am new to this, so please bare with me if I do not speak appropriately.

Back at the end of June, I contacted DELL because I kept receiving the Bios dump screen (blue screen). I allowed DELL onto my computer, who then went into all types of areas of my computer. DELL could not fix the issue (whatever it was), so they explained to me to do an operating system restore. I did this.
Once it was done I installed the Symantec Antivirus that came with our DELL laptop. The subscription ran out and I tried to remove it to use another antivirus. This is when I noticed that I have no Add/Remove buttons on most of my programs. I have about 14 items on my list that says NORTON next to it among other programs I know nothing about and cannot remove.

I am hoping that someone here is able to help me. I have spent countless hours on the internet trying to find the answers, but am so afriad to contact DELL. I do not want to go through another operating system reinstall. We bought our laptop 2 years ago and it has already had to have 2 operating system restores, along with 2 system restores.
I am sure this may be a problem on my part, but I do not know why.

Could someone please help me to figure out what to do to fix my laptop?

One more thing to add is the Music Match error message that pops up: Shellconhiddenwindow (I believe that is it). How do I get rid of this?

Oh please please help me. I thank you in advance for reading this.

Kim

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Try this fix from Kelly's: http://www.kellys-ko...oremovepage.reg
1. Copy to Notepad
2. Save as.. NoRemovePage.reg
3. Right click saved file and "Open with..." Regedit
4. "YES" to confirmation.
Reboot may be necessary.

[1101doc]

Try this fix from Kelly's: http://www.kellys-ko...oremovepage.reg
1. Copy to Notepad
2. Save as.. NoRemovePage.reg
3. Right click saved file and "Open with..." Regedit
4. "YES" to confirmation.
Reboot may be necessary.

[mjwkjw]

Thank you so much for responding to my post, however, I did what you showed me and it did not work. I am not quite sure what else to do. Would you have any other suggestions? Is it normal to have items on Add/Remove that I cannot delete?

Thank you again and look forward to more advice.

Blessings,
Kim

[1101doc]

Phooey! Now I would try doing them one at a time as outlined here:
http://www.winxptuto.../arpbuttons.htm

Get free ERUNT first and make a Registry back-up:
ERUNT info and tutorial-- http://www.winxptuto.../arpbuttons.htm
Download ERUNT-- http://www.larsheder...nline.de/erunt/
(Click on one of the "Server" links.)

[mjwkjw]

Good afternoon,

Hi again! I tried what you mentioned, but still no help. It did help bring back 'some' of the buttons though. I cannot seem to uninstall the Norton stuff though. Why on earth would there be SO many Norton Antivirus things on my Add/Remove list? There is no way to uninstall this. I went to the Symantec uninstall website and it says to use the Add/Remove buttons, yet I can't seem to get them on there. I keep getting a reminder to renew my subscription, but there is no cancel or uninstall steps available.

Any other ideas?

Please know how thankful I am for your help.

Talk to you soon,
Kim

[1101doc]

Norton, Norton, Norton. Always with the Norton.

Actually, some of those Norton entries don't have their own buttons anyway.
Let's get rid of Norton and then worry about the other stuff, OK?

First I'm going to hope that you have it on a disc? Nope, of course not. Too easy.
Not hard to un-install from a disc. Just follow the prompts.

So~ First, make sure that everything Norton/Symantec is turned off and not running.
(Kill all processes)
Use Process Explorer to make sure.
http://www.microsoft...ssexplorer.mspx
Make one of your P.Ex column choices 'Company.'

Type services. msc into a Run box. When it opens up, expand it and look for anything Norton/Symantec.
(Don't forget 'Speed Disc' if you have it.)
When you find an entry, right click it. Set the start-up type to Disable.
Then Apply. Before you OK the dialog box, click the Stop button, and wait for the small progress bar to finish.
Do this for all of the Norton/Symantec Services you find.

Then open the Program Files folder for Norton and find an "uninst" file.
Double click it to run. Hold your breath. Pray. Make burnt sacrifices. Cross your fingers.
Won't help, but at least it'll feel like you're doing something.
If you get a failure message, it may be that you missed something that is still active. Go back through and check. Carefully.

There may be other uninst. files in other folders. Try them all.
Once you've done everything you can, run the tool which you get from Symantec:
http://service1.syma...005033108162039
Be sure to get the version that is for your particular product. Run that. Reboot.

At this point almost all Norton should be gone. But. Open C:\RECYCLER and delete the NProtect file there if found.

Live Update needs to be uninstalled seperately. It has a Service as well. Windows ' is called Automatic Updates. Nortons' is called "Automatic live update." Turn that one off, too. Uninstall "Live update" from Add/Remove if possible. (Check its Registry entry as noted in the article you used to see if it is there. (Change appropriately.)

Run the Norton Removal Tool again. Reboot.

Consider that you now have no anti-virus or other protection that was being offered by your Norton. Prepare ahead of time with downloaded set-up files for the utilities that you plan to use, and once Norton is gone, install those before re-connecting to the net. Your first step after installing the new anti-virus and anti-spyware should be to get them fully updated. Do this even before checking your e-mail, OK?

When I'm un-and re-installing my security utilities, I actually unplug the cable and disable my wireless so that my computer is isolated while vulnerable. Paranoid?
Maybe, but better safe...

Let me know how things are progressing. Once we get you out from under the shadow of Norton,
we can work on whatever is remaining.

Edited by 1101doc, 30 September 2007 - 04:12 PM.

[mjwkjw]

Oh thank you so much for your help again. So sorry it took so long to get back on here, had some issues come up with my plug adapter.

So, I went through your steps and accomplished everything but finding an uninstall file. So I searched and searched some more on the Symantec site again. I actually found that I have a 2006 version and found a way to uninstall all norton files. Here is the link that I used:

http://service1.syma...n...lg=en&ct=us

It actually worked, amazing. Maybe if I would have had more patience to look, I could have found this earlier, much earlier. You have been a blessing and an actual joy to read from. I laughed so much reading your post. Thanks for the humor you make in life.

So, now onto other things. There are still things that I cannot seem to figure out how to remove, let alone what they are. I told you I am not intelligent in the computer field yet. In 3 years I will be, since I am going to college for computers, but not currently. So is it possible that you could help me figure out the rest, please?

Let me know!
Thanks,
Kim

[1101doc]

Of course, glad to help to the best of my ability.

I hope that you have ERUNT working for you now. I won't boot without it.

I know that removing the remaing programs is foremost in your mind at this time, but why? Are they giving you any trouble? Taking up just way too much disc space?
If there really is no urgency to that project, I suggest that you take a little time to do some basic XP housekeeping that will make everything work just a little more smoothly.

Taking the following steps will do the trick, and provide you with some basic system experience as well.

Clean out the junk files: http://www.atribune....tent/view/19/2/

Defrag the drive: http://www.kessels.com/JkDefrag/

Do a checkdisk: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315265

And a scannow: http://www.updatexp....cannow-sfc.html

Also take a look at my Vox: http://doc1101.vox.com/
Copy and paste the URLs to your browser address bar
to view the referenced web pages.