Screen Saver

[DogStar]

Not sure if I'm in right section but...
My mums comp at bootup shows a picture of 3 dogs(which I figure is an old Screen saver or such) until windows gets to desktop when her active desktop loads in with new background.
The problem is that at shutdown it goes to the 3 dogs pic again and then instead of showing "now safe...blah..blah" it shows a weird pixel effect pic of the 3 dog pic.
I have looked in the display properties to see if I can hunt this 3 dogs pic down but no luck.
It doesn't seem to affect anything but cosmetically it is annoying.
She has win98 SE.
Any ideas appreciated.

 

[Phantasm66]

This bounty hunter is my kind of scum!

Originally posted by DogStar
instead of showing "now safe...blah..blah" it shows a weird pixel effect pic of the 3 dog pic.

Hhehehe! LOL! That's SO cool! I've NEVER heard of that before.

Try turning active desktop off (right click desktop, untick show as web page or something...) and then go into display properties and select no background. If you have active desktop, its a bit like the original bitmap is still there, and the .jpeg or whatever is like a 2nd layer.

Its also possible that the "dog" screensaver wrote over the bitmaps for your startup, shutdown screens, etc.

Now, the screen that should say "Windows is now shutting down" is actually a bitmap called LOGOW.sys. It is a bitmap, but the .bmp extension has been changed to .sys.

The screen that says "Its now safe to turn off your computer" or whatever is called LOGOS.sys.

These reside in your c:\windows directory, I believe.

You could create any bitmap with these same dimensions and number of colors, and then save it over these files.

I am presently looking for the names of the files which are the other screens, I will let you know. Perhaps other 3DS members can help as well.

The original bitmaps will be in one of the .cab files on your windows CD. Apologies, I don't know which one. But if I find out I will let you know.

 

[DogStar]

I was thinking that I should disable Active desktop and go hunt these hounds down, but was unsure. Thanks for your help Phantasm.
I will try what you suggested and let you know how it goes.
My mums comp really needs a good reformatting as my elder brother gets on it and somehow really screws it up, but my mum sorta freaks out when I mention reformatting.
I will get a screenshot of it and post it as this picture will speak louder than words.

 

[DogStar]

OK. Got rid of the hounds of the baskerville.
Could find no trace of the logos.sys file or logow.sys files in the Win Dir.
If I copy these files onto a floppy from my comp and paste them into my mums Win Dir, will this work?
On my comp the logow file has .W98 extension but should still work huh?

 

[Phantasm66]

I want them alive!

.sys files are probably hidden system files, which you might not see unless you unhide system and hidden files.

another way to find them, I should think, is go to start, search and point it at the windows folder, searching for "logo" . Not *.sys because there will be a lot of .sys files I should think.

 

[DogStar]

Update time.
Found the logo.* files ( you were right-hidden)
Went to fix it but then mum starts trippin on me...so I said fine,when the OS craps itself don't ring me (very intense visit).
So untill she rings , have to put this thread on hold.
But got rid of those bloody hounds
Sorry I couldn't give them in alive.
Thx for the help.

P.S.Couldn't get screenshot but I'll try to describe.
In explorer all folders before the win dir have obscure names.
e.g. "$%-_(7"
Like they're encrypted or such.But you can't delete,rename or open them, and the file properties all say 0 bytes.
Never seen anything like that before.
Makes me glad I don't let others use my comp. At least that way if something screws up I can only blame myself.

 

[Didou]

You might want to consider installing an Anti-Virus program for her. Can't hurt...

 

[DogStar]

Has NAV 2002 installed in last 2 months.
I put on Zone alarm the other day and she freaked when she copped 3 hits in a hour.
Going to put on a new prog by name of Pestpatrol ( like anti hack,spyware and trogan hunter).

PestPatrol

P.s. I'll have to wait for her to calm down first.
Mothers.Gotta love 'em.

 

[DogStar]

Here's the screenshot of my mums c drive.Any ideas what has happened?

 

[Didou]

Have you tryed running scandisk ? You might wanna try "inspect disk surface" too while you're at it...

 

[PanicX]

I've seen virus's that do exactly what you see. The best fix that I know of for that damage, is a reformat, most likely those extra folders are writen in ASCII code, which Win98 can't read. If you try to open or delete any of those folders, do you get a "Folder does not exist" error or something similar? If so that's your problem. Make sure you're Anti Virus is updated with the latest definitions, and run a complete scan of your system.

 

[DogStar]

Thx for your input.
Will run advanced scandisk.
I agree that a reformat is what it needs but my mum is adamant that she doesn't want to do this and lose all her stuff.
One bonus is that my elder brother has been banned from her comp.(bit late after the horse has bolted but better than nothing)
Yes your right panicX about trying to delete and such these folders.Get error 1026.Will suss out at MS site.
Thx again for help.:grinthumb

 

[DogStar]

Update

OK.
Ran full scandisk--no probs
Defragged
Ran full scan with NAV 2002--no probs
Tried to scan individual folder(s) with NAV but folder(s) do/don't exist.
Booted into Dos and dir shows same folders.
Went to bios setup and needed a password to access which is weird because when I set up comp for my Mum I didn't set BIOS password.
This seems like a virus prob but shouldn't NAV detect and remove, or is it too late after virus has infected?
When in Dos the files dates were 1/11/01, but my mum has only installed NAV in last 3 months.

Think she is starting to understand that reformat will be best solution regardless of lost info.
Will put on ME for her this time me thinks.(gotta love that system restore)

 

[DogStar]

Bump

*bump*
Any other ideas before I twist my mums arm into a reformat?

 

[ToRN]

Nav eats up all your resources and is not the best around. Low resource, frequent updates and almost every virus possible you'll get with F-Prot.

Maybe you had a virus, but it could be something screw up your indextable of the fat. I had the same prob and no viri also. It happened after loosing power and shutting down the pc inproperly.

 

[Didou]

Try checking your partition with a more advanced program such as Partition magic maybe...

 

[erwin1978]

Those pictures are probably stored in the temp folder. To stop the dog pictures from showing when you startup, simply change your wallpaper to none and restart, then you can pick another wallpaper.

 

[MrGaribaldi]

Guess I should've read this thread earlier... But I'll answer what I can anyway

To fix the dog problem:
Find a file called "logo.sys" or "logow.sys" or something like that... Back up(all logoX.sys), Delete them and you should have the regular windows load screen back... (I'm sorry, but I can't remember where you're supposed to find the files....

To fix the folders... (Note this is going to take time!)'
boot into dos, type deltree <insert foldername here>...
What will take so long with this is that you'll have to use the ascii table to enter all the characters, and not your regular keys... (note, the regular alphabet can be typed in like usuall)

To do this hold down <ctrl> and <alt> (or one of the two, I can't remember) and use the numpad to enter the diff characters... (You'll find a complete list of the 255 diff characters here)

Sorry for answering this post so late, but the topic put me off... Pure chance I checked it today...

Hope this helps you, or someone else with the same problems

 

[DogStar]

Thx for all the help.
Finally convinced My mum to reformat.
So started today.All was going fine till finalising settings and then it was BSOD war.Popping up all the time and the comp was going ballistic. I just happened to check the back panel and noticed the PSU fan was not going, (more PSU woes) and you could fry an egg on it I reckon.
So off to my fave comp shop tomorrow to pick up another PSU for my mums comp. :dead:
Thx again for all the help.

 

[svtcobra]

make sure you buy the best possible PSU your 'mum' will pay for. I doubt you can walk into a store and get a good one..I think you'll need to order a "good" one.

 

[Justin]

FYI, if it happens again in the future or you don't wish to reformat that particular HDD, you can remove those directories via the command prompt.

You will have to get the ASCII code for the names of them, I know there are charts out there, and then use those. e.g. use "rd [weirdfoldername]" via holding ALT, and pressing 0+[ascii code here] to name it. If the directories aren't empty, I think you can use the deltree command to get rid of it anyways. Can't remember if w98 has deltree or not.

Anyone can test that, in a command prompt (on 9x/DOS boxes) use MD ALT+0255 to create an "invisible" directory. If you try to open it within windows or any windows based program all you will get is an error and generally a double "path/folder does not exist" error. BUT, if you use CD ALT+0255, you can change to that directory and even store things within it just fine.

Heh... I seem to recall a very old DOS tool called PCTOOLS that was quite handy in situations like that.