Yesterday was a somewhat hellish day. My computer behaved like it was left over from the movie Event Horizon.
The problem started out as a notice that my computer needed to restart because 3 Trojans had been found by my antivirus program. Fine, except after restarting I got the same message. The source of the malware had not been removed. The problem wasn't a malware program that could be easily removed, it had hid itself inside Windows itself.
Even this shouldn't have been a problem. I had an image backup that should have restored my computer to a fully functional non-infected state. First though I had to argue with the system BIOS to get it to run the recovery program in the proper mode. It used to be you just inserted the recovery CD and that was that. Sorry, you have to boot in UEFI mode, that is if you can figure out how to do it.
Well, I got Windows 10 running again, only for some unknown reason Windows Update wasn't functioning. Got a totally useless "You've got to fix the problem" message, not that we are going to tell you how or even what the problem is. Then there was the 2 hrs I waited on the phone trying to explain to the maker of my antivirus program that this is the same computer I bought the program for.
Of course, after all of my heroic efforts, the Trojan was still with me.
A total HD wipe and clean boot should have fixed the problem. The trouble was that the "free" Windows 10 users don't get physical install media, nor do they get a normal product code that would be needed for a direct reinstall.
But wait, I do have a Windows 7 CD and product code. All I need to do is go back to the OS that worked better in beta than my retail copy of Vista did. Sure I would miss the doodads that I had come to love in windows 10 and "special features" like not being able to play movies on my computer, quirky browsers, and constantly being reminded that my firewall encountered a new network because it cannot save my response to the HD.
Don't get me wrong. I like Windows 10, yet it makes me think of what would happen if a Porshe was built by Volkswagen. Its like the devs really want you to love all the new features of Windows 10, but do not care about the technical flaws. The bells and whistles are nice, but at the moment they are made of tin.
