13-08-2011, 01:06 AM
I've seen this before so I thought I'd make a thread this time, a very common issue I get landed with on a daily basis are viruses.
The issue is that whenever you attempt to run a .exe file it prompts you to select a program to use.
I got a machine in today, it wasn't slow, no popups, no fake programs, nothing too out of the ordinary.
The first thing I do when a machine comes in with a virus is boot it up into normal mode so I can see the extent of the damage, as above it seemed fine. I'd then normally boot into safe mode with networking and install and update Malwarebytes. Not possible this time, so I performed a scan off an Antivirus disc, (removed 19 infections), rebooted, same issue, so this time I simply renamed the mbam.exe to mbam.bat and ran it, installed, updated and scanned, remvoed 24 infections, reboot, same issue (cannot run .exes).
At first I tried the below registry changes, this however didn't work for me.
Method 1
Fixing the association settings using Registry editor
1) Start > Run and type Command
2) Enter the following commands
cd\windows
regedit
3) Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT \ exefile \ shell \ open \ command
4) Double-click the (Default) value in the right pane
Delete the current value data, and then type:
5) Navigate to:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.exe
In the right-pane, set (default) to exefile
6) Exit the Registry Editor.
Method 2
Simply download, extract and run this file. It's called exefix_xp.com
http://markwood.co.cc/donotdelete/fixes/exefix_xp.zip
The issue is that whenever you attempt to run a .exe file it prompts you to select a program to use.
I got a machine in today, it wasn't slow, no popups, no fake programs, nothing too out of the ordinary.
The first thing I do when a machine comes in with a virus is boot it up into normal mode so I can see the extent of the damage, as above it seemed fine. I'd then normally boot into safe mode with networking and install and update Malwarebytes. Not possible this time, so I performed a scan off an Antivirus disc, (removed 19 infections), rebooted, same issue, so this time I simply renamed the mbam.exe to mbam.bat and ran it, installed, updated and scanned, remvoed 24 infections, reboot, same issue (cannot run .exes).
At first I tried the below registry changes, this however didn't work for me.
Method 1
Fixing the association settings using Registry editor
1) Start > Run and type Command
2) Enter the following commands
cd\windows
regedit
3) Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT \ exefile \ shell \ open \ command
4) Double-click the (Default) value in the right pane
Delete the current value data, and then type:
Code:
"%1" %*5) Navigate to:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.exe
In the right-pane, set (default) to exefile
6) Exit the Registry Editor.
Method 2
Simply download, extract and run this file. It's called exefix_xp.com
http://markwood.co.cc/donotdelete/fixes/exefix_xp.zip