Norton uninstall problem

hertzyabazas

My Laptop came installed with Norton Anti-virus and I recently uninstalled it before realising that I would have to download Norton Removal Tool to get rid of it completely. When I go into the page to download the programme it tells me "If you cannot find your product key, CD or installation file, and you have Windows XP, then we suggest that you upgrade to the latest version of your product." I dont have the product key and don't fancy having to pay for the upgrade and I can't find it in C:/My Documents/Symantec/Norton Product Name_Key.txt
If anybody can help me get rid of Norton completely I'd be very grateful as my laptop is running seriously slow.
Also running the Virgin Anti-virus and Firewall in the meantime. Opinions on this very welcome too?
Many thanks

Lum

You don't need the product key to uninstall it, you only need it if you want to install it again.

If you have no intention of ever installing norton then just download the removal tool here and run it.

As for the Virgin AV/firewall. They probably didn't make their own but have rebadged someone else's, best to find out what it actually is, but as per the other AV threads I'd just go with Avira and Windows Firewall.

esuhl

You can download the Norton Removal Tool here:
http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039

I presume that Virgin have branded another antivirus package. Personally, I'd remove it and install Avira AntiVir, which is free, lightweight and very effective:

http://www.free-av.com/

If you have a router, you won't need a software firewall for unsolicited inbound requests, but maybe someone can suggest a good one - Comodo and ZoneAlarm are okay, but not great...

aliEnRIK

The virgin anti virus stuff is next to useless

Id advise uninstalling and installing AVIRA anti virus and switching on Windows firewall (or download PC TOOLS firewall)
Also use MALWAREBYTES as a secondary scanner

Lum

Rik: are you aware that Avira 9 recently added spyware/malware protection to the free version?

aliEnRIK

Lum wrote: »

Rik: are you aware that Avira 9 recently added spyware/malware protection to the free version?

yes. I said to INSTALL Avira (Maybe you missread?)

hertzyabazas

Sorry to be a pest but last night I ran the removal tool and it said it was successful but now it wont connect to the internet. Using a wireless router and not a signal strength problem. ISP is Virgin and clicked on the 'repair' button and went straight to a blue screen and started a physical memory dump with the following message
'DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL'
restarted and clicked 'repair' again and started another PMD with a different message
'BAD-POOL-CALLER'

Does anyone have any pointers please?

Knub

hertzyabazas wrote: »

Sorry to be a pest but last night I ran the removal tool and it said it was successful but now it wont connect to the internet. Using a wireless router and not a signal strength problem. ISP is Virgin and clicked on the 'repair' button and went straight to a blue screen and started a physical memory dump with the following message
'DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL'
restarted and clicked 'repair' again and started another PMD with a different message
'BAD-POOL-CALLER'

Does anyone have any pointers please?

Sounds like system files or drivers have been affected by the removal tool. This is what the Driver_IRQL.... means.

The bad pool caller means the software that you have uninstalled has done some damage to the registry in some way and now the system is confused in what it is trying to do.

I would recommend a program called "RegClean" to start with, if you search and download the free version it may help.

I think you may need to reinstall your router software and possible any networking drivers if you are having issues when you try and repair your connection.

Lum

At the bottom of that blue screen (usually refered to as a BSOD or Blue Screen of Death) it should say which file caused the problem, eg tcpip.sys

You'll also get a STOP message with an 8 digit number beginning with 0x

those bits of information will be most useful in trying to troubleshoot this.

This is one of the reasons why I hate Norton IS, it burrows so deep into the system and then doesn't remove itself cleanly when asked leaving people with broken Windows installs.

aliEnRIK

The removal tool is supposed to be specific to the norton type
I hope the correct one was run

hertzyabazas

Yes, correct one was run