Big checkered box appearing in my Add/Remove Programs box.

[Crawdaddy79]

I made a small video of me scrolling from top to bottom, and back up again in my Add/Remove Programs dialog box.

Inside is this HUGE nasty box that takes for ever to scroll past.

I have gone into the Uninstall section of regedit and cannot find anything extremely peculiar in it...

I am wondering if anyone knows anyone who has experienced this same thing.. and am hopeing that there is a fix for it besides formatting the entire drive.

Here is the movie (4 megs): http://www.crawspace.com/web2/boxinaddremove.avi

 

[Crawdaddy79]

No takers?

 

[mechBgon]

What antivirus software are you using (brand and version) and what date are its definitions?

 

[Slikkster]

Any chance you have Autocad installed?

 

[Crawdaddy79]

I have no antivirus software. (My other computer has lasted three years without it, and I'm not doing anything different with this one than I did with that one... Maybe one of those little wigglers slipped through the cracks... it's possible.)

And I don't have Autocad installed.

I think what did it was I installed this old Solar System encyclopedia thing that seemed designed for Windows 3.1 (even though it says "2005 edition" on the case)... It didn't install correctly and since then I've had that box in there. I'm not completely sure that's what did it, but that's the closest thing I can think of.

 

[mechBgon]

It couldn't hurt to try a free online virus check. The Panda and TrendMicro scanners are said to be quite good, you can find links to them and some other ones here. Kaspersky is one of the best, and they also offer free 30-day trials here.

If you turn out to have a virus, then install the Kaspersky trialware, set its real-time and on-demand scanners to maximum, click "Configure Updater" and set it to "From Internet, extended databases," then update. Now disable System Restore, reboot into Safe Mode, fire off a full Kaspersky scan, and take a break while it plows through all your data.

 

[Crawdaddy79]

Thanks a lot for those links.. Free online virus scanners. I didn't know those things existed, or if they were that they were effective.


I tried the Panda one, it scanned and disinfected about 15 java viruses (as well as a couple of non-viruses in other programs which I might have to reinstall).. But the box is still present.

I guess I'll have to try each of the scanners until it's gone.

 

[Slikkster]

Sorry that I've been away, and haven't had a chance to chime in. Anyway, I might have found a fix for you. I mentioned Autocad because it's common with that program, but certainly not limited to it.

In the registry, there's a section labeled "Uninstall" that has the program details that corresponds to the applications you have listed in Add/Remove. Here's the actual key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall

Now, it's not too easy to see what's going on here, because everything starts with a "{" and has a long string of letters/numbers ending with another bracket.

You want to sift through those entries in the Uninstall section --tedious as that may be-- and look for any entries that have a subkey named "DisplayIcon". You can use the Find feature for that, too.

The problem you're having typically happens when the DisplayIcon entry ends in a negative number, like
"c:\yourprogramblahblahblah.exe,-1"

If you find one that ends in that "-1", delete the minus sign so it just reads "1", or delete the -1 altogther.

You can use the Find function once you get to the Uninstall key and do a Find for DisplayIcon. Then, if you don't see a negative number for a DisplayIcon entry right away, you can use the F3 key to have Find search for the next DisplayIcon setting.

Close the registry afterwards. See if Add/Remove displays correctly. Might need a reboot.