Win98 hosed - How to save OE data?

[Muse]

My sister-in-law's Windows 98 computer is just about hosed. Her daughter installed Turbotax and turned off or uninstalled NAV 2002 and now she got a virus and can't run a NAV scan to get rid of it. Not a fast box in the first place (128 MB and a Celeron of some type), and she has dozens and dozens of applications and things are just screwy. Uninstalling NAV and reinstalling didn't fix the virus problem - She can't run NAV or Liveupdate. Everytime she tries to run NAV it tells her to reboot, ad infinitum. Removal of NAV and reinstall gives the same situation.

So, my idea is for her to get another computer, keeping her new Samsung 191T monitor. Maybe get it with Windows 2000 or XP, and a video card with a DVI output for her display. Basically, the question is how does she keep her Outlook Express data? She has one HD now. She has Office 2000, but uses OE for her mail. I'm thinking she could use her current HD as a 2nd HD in a new system, and copy data as required, assuming this method would save her OE data. I guess it's possible to export her OE data from within OE, but that might be tough. Anyway, how do you best save OE data? Thanks for the help.

 

[boomerang]

From Outlook Express, click on File>Export. Export her Address Book to your media of choice.

From OE, click on Tools>Options and the Maintenance Tab. There should be a button there labeled "Store Folder". Click on it and note the location of the files that contain her emails. Navigate to those folders and copy them to the media of your choice.

Whatever you do, do not install that virus infected HD as a second drive. Do you want the virus in the new machine too?

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: boomerang
From Outlook Express, click on File>Export. Export her Address Book to your media of choice.

From OE, click on Tools>Options and the Maintenance Tab. There should be a button there labeled "Store Folder". Click on it and note the location of the files that contain her emails. Navigate to those folders and copy them to the media of your choice.

Whatever you do, do not install that virus infected HD as a second drive. Do you want the virus in the new machine too?

Good thinking. Well, I suppose it would be prudent to install NAV and run Liveupdate before installing that HD. I doubt the virus would propogate without it's little nest in an active OE, which I'm pretty sure it's residing. I got an email from her yesterday that was clearly infected so the virus's method of propagation is through her OE address book. I've gotten 3 such emails from 3 different people I know in the last week, as a matter of fact. AFAIK, the virus haven't gone out to any of my acquaintances, but I don't know that for sure. She has no backup method other than using her HD. No CDRW, etc. Just a floppy drive. I suppose she could send them to my brother, who's on their LAN, but I doubt they have file sharing set up. I guess I could try to walk them through that on the phone, but I have a feeling it wouldn't go real smoothly. Maybe I could try something like having her send her backup files to me or my brother via email, assuming they compress relatively well.

 

[jackschmittusa]

Have you tried to boot from the Norton cd and run the av from there?

 

[Ape]

Originally posted by: jackschmittusa
Have you tried to boot from the Norton cd and run the av from there?

You can also make Norton Recovery Boot Disks (floppies). Ape Out.

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: Ape

Originally posted by: jackschmittusa
Have you tried to boot from the Norton cd and run the av from there?

You can also make Norton Recovery Boot Disks (floppies). Ape Out.

Thanks Ape and jackschmittusa. Yes, I saw that stuff in Norton on the Windows 98/NAV 2001 partition on one of my own machines. I was on the phone with my brother for hours yesterday trying to sort this out. The machine has been brought to its knees. It's become extremely slow and locks up very quickly. Sometimes it will not boot at all without locking up. Processes appear to take over and it is difficult to end them with Control-Alt-Delete. My brother tells me that they've reinstalled NAV 2002 a couple of times the last few days and he didn't see the message at the beginning saying you should boot from the NAV CD in the event that you already have a virus. I asked him twice and he was adamant. Anyway, it seems to me that they can try to boot from the CD. They aren't very comuter savvy and I tried to explain to him that the machine may or may not be configured to boot from a CD and that the setting is in the BIOS. He's never heard of BIOS before and I gave him a short lecture.

I wonder if Norton Recovery Boot Disks would help at this point. I walked him through the process of backing up the OE folders and address book. It seems to me that if they get another computer or another HD, they could immediately load NAV and run Liveupdate and then install their current 12 GB HD (the only HD) as a 2nd HD and restore the OE messages, address book and the word documents. Then they could reformat the 12 GB HD and use it for backing up data, etc.