LOL, I know the feeling! I'm to the point where it's not cost effective to try to clean them, I just back them up and reinstall.

Plus, I dunno what your parents do online, but you can never trust that computer again to keep things private.

The (now) default unity desktop is probably just too weird for anyone who is already used to windows. I would go with the previous release with gnome 2x instead, apply all the updates and lock it down. For shit games like bejeweled, there are some plausible open sauce imitations.

I'd probably do that with my computer but easier to fix the problem than reinstall everything for them. I just won't use internet banking in their PC ;)

This Libre Office better be good. It's taking about 6 months to install :@

It's in the current iteration of Ubuntu. I preferred StarOffice in the older distros to be honest, but then again I tend to use MS Office for all that guff anyway (dual boot).

I'm sure it's lovely.

Ack, I had to help my Dad remove one of those fake antivirus/antispyware programs a few months back from his office PC (he's a one man business renting a single office room). It was a feckin' nightmare. He's still running XP which is fine and dandy as he's got some ancient software that he doesn't want to risk on a newer operating system. In the end I used something called BartPE to kill it off. I used this a lot when I was doing my own "business" a few years back supporting comuters and networks in the local area and it's a life saver. Bit fiddly to get a good copy working but bloody handy too.

Not sure whether there's a version that'll work for Windows Vista/7 so it might be in the obolete bin a little bit these days, but perfect for the XP machines still hanging around.

Next time he kills his PC though, I'm going to tell him it's broken and he needs a new one. He's been saying he'll get a new PC for two years. Just worried about the funny little tools he uses...

This sounds like me and my father in law.

 

He fills his PC up with shit over the space of a year or 2 then I fix it. He's had variants of the XP Antispyware 2008 twice now. I've set Malwarebytes to run at startup but he still manages to get it.

 

Last time getting rid of of XP Antispyware 2008 did so much damage I ended up flattening the system and re-installing it.

 

I hate being family tech support :(

Sometimes the only thing you can do is wipe it and start fresh. The nasties are getting nastier!

The family or the PC?

I refuse to answer that!

This had never occured to me..

 

why not?

You could just generally broadcast to the family, apropos nothing, that certain malware is associated with searching for pr0n. He might stop then.

Or get him onto Linux.