how to rid yourself of a virus

[popuppirate]

my brother downloaded a dvd burning software package called alcohol 120%, upon trying to install this a virus was opened. now his laptop when turned on stays on for only 30 seconds before restarting it. he has a boot disc however as mere computer ameteurs we are not entirely sure on how to run this disc. when pressig f2 i get on a sub menu and can flick through into a boot menu, this gives me the options hard drive, cd rom/dvd drive however i cannot seem to load the disc from either of these options any help would be greatfully apreciated.

[NHH]

A few questions...

Did your brother download a trial version or a cracked version of alcohol 120%?
What Anti Virus software do you have installed?
Did the AV software tell you the name of the virus that was found?
What version of Windows are you using?
Do any messages pop up before the system reboots?

I did a Google search and the most possible causes I've found is either...

a) You have a proper Alcohol 120% installation and your anti-virus software has incorrectly seen the low level 'virtual drive' driver as a virus.
If this is the case, disconnect your internet connection (just to be safe) & try to quickly disable your anti-virus software before your computer restarts. It could well be the anti-virus software that's restarting your PC.

b) A dodgy cracked Alcohol 120% package which has installed a nasty worm called Mantas, which may have well hosed your Windows installation by replacing many system files. Your best option here would be to reinstall Windows on top of the current installation.
If you have a bootable Windows CD (i.e. not a 'restore' CD) just boot your PC from the CD and follow the prompts to install Windows by replacing your existing Windows installation. You'll have to re-install all your programs again but at least you won't have lost any data.


An additional point I'd like to make is... You don't need Alcohol 120%, there is a free package that does the same thing (i.e. mounting CD/DVD images as a 'virtual' drive) called Deamon Tools.