You cant fix this, I'm sure.

[eautocad]

I know you can't fix this problem.. Here's the issue:


I got a virus on my computer, so I did the usual format and reinstall. Still there! whaaaatt your crazy right? No...


This computer is junked now because somehow a virus burnt itself to every read-only chip on the board and peripherals defying all logic of electronics as we know it... How do i know its on all periphs? I tried using them on other boards and then those boards were infected and rendered useless..... I know you can't fix this problem.

Can you? I've talked to every IT person I know and they are stumped, as well as I... I've got CS background and I just can't see how it could have "burnt" itself to read only chips... what in the world!!!!

If i can't figure it out in a week, I have someone at USF that is going to run lab tests on the chips to see if my house was broken into and chips were resoldered, and do some csi to see exactly how this happened

My prof said if it's what he thinks it is than this might be in the paper and on cnn... keep an open eye!

[wige]

Sounds like you got a rootkit type virus to me. Pretty common.

Doing a simple format and reinstall will generally not eliminate most rootkit type viruses. They install in what is more or less the boot sector of the hard drive, so that when you reformat and resinstall the Operating System they can immediately reinfect the system. There are special steps that generally must be taken in order to clean out this "invisible" area of the boot drive and eliminate the infection. Probably the easiest is to install Linux, and have GRUB rewrite your boot partition, then cancel the installation and run the Windows boot partition formatter to reset that partition to allow Windows to run.

That being said, I have heard of viruses that can infect the BIOS. Your ROM is not completely read only, this is why you can install updates to the system BIOS. If a virus does manage to get into your BIOS chip, cleaning the system may require special steps, generally starting with forcing an update of the BIOS. However, if your BIOS is infected (confirm by replacing all hard drives, and reinstalling the OS - do not connect to the network or any peripherals - if the virus is still there, it's probably in the BIOS) I would generally recommend sending the motherboard to the computer manufacturer for repair, since you might end up toasting the BIOS if problems occur. I have to say, though, this would be an extremely rare type of attack, and is unlikely to be the culprit. There is only so much you can do at the BIOS level, and only so much room on the chip to install the virus.

You did mention peripherals. It is very unlikely that peripheral devices would become infected. However, other computers on the network could be infected, and reinfect your system when you connect to the network. It is also theoretically possible that the router could be infected with a virus that is infecting the computer. Printers and other peripherals with embedded servers could also be attacked. However, again, this is extremely unlikely due to the variety of such devices, and the resources necessary to stage an effective attack.

[TrafficProducer]

When formating did you try

fdisk /mbr

This will rewrite the Master Boot Record

(It is a low level format, It will wipe the Partitions, fdisk can be used to create new
Partitions)
Virus burnt itself to every read-only chip: This should not be possible; but read:-
Virus Warning:

How to reformat a computer if CMOS has virus? - Yahoo! Answers

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/38591

Install, (I assume you are using), windows and do a virus scan before putting on any more software.
Use more than one Anti-virus tool. double check each bit of software.

[Ladana]

You could try rootrepeal and rootkitrevealer (easily found googling). It helped me track down some bastards, and later removed them by booting from a knoppix dvd. Both tools are very handy to have in general and free too.

[redcar]

I'm not sure about the peripherals becoming infected and would be the first one I've come across. My first thought as above was a rootkit virus.

[divengrabber]

ok got your question


First download new version of Avira Antivirus. Install it in your computer.


Start your pc in safe mode.

Then Install your software. Run the software.

This software remove all your computer virus and unregistered file which creating problem while working. After completing the scanning process shut down your computer and starts normally.


Try This.

Thanks.

[kylelmoon]

Dont just format and reinstall... Remove every partition you got in your harddisk and create a new one.
Try low level formatting if this wont work.
I heard viruses invading the PC Bios though... But try first my suggestion before throwing your pc away.

[TrafficProducer]

Yes; I know two harddrives that have been trashed because the users use bit-torrent/utorrent to download and install software which had this type of virus.

I think this virus embeded in the Harddrive electonics, not the BIOS.

Maybe if you can try the harddrive in another computer, but as stated use SFDISK to wipe and format from a boot DOS disk.

[wige]

Originally Posted by TrafficProducer

I think this virus embeded in the Harddrive electonics, not the BIOS.

By the hard drive electronics, do you mean the boot sector (a partition of the hard drive where the bootloader lives - these viruses are called rootkits) or that it infected some other component of the hard drive such as the front-end cache?

[TrafficProducer]

Originally Posted by wige

By the hard drive electronics, do you mean the boot sector (a partition of the hard drive where the bootloader lives - these viruses are called rootkits) or that it infected some other component of the hard drive such as the front-end cache?

hard drive electronics; I was actually thinking of the chip, (IC) hard drive electronics, that is phyical hardware re-written to....

But.. I'm no expert