what if i dont want to press f6 during a windows install

[gore]

I am sorry but I have been a computer tech for 6 years and I have never seen such a thing happen. I am not sure where you get your information from.

Hmm, either your customers are smart, or you just don't do many jobs.

I've seen in person more than 3 times a machine get basically spanked after a fresh install of XP.

We also did this at my college:

The admins set up a few test machines, unpatched, and didn't put them behind the school's firewall.

I believe the exact time was under 20 minutes before it had an infection.

My cousin a while back bought a new desktop, didn't install updates or have a firewall, and within ONE week, 7 Trojans and 1200 pieces of spyware.

Now he may be a special case because he DID surf the web with it, but the college set up test wasn't.

I'm also a tech, and clean up this crap weekly off people's machines.

So far the record is 98 Trojans + 134 Malware apps + viruses on a laptop the customer used for payroll and taxes.

[nihil]

Hmm, either your customers are smart, or you just don't do many jobs.

Actually, a lot depends on the environment you are working in. If you deal with the general public you will see it fairly frequently (depending on age, usage, surfing habits etc.). In a corporate environment you won't.............. well you shouldn't............. and you would normally be doing a mirror image unattended.

I slipstream my OSes so all I have to do is reinstall without going near the internet with an unpatched machine.

[oofki]

I guess it would be because 95% of my customers are behind routers. Other then that I havent seen anything like that since pre-sp1

[gore]

The router is probably why. Most of them seem to ahve some form of firewall or blocking built into them, so that would of course throw a hammer into the malware machine trying to infect the box.

These as I said were placed outside the firewall at the college, and the others had no firewall at all. A machine with a direct connection to the net and no firewall at all to stop anything won't really have time to install patches before something finds it's way in.

[ArPaNET]

That is crazy to think about how fast you can get your computer "owned" (as someone may put it)...

I would slipstream vista but by the time I got done burning it, there would be 50 new updates =)

just keep your AV/Firewall on a disc, install both of those, then go for the updates/patches... That kinda makes me want to test this, and see how fast it takes to get an infection!

[nihil]

@ ArPaNET:

I would slipstream vista but by the time I got done burning it, there would be 50 new updates =)

Damning your case with over-exaggerations there ole chap?

Vista actually has the fewest updates of NT 4.0, N.T. 5.0, and XP. I guess you would say that M$ have given up

OK.............. Vista is a bit bloated for a CD but I could burn a slipstreamed version in around 15minutes.

I guess it all boils down to how often you might want to use this facility? I build a new mirror each patch Tuesday. Then all I need to do is pull applications and data........... hey, you don't think that real men have stopped eating quiche and started backing up?

Fortunately, most apps let you d/l an update rather than the full Monty.

[stumpylizard]

Thank you for all your help. did a search on slipstreaming and I was able to find detailed instructions. I will let you know if it works.

[Cider]

So is everyone telling me, Xp sp2 installed. AVG free + windows firewall. I connect to the internet to download updates.

There is a chance I will still get infected?

The link to the "Guide" in that article doesnt work.

[gore]

If you have AVG and SP2 on CD (Which I do as well as Spybot and Ad-Aware) and the machine isn't hooked up to the net while you install those, then your chances of that aren't exactly high.

What I was talking about is a fresh pre-SP2 machine my college had set up, put in front of the firewall, and yes, before updates could all even start to install, it was infected.

It doesn't exactly help that most updates need a reboot and that Microsoft now makes you download and install some verify you aren't a pirate **** before Windows Update works at all.

When I re-installed on my laptop, I was sitting there swearing at the thing while it installed the new Windows update crap before I could actually install real updates, and then started thinking about a few customers I've done work for, where they had a Dell machine with BIOS before A06 and how if they followed the instructions and auto downloaded and installed every update SP2 would be one of them turning the machine into a door stop.

I'm sure we can remember that lol SP2 + Dell + BIOS before A06 = very expensive paper weight.

As I said though, if you install that stuff including SP2 from a CD and the machine isn't on the net, the chance you're going to have a problem isn't nearly as high but, I don't leave the thing on long enough until everything is installed to find out because all my machines are doing stuff now so I don't have a Windows test box now.

[phishphreek]

Dell has a utility where you put the drivers in some folder, run their utility and it'll create a boot partition on your USB device to load your drivers in RAM before it even gets to the windows install portion of the OS. It can be used with any computer, not just Dell. It has saved me on several occasions since most systems don't come with a floppy anymore and carrying around a usb floppy just adds weight to your toolkit.

Helps if I include the link... lol
http://support.dell.com/support/down...&fileid=193842

Oh, I think they have a utility that will also create a boot cd to do the same thing... but I never tried that one. USB flash is so cheap now I use that for almost everything.