Is it about to give up the ghost?

[df1]

Hi,
I'd apprecite some advice. I'm running a nearly new computer of, I believe, pretty good spec - Pentium 4 3GHz, 1024mb Ram and so on. It's been fault free until about 3 weeks ago when I did it's first Windows update. Thereafter things didn't seem right. It was slower to boot than usual and seemed to be processing at idle (if that makes sense?). On one occasion I tried to shut it down and was presented with the following:

CCAPP.EXE not responding

to which I clicked "end now" but nothing; no reponse. It froze so I shut it down by holding the master on/off in. It really didn't like that as when I came to reboot I was greeted by all sorts of messages about recovery from serious errors and lots of disk checking procedures and rectification.

I have Norton 2006 Internet Security installed and I think it has been letting nasty things through in spite of my keeping it up to date.
Does 361101032253584.exe mean anything to anyone? This thing "failed to load properly" and appeared in mycomputer/local disk. Norton didn't pick anything up yet every time I booted up I got this "fail to load" type message relating to this long number. Now don't shout at me but I just deleted the item from the local disk in the vain hope that it would solve the problem. I never saw the message at startup again but it was running in the processes section of windows task manager and was using quite a bit of processing capacity.

I decided a destructive recovery was in order and so did it. However things just don't seem right and I'm just not happy with the performance as it's not as before. I've done four recoveries now and it doesn't seem to help.
Have I broken it do you think or is there something I can do to resolve this? What are the merits of windows updates? Did they contribute to my problems?

Any thoughts much appreciated.

Thanks

[BOAC]

Always a good idea to paste those file names into Google as a start. If you do that you willsee that CCAPP is a Norton prog and 361101032253584.exe is Malware with which you are infected.

[Mac the Knife]

Welcome to the world of Norton (and Windows)

"..ccapp.exe is a process belonging to Norton AntiVirus. It is responsible for the auto-protect and email checking facilities..."

Have a look at http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/nav.nsf/0/10c2fdd9a6f5d98288256d75006b7b86?OpenDocument

Linux User #302442 :ok:

[frostbite]

I know it's not particularly helpful to you, but there are two things I avoid like the plague:-

Anything Norton/Symantec

Windows updates

[df1]

thanks folks,

BOAC thanks for researching that. I'm still non the wiser as Norton doesn't or rather didn't pick it up despite being up to date. I wonder then if there were any other instances of malware on the damn thing.

Thanks to Mac too!!

Frostbite, I'm coming round to that way of thinking now. Do you have a recommendation for a security software?

Cheers.

[frostbite]

I use Zone Alarm and Avast (both free) and the latter self-updates almost daily, sometimes more than once in the same day.

If/when you decide to get rid of Norton, you will find it has many claws in your machine and requires a bit more than the regular uninstall. Mention it on here and I'm sure you will get excellent advice from the many who have done it already.

[Tarq57]

For what it's worth, I also use Avast home, and it's very good. Other worthy freebies include Avira, and AVG. (see the sticky on free programs)
There is an uninstall tool for Norton, available from the Symantec website.
I remember getting similar error messages on the new PC when Norton was on it. It never ran right, and I removed the program long before the subscription was due.
XP has a built in firewall, which is adequate for most safe surfers. For added protection (ie: including outbound) a different firewall is wise. I use Comodo.

[Keef]

All good advice above. A decent firewall, and competent virus protection are essential these days. There are several good, free ones about.

I use ZoneAlarm and AVG Free, and they have never failed me. Norton did (badly) and the Windows Firewall only stops stuff coming in - if it sees it. The harvester bots that send your e-mail address book to their spamming masters seem to go straight through the XP firewall.

Windows updates these days are mostly plugging the odd hole here and there in the colander, and adding a bit more MS spyware to your computer (like the infamous "Windows Genuine Advantage", which is the opposite of what its name says).

[Big Hilly]

Keef's bang on. I recently gave up on all things Norton and moved to AVG for anti-virus and I can hand on heart say that it's like having a new machine.
BH

[JPjoystick]

Strangely,i have run older Norton products with no problems and found them very good,but norton 2006 gave my PC endless problems,which was only solved by uninstalling it,even then it didn`t want to go willingly.Glad that AVG gets a good rating here,i started using it a few months ago instead of norton.
Zone alarm is an excellent free firewall.