Running a startup scan when Spybot can't be opened....

[StevB]

At times, when fixing an infection, Spybot will prompt the user to reboot and a scan runs at startup. How do I get this scan to run at startup if I am unable to run Spybot after the computer has booted?

I suspect that whatever infection this machine has, it's preventing Spybot from running. It will not run in Normal or Safe mode. The person who uses the infected machine is not very good about keeping things updated, so it's most likely that 1.4 is what is installed. It is definitely not 1.6.

Thanks.

[drragostea]

If you are able to run Spybot (successfully) and get to Advanced Mode and setup a scan during bootup, then Spybot should add a startup entry in the Startup Manager.

Certain malicious malware tend to disable some anti-virus/spyware applications. What you can do is... rename the Spybot-SD execute (desktop shortcut) icon. The default naming will be "Spybot - Search & Destroy". So you can name it to "Spybot-SD" to see if this will work.

Can you attempt to uninstall v.1.4 and upgrade to the latest, current version (1.6.0.30) on the client's machine?