Sunday, October 30, 2005
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back in 168k
On another note, too many new games are coming out at this inauspicious period... just when my exams are coming =(
While F.E.A.R. does not seem to be able to run smoothly on my one year old laptop, Quake IV runs ok! Horrors! Not to mention that Indigo Prophecy is an absolutely brilliant game (great story and presentation. Love it!)... and I still have Dungeon Siege 2 and Warhammer 4K: Winter Assult to work on. Argh! How am I to find time to study???
(Through much discipline and perserverence. Har har.)
Star Wars: A New Hope in 168k
Masterful.
Sunday, October 23, 2005
Super Mario Doujin
Super Mario was never this gayArgh my eyes!
Gosh!
More evilness here! Megaman! Nooooo!
Guess who.
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
Rolling Bomber Special!
Shingo - A Power Rangers Parody
Just got this link from Xephyris. It's super hilarious! Check it out!
Monday, October 17, 2005
Finally!
I finally got my laptop back. *phew* 3 weeks leh!
Anyway I had to spend the whole day reinstalling all my stuff and updating and patching... damn tiring and tedious. Luckily I didn't accept the temporary harddisk otherwise I would have to go through this process TWICE.
On a lighter note, I spent a few hours playing
Escape from Rhetundo Island. You'll need the latest version of
Flash Player to play this though.
This is really a torture device cum time vacuum disgused as a fun and addictive game... but we finally managed to complete it all on our own! Yay Marie!
Saturday, October 15, 2005
*RAWR*
I called the Toshiba Service Centre yesterday and they said that my laptop was ready... but they said that they would be closing soon so I would have to wait until the next day to collect. Knowing how unreasonable customers can sometimes be, I decided to be a nice one and told them, "Alright."
So I went down to the Toshiba Service Centre this morning... and guess what? I STILL HAVEN'T GOT MY LAPTOP!!!!!
If you remember, they offered to loan me a temporary harddrive. However, I rejected the offer since it was of no point. HOWEVER, they wrote down on the form that I accepted the loan, so when I told the person at the counter that "No, I don't owe you a harddisk", the person said that she needed to check with her supervisor regarding the issue... BUT the supervisor wasn't around so I would have to come back on Monday to collect my laptop instead.
I mean, my laptop is here with you! What do you expect me to be doing with a harddisk without a laptop? Use it as a paperweight?
Argh! If I don't get my laptop this Monday, I'm really going to kick up a big fuss. *RAWR*
Monday, October 10, 2005
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
New Wallace & Gromit movie!
Trailer here. Funny.
Toshiba service sucks
It's been 3 weeks and I still haven't got my laptop back from the Toshiba Service Centre. I called them up again for the third time. It seems that they still haven't got the stock for my new harddisk...
"So how long will it take for the new stock to arrive?"
"It normally takes 1 week."
"But it has been 3 weeks!!!"
*sigh* They offered to loan me a harddisk first then replace it once again when my harddisk arrives... but when I asked if they would help me transfer my data over from the temporary harddisk to the new harddisk, they said no. I mean, what's the point? I'll just need to spend the whole day configuring and installing all my applications TWO TIMES. Even if I get the temporary harddisk, there'll still be a sense of temporarility and the mindset that I shouldn't do much because it'll be troublesome to transfer or redo all of it again when the new harddisk comes.
At least I still have this other laptop to use... even though the only work I can do on it is to use Microsoft Word to write essays =(
I hope I don't have to wait forever.
Friday, October 07, 2005
Extreme (movie) makeovers
I think these are quite brilliant. If you haven't seen the original movies, these trailers would make you think otherwise of the nature of the films. I find the concept of this whole thing very intelligent and amusing indeed. I guess it shows the packaging really does matter.
I first saw the
remake of The Shining on Ebaums but apparantly there's more like it out there on the net!
Psycho - the romantic comedy
Titanic - the horror movie
Westside Story - the zombie flick?
Let me know if you find anymore.
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Vote for Steveo
Bill Gates +
Napoleon Dynamite =
Some hilarious shitIf you didn't watch Napoleon Dynamite then don't bother with these links. Strange how the Napoleon Dynamite movie didn't get much publicity here at home. The only other person I know who watched it was Lincoln... *shrugz*
Monday, October 03, 2005
More LOTR Shit
Sunday, October 02, 2005
Final(hopefully) details of the ossvc.exe investigation
This virus/worm/trojan watnot is as yet unclassified and unnamed, however it has been identified as malware. This is to say that it is recognized as an evil file that does bad things to your computer. In this case, it opens a backdoor for unauthorized entry into your computer.
Indirectly, the processes that it creates will lead to an increased harddisk activity and this will eventually lead to a harddisk failure. I suspect this because it is too suspicious for so many people to be suddenly experiencing harddisk problems at the same time. So far, I personally know of at least 6 victims that have experienced hardisk failures within the period of the past 2 to 3 weeks. (Nev, you are one of them =P)
I suspect that this malware is automatically downloaded and run when you visit a malicious site. This is a common method of infection that a lot of ad-ware use.
So far, this is what I can determine from my investigations with some confirmation from the
Norman Scanner Engine:
This malware creates the file ossvc.exe in your SYSTEM32 directory. However for some reason, even though the file exists, you are unable to locate it with the Windows Find File function.
[Edited: I have found the reason why! It has classified itself with system, hidden and read-only attributes. In order to locate the file, you need to remove these attributes first. You need to run the command: "attrib -h -s -r %SystemRoot%\SYSTEM32\ossvc.exe". After that, you can delete it just like any other file. The other files that it creates are also with system, hidden and read-only attributes so to remove them, you have to use the command as well, but with the respective filenames.]
ossvc.exe also adds entries into your Windows Registry.
It adds
"Msupdates" = "ossvc.exe" in
1) "HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run".
2) "HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunServices".
3) "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\OLE".
After being activated, it will run all the programs in your Windows Registry startup list. I suspect that it does it in order to make it harder to locate using the Windows Task Manager. Meanwhile, it will look for an internet connection. When an internet connection is detected, it connects to "irc.icestormz.com" on port 6668 (TCP) and connects to IRC Server. It also creates a possible backdoor functionality [Authenticate] port 113. (This info is from the Norman Scanner Engine. All I've detected on my side are instances of tfp.exe being run occassionally. However, both info reinforce each other.)
Through this backdoor, a file with a random filename is also downloaded and an entry is added to the Windows Registry under the name "SPK3". This file will be run and will eat up your processor memory at an alarming rate. Eventually leading to you encountering the Blue Screen of Death. The file sxd.exe or sxded.exe will be copied to your C:\ and run as well.
How to remove this malware:
1) Restart your computer.
2) Press "Ctrl-Alt-Del" to run Windows Task Manager.
3) End the process "ossvc.exe"
4) Close Windows Task Manager.
5) Run "attrib -h -s -r %SystemRoot%\SYSTEM32\ossvc.exe".
6) Run "del %SystemRoot%\SYSTEM32\ossvc.exe".
7) Delete sxd.exe or sxded.exe if they exist in your C:8) Run "regedit".
9) Use the Find function to locate all instances of "ossvc.exe" and delete them from the Windows Registry.
10) Use the Find function to locate all instances of "SPK3" and delete them from the Windows Registry.
11) Restart your computer.
Hopefully this will be the last time I will be writing about ossvc.exe. If not, it will be because that I have not successfully removed the malware from my computer...
[Edited: So far so good =)]This virus/worm/trojan watnot is as yet unclassified and unnamed, however it has been identified as malware. This is to say that it is recognized as an evil file that does bad things to your computer. In this case, it opens a backdoor for unauthorized entry into your computer.
Indirectly, the processes that it creates will lead to an increased harddisk activity and this will eventually lead to a harddisk failure. I suspect this because it is too suspicious for so many people to be suddenly experiencing harddisk problems at the same time. So far, I personally know of at least 6 victims that have experienced hardisk failures within the period of the past 2 to 3 weeks. (Nev, you are one of them =P)
I suspect that this malware is automatically downloaded and run when you visit a malicious site. This is a common method of infection that a lot of ad-ware use.
So far, this is what I can determine from my investigations with some confirmation from the
Norman Scanner Engine:
This malware creates the file ossvc.exe in your SYSTEM32 directory. However for some reason, even though the file exists, you are unable to locate it with the Windows Find File function.
[Edited: I have found the reason why! It has classified itself with system, hidden and read-only attributes. In order to locate the file, you need to remove these attributes first. You need to run the command: "attrib -h -s -r %SystemRoot%\SYSTEM32\ossvc.exe". After that, you can delete it just like any other file. The other files that it creates are also with system, hidden and read-only attributes so to remove them, you have to use the command as well, but with the respective filenames.]
ossvc.exe also adds entries into your Windows Registry.
It adds
"Msupdates" = "ossvc.exe" in
1) "HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run".
2) "HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunServices".
3) "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\OLE".
After being activated, it will run all the programs in your Windows Registry startup list. I suspect that it does it in order to make it harder to locate using the Windows Task Manager. Meanwhile, it will look for an internet connection. When an internet connection is detected, it connects to "irc.icestormz.com" on port 6668 (TCP) and connects to IRC Server. It also creates a possible backdoor functionality [Authenticate] port 113. (This info is from the Norman Scanner Engine. All I've detected on my side are instances of tfp.exe being run occassionally. However, both info reinforce each other.)
Through this backdoor, a file with a random filename is also downloaded and an entry is added to the Windows Registry under the name "SPK3". This file will be run and will eat up your processor memory at an alarming rate. Eventually leading to you encountering the Blue Screen of Death. The file sxd.exe or sxded.exe will be copied to your C:\ and run as well.
How to remove this malware:
1) Restart your computer.
2) Press "Ctrl-Alt-Del" to run Windows Task Manager.
3) End the process "ossvc.exe"
4) Close Windows Task Manager.
5) Run "attrib -h -s -r %SystemRoot%\SYSTEM32\ossvc.exe".
6) Run "del %SystemRoot%\SYSTEM32\ossvc.exe".
7) Delete sxd.exe or sxded.exe if they exist in your C:
8) Run "regedit".
9) Use the Find function to locate all instances of "ossvc.exe" and delete them from the Windows Registry.
10) Use the Find function to locate all instances of "SPK3" and delete them from the Windows Registry.
11) Restart your computer.
Hopefully this will be the last time I will be writing about ossvc.exe. If not, it will be because that I have not successfully removed the malware from my computer...
[Edited: Argh! Some evil thing is still trying to activate ossvc.exe on my comp! Anyway instead of trying to stop it, I'm going with another approach instead. Similar to vaccination, now that I've located the offending file, all I have to do is to replace it with a harmless version. Eg: I renamed a copy of my notepad.exe as ossvc.exe and put it in the SYSTEM32 folder. So now when that mysterious evil thing tries to activate ossvc.exe, it activates my harmless version instead =D]
[Edited: It hasn't been bothering me anymore recently =) Either it's fixed... or it's just managed to hide itself even better =P You can tell that it's still improving itself bcos last time there one file was called sxd.exe and then it was suddenly replaced by sxded.exe. It's a scary thought to think that there's someone out there still monitoring the progress of the malware and continually updating it to make it more effective =(]
[Edited: ossvc.exe has another variant of the name MsMicroSoft.exe]
[Edited: ossvc.exe has claimed yet another victim. Condolences to you, Nat. For some reason, Toshiba laptops seem particularly susceptible, especially if they are left on for extended periods.]
