I think my laptop has Sars...

[durex]

Im not going to be back in the office for another month....

[Cartoonite]

my suggestion is to uninstall software. it might sound wierd to u but i've recovered like that from a similiar state.

Only problem is I cant uninstall a bunch of my programs...

Ill try out those boot time antivirus checkers...

As far as re-installing.. heres the thing. If I were to reformat and reinstall I would need to do it without their help or them noticing. Ive got a my own copy of WinXP and grabbed the i386 folder from the install disk they use and I know there are ways I can find the CDKEY my pc is using now... so I could re-install.

That leaves me with a few problems though..

1. This laptop has Symantec AV installed and is setup to be managed via their symantec server... I obviously dont know the password and I would assume I would need to be on the network when I install this to select the syamtec server and whatnot... again, Im hardly ever in the office, so this would be difficult.

2. Ive got outlook installed which is setup to login to their exchange server.. which I dont have the slightest idea how to setup

3. Currently the account I use to log into my PC is a domain account.. not a local one.. so I wouldnt be able to create this account unless I have direct access to the network...

4. I dont have any domain admin access so I wouldnt be able to add myself back to the domain when I did get back into the office, right?

So as you see, I dont think I would be able to reinstall windows without the assitance of my MIS dept, which I wouldnt have. If anyone thinks I would be able to get around the above issues, by all means speak up as I would have no problem with reformatting.

Thanks for the suggestions guys! Keep em comin!

Can't say I can address all of these issues, but I think I may be able to help out a little bit.

1. Can't help you here. Think you may be SoL just based on this point alone.
   
2. Resetting this is easy enough. You will need the name of your mailbox, your password and the name of your Exchange server. The name of this server can be found from within Outlook itself or through the Mail icon in Control Panel. Don't remember the exact steps offhand, but if you try opening the Mail Control Panel applet I believe it is fairly self-evident from there.
   
3. If you are not connected to the network you cannot delete your domain account. Further, if you are not a domain admin (which I assume you are not) you also cannot delete your domain account.
   
4. You will likely have issues reconfiguring your laptop to join the domain (if that is how it is currently configured) if you are not connected to the network. I suspect the laptop's domain account would also have to be reset, since reinstalling XP should give you a new GUID and SID, essentially marking it as a brand new machine, regardless of the computer name you assign it.
   

In all honesty, though, I suggest you contact your company's technical support/IT department if this is a company machine. I understand that you don't really want to turn your computer over to them for several days, but I don't think it is wise to risk violating whatever agreement you have concerning use of company assets. If you can't fix it yourself (with our help ) through virus scanners or any other method short of a re-install, I really suggest you write it off and just give the laptop to the IT department to fix.

That's just my two cents.

BTW: Any luck running those boot time scanners?