Oh, and Free download of Symantec is never really free. You will usually get 30 days free and then you have to start paying.

Anyway, thanks for the info. I’m glad to hear that it is not impossible to clean these machines.

Well I finally cleaned up those 27 machines. After problems with the first 8, and having to remove hundreds of registry entries manually on a few of them, I found the answer. It was as follows:
1 - go into Norton and turn everything off (email scanning, file scanning,
Internet browsing, etc.
2 - run the Norton Removal Tool which you can download from the internet,
3 - Run Regedit and search for “Norton Internet” and delete anything you
find that looks like an NIS entry,
4 - You will have to do several reboots during the process, but in the end
your PC will be clean.
The process on the above machines was a real bitch to resolve but the last 20 machines or so went pretty quickly.

I have since delivered about a dozen PC’s on which I deleted the “Trial” version of Norton Products and installed the Free version of AVG Antivirus, along with AdAware and Spybot Search & Destroy. This Combo has kept my home office environment clean for many years and I recommend it to all my clients.

And now the BAD news. Where I reside, in South-Western Ontario Canada, Rogers is one of the major internet service providers. Rogers
has an arrangement with Yahoo and Symantic and markets “free” Norton anti-virus to customers. I have had to run cleanup on several customers with experiences that include not being able to access their email (Norton firewall). Corrupt Internet Explorer - eventually leading to a total crash in the operating system - Windows XP Pro.

I think it is criminal that these companies can allow a “free” download of
software that will virtually kill a system that does not have enough hardware/software resource to handle the product. I think that Government at all levels should have in place an ombudsman to review
consumer problems caused by “free” downloads.

Thanx
Ken

Still, some people are locked into it by a Support contract with Symantec, or company policy so I would love to give them as much help on this issue as possible.

Have now advised six customers of this problem and the fact that norton slows the PC to a snails pace and they are quite happy to use another product personnaly until there is a cure for this issue this is what i shall be doing not wasting time trying to sort out a really stupid corporate route taken by Symantec. ENOUGH I SAY

Now just 19 machines to go.

Ouch! Man that must suck!

I would just try to program some application to just run for the 19 machines.

Actually you could just create a .reg file that deletes all these entries. Then all you would have to do is to put that file into a shared folder on the network, then have all your machines mount that folder and run it on bootup via login script.

Then you just reboot them and wait for the magic to happen.

Btw, if you create a .reg file that would wipe or zero out all NIS values, I would gladly host it here.

That’s awesome! I hope my former comments can assist you in getting rid of the unnecessary time consuming pain. 19… That’s quite painful. I would just try to program some application to just run for the 19 machines. Just doing 1, gave me hell. If you program one, I can probably assist. =)

Its Ken again. My final solution was to search the registry for every occurance of “Norton Internet Security” and remove the line or the key.
There were hundreds of entries, and this after running the Norton Removal Tool. After 5 run-thrus I’ve now got it down to 35 minutes.
I have since downloaded a copy of Registrar Lite 2.0 from
www.answersthatwork.com which searches and creates a list of occurances which can be viewed and deleted en masse.
Now just 19 machines to go.

Had the same problem with using a legal copy of NIS 2007 to update a legal version of NIS 2006 on 3 PC’s. After fighting with the first 2, I found that if you uninstall NIS 2006 and Live Update using MS “add/Remove”, then install NIS 2007 from CD. When you do this, it picks up the old Product Key (not sure where from - registry or possibly some file left behind after removal with “Add/Remove”) and goes on to tell you you have 0 days of protection left without asking for the new product key. If you open NIS, click io the Norton Internet Security Tab at the top of the main frame, open the Support section, and at the bottom under Subscription and Account Information click on Activate your product, a wizard opens which takes you to a window in which you can enter your new Product Key

The best way at this point is reformat your computer. The only way my solution works, is don’t ever use Norton. Just curious, did you use the registry mechanics? It should automatically delete any Norton/Symantec rogue registries. If that doesn’t work, here’s my proposal, back up your core data, and reformat your computer. This way the crappy Norton, won’t look at your former registries, and it’ll suddenly think it’s new. For myself, I now use McAffe. I believe it is significantly better since my new computer does not lag and works efficiently. I only use legit copies.