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2 Questions in Regards to: networking/speed and viruses on macs

C

CNU182

macrumors regular
Original poster
Oct 9, 2003
239
0
My friend who works in an office building is having two problems with his macs.

The first, is a g4 tower running 10.3.9. He is the only one plugged into the DSL, yet it takes forever just to load a website. i hooked up my computer had regular speeds. What are some troubleshooting steps I should attempt?

The second problem is that he *says* his mac has a virus because everytime he sends attachments, the receiver does not get them, because they are said to have viruses. Also need help troubleshooting.

Thanks in advance, and sorry for such few details. Thanks.
 
His Mac could have a virus if he received e.g. a Word file from an infected Windows PC. It wouldn't affect the Mac, but forwarding the infected file as an email attachment would forward the virus.
 
-CNU182

psychofreak is correct, there are zero virii for OS X in the wild, and 2 in labs. But your friend's mind at rest there.

As for the other items, well, let's do a bt of sleuthing <cracking knuckles>

Let me guess: the receiver of his emails is using AOL right? ... or something like it. AOL indiscriminately, based purely on algorithms strips attachments either from things it thinks are spam, or messages it thinks have a trojan (type of malware, brother of a virus), sometimes leaving a XXX.MIME file sitting where the attachment used to be. If this is true, there's really nothing your friend can do about that - the action required is on your friend's intended recipient.

Ok, slow (wired?) on his machine, fast on yours. Hmm, could be few things.
1. Is he running full duplex on his connection? (System Preferences/Network/Built-In Ethernet/Ethernet)
2. Are you using the same wire (if not, wire he's using could be damaged).
3. What browsers are you both using?
4. Have you actually timed the load from 'Go' keystroke, to completed load? It is possible that due to different browsers, total load could be the same, but one displays during load, while the other holds off until all of the images are downloaded, thus giving the appearance of a slow load on the browser that is holding off.
 
thanks!

Wow thanks for all of the quick response. Unfortunately I won't be able to get more details until I go over to his office tomorrow.

As far as the network is concerned, i know:
1. i'll have to check
2. yes-same wire
3. we are both using safari
4. no i have not, i just know that if i go to cnn.com or any site, it can take up to 20 minutes to load.

I will get more info, and feel free to ask more specific questions. and once again, you guys are AWESOME!
 
Check DNS

It seems like I've been seeing a lot of reports of slow network performance that have been caused by DNS. For some reason a lot of DSL/Cable modems/routers don't hand out real DNS server IP addresses, and instead depend on the user's computer to broadcast their DNS queries. On the Mac you'll see this as an empty DNS Servers setting in the TCP/IP section of your Network Preferences. If you can find the IP addresses of some real DNS servers (or at least one), try putting it/them in there and see if that helps.

Good luck!
 
janitorC7 said:
Use open DNS http://opendns.com

its better as far as a DNS server goes
Click to expand...

You can also sometimes get the DNS server information either from your ISP's Support and/or FAQ page(es), or even from the Status page of the web interface for your home cable/DSL router. It can sometimes be better to use your ISP's DNS server(s) because they can be more responsive since they're on the ISP's network. This isn't always the case, so you can try other servers, but you might want to try the ISP servers if you can determine the correct address(es).

HTH
 
great

thanks guys. im going to upgrade the one machine to 10.4 and hopefully that will resolve the network issues. As far as the 'virus' problem, i think it has something to do with office and the use of macros. when i open the documents on the machine, it asks me if i want to disable or allow the macros to play out.

when i send emailed attachments which are in question to my gmail account, gmail in fact reports that the attachments had to be 'cleaned'.

thanks again
 
try doing a trace route with both computers and see if they're going through the same route to get to an ip
 
once

once again, thank you everyone. as far as the network was concerned, i simply removed the dns addresses that were manually put in, and everything worked.

in regards to the 'virus' situation, im well aware of the fact that macs don't get viruses. i think it may have something to do with macros, because upon opening the document it displays warning messages.

some people i have talked to said it may be an office issue, and i may need to uninstall/reinstall.

does anyone know of a decent..preferably free..av for the mac?
 
CNU182 said:
once again, thank you everyone. as far as the network was concerned, i simply removed the dns addresses that were manually put in, and everything worked.

in regards to the 'virus' situation, im well aware of the fact that macs don't get viruses. i think it may have something to do with macros, because upon opening the document it displays warning messages.
some people i have talked to said it may be an office issue, and i may need to uninstall/reinstall.
does anyone know of a decent..preferably free..av for the mac?
Click to expand...
Previous posters who reply "aint no Mac viruses, fool" - shaddup and get a clue. The Mac can be a vector for any PC viruses without being infected itself and can happily be infected by any virus that expolits cross-platform languages and scripts like ... MS Office Macro language

OP: It is undoubtedly an Word Macro-virus issue. These are nasty. They infect the Normal template in Word Styles, which in turn infects every word document you open. You can trash the Normal template, but if you don't clean every Word doc on the machine, it will reinfect the Normal template and start the merry go round again.

MS Office uninstall and reinstall, and/or Archive and install OSX, will NOT solve the problem.

For starters, your friend may need to invest in an antivirus program that scans for and isolates macro viruses. As horrible as Norton products are on Macs, Norton Anti Virus DOES do this job. ClamXAV should as well, but I have seen a report where it did not.

The second step is to turn off Macros in MS products and enable Macro virus protection. Then you need to hunt down and disinfect all infected MS document files.

Instructions:

http://outlandishjosh.com/wp/index.php?p=861
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/291824/en-us

I caution you, if you do not disinfect EVERY MS document, then you will get reinfected again, and again...

Thanks
Trevor
CanadaRAM.com
 
CanadaRAM said:
Previous posters who reply "aint no Mac viruses, fool" - shaddup and get a clue. The Mac can be a vector for any PC viruses without being infected itself and can happily be infected by any virus that expolits cross-platform languages and scripts like ... MS Office Macro language

OP: It is undoubtedly an Word Macro-virus issue. These are nasty. They infect the Normal template in Word Styles, which in turn infects every word document you open. You can trash the Normal template, but if you don't clean every Word doc on the machine, it will reinfect the Normal template and start the merry go round again.

MS Office uninstall and reinstall, and/or Archive and install OSX, will NOT solve the problem.

For starters, your friend may need to invest in an antivirus program that scans for and isolates macro viruses. As horrible as Norton products are on Macs, Norton Anti Virus DOES do this job. ClamXAV should as well, but I have seen a report where it did not.

The second step is to turn off Macros in MS products and enable Macro virus protection. Then you need to hunt down and disinfect all infected MS document files.

Instructions:

http://outlandishjosh.com/wp/index.php?p=861
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/291824/en-us

I caution you, if you do not disinfect EVERY MS document, then you will get reinfected again, and again...

Thanks
Trevor
CanadaRAM.com
Click to expand...

Wow thank you so much! You are tremendously helpful.
 
Why were my posts deleted?

I had several posts on here about Mac OS X having about 20 viruses, and they are not here. I'd like to know why they were deleted? They weren't rude, I was simply pointing out, that yes there are viruses for OS X. I work in a computer store and people always say Macs don't get viruses and I would hate to see someone not have an Anti-Virus and then get a virus, that's all.
 
-emac82

That's a good question. Did a mod pull a trigger too quick?

I hadn't heard of these virii, and was asking you about them. Because to the best of my knowledge there aren't any "in the wild".
 
patrick0brien said:
-emac82

That's a good question. Did a mod pull a trigger too quick?

I hadn't heard of these virii, and was asking you about them. Because to the best of my knowledge there aren't any "in the wild".
Click to expand...

Oh, I don't have any links, and I'm too lazy to look for them, but I know that they are out there.

I thought you were making fun of me earlier lol...It's so hard to tell people's intentions, when we are writing stuff...Hard to sense sincerity, sarcasm..

:):):)

Hopefully we can find out why our posts were pulled!
 
-emac82

Hopefully, yes.

I am indeed interested in the virii, because that's major news if true. I know there were some virii for Classic, but I know of only the "proof of concept" virii - ones that only exist in labs for OS X. And I an honestly interested in knowing more.
 
patrick0brien said:
-emac82

Hopefully, yes.

I am indeed interested in the virii, because that's major news if true. I know there were some virii for Classic, but I know of only the "proof of concept" virii - ones that only exist in labs for OS X. And I an honestly interested in knowing more.
Click to expand...

I will see what I can find out for you. :)
 
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