MS Office is damaged

[ScottInTexas]

My daughter's computer suffered that stupid virus that tells you you have an infected computer and pops up all sorts of windows to make you buy the fix. Well after hours of digging I killed it and got everything back to normal. I thought. When she goes to open a Word document (Office 2003) Word opens but an installer shows up on the screen and if you click OK to install the software a message saying the installation is damaged (msi). Since I bought the computer with everything pre-loaded I don't have the discs nor do I have product keys etc. How can I fix her computer and avoid buying Office again?

Dell Inspirion I6000
Windows XP Pro SP2

[vinyl-junkie]

Who did you buy the computer from? They should be able to help you reinstall Word, as well as furnish you with a product key. I would also ask them about how to reinstall anything else that came preloaded on the PC. You might need that information someday.

As a peripheral issue, you should really think about getting anti-virus software. Beats the heck out of going through this kind of problem again. It's not that expensive and so worth the investment.

[Apostropartheid]

Dell supply more discs with their computers than I could even imagine using. OS, drivers, and preinstalled software. Dig around in the box. If not, call Dell and they should have one shipped out for you.

[ScottInTexas]

I have anti virus running. This evil piece of trash uses a fake window that appears, to the unsuspecting user, to be a valid alert. The user clicks the yes button because she thinks that it really has detected a virus that needs to be removed. That installs a program and several files, inserts several entries in the registry and starts a process. It takes a long time and serious hunting to kill it. The first time I saw it was when a friend got it. She was using Norton. The second time was when my daughter got it. She is using Avanquest. It does not appear to be something the Norton, McAffee or Avanquest recognizes. If I could remember the name you can search for it and see all sorts of references on the web.

I don't know where the computer came from. My company buys several twice a year and they let us get in on the bulk deal. We just tell our IT guy we want one and what software we want. I'll have to check with them to see if I can find the point of origin.

[primefalcon]

I have anti virus running. This evil piece of trash uses a fake window that appears, to the unsuspecting user, to be a valid alert. The user clicks the yes button because she thinks that it really has detected a virus that needs to be removed. That installs a program and several files, inserts several entries in the registry and starts a process. It takes a long time and serious hunting to kill it. The first time I saw it was when a friend got it. She was using Norton. The second time was when my daughter got it. She is using Avanquest. It does not appear to be something the Norton, McAffee or Avanquest recognizes. If I could remember the name you can search for it and see all sorts of references on the web.

I don't know where the computer came from. My company buys several twice a year and they let us get in on the bulk deal. We just tell our IT guy we want one and what software we want. I'll have to check with them to see if I can find the point of origin.
Well you probably have another issue here too, the windows OS would be licensed to the company for company use, which means Microsoft may not offer any support to you as an individual, there may even be legal issues with the company not wiping windows without fully contacting Microsoft and transferring the licence to you, though I doubt they'd press charges against you but the company themselves might open themselves to litigation if the info gets back to MS

[ScottInTexas]

The computers are registered to us and come in the box with our name on it. Everything is legit and when we register our machines the we have a verification. As you know MS checks for proper licensing now. When I want to download a template, for example, the software checks my license first. It's just that my company may order 30 computers at a time and that saves us all some money.

[Apostropartheid]

Obtain a disc from your IT guys at work and write down the licence key you have currently (try a licence key sniffer or whatever they're called; they'll find it for you if you don't know it already.)