Popup Keeps Coming Up Even With Popstopper!!

zeppelin5000 · #1 10-16-2003, 09:19 PM

Hey everyone i'm new here. I just got the popup stopper companion, and for some reason, as odd as this may sound, this one popup keeps poping up at a certain time of the day, at around 9pm. I get no popups what so ever during the day or in the morning, but then at night, this box constantly pops up. Its a blank box, but at the top the site on it is www.sandboxer.com....it's some type of online gaming site. It is somehow slipping through my blocker between like 9pm and sometime into the night. It sounds weird , I know, but thats how it seems! And sometimes other ads come with it that wouldn't normally come through. Its very annoying......and it sometimes freezes on my screen and disrupts my computer. How is it coming through?? I have ad-aware 6 and have run it a few times and it cleans out all bad files. It has said though, that some files couldn't be removed. Should I run it in safe mode and try to delete those files?? Do you guys think its one of those files that wouldn't delete? I've also ran a virus scan..... everythings fine. Please help if any of you know what this may be, or if you too are having the same problem.

ESALADUANE · #2 10-17-2003, 08:46 AM

If you're using McAfee VirusScan, then see here (McAfee uses the name "Adware-MemWatcher):
http://vil.nai.com/vil/content/v_100635.htm

If not, SpywareInfo Forums has a thread on "sandboxer".

cX_GX · #3 10-25-2003, 11:26 PM

For stopping popups, I recommend updating your "hosts" file to null route several hundred known adspam sites. (ad.doubleclick.com) like that so they don't even load. the hosts file is like a dns server on your computer that it checks before the isp's dns server. It is in plain text and you can view it, edit, add,delete sites to your liking. If you point the site to 127.0.0.1 then it searches your own computer for the ad, it cant find it, and gives up with an X for an image. Popups still appear but nothing will load. A program called E-Dexter (search google for it) will have a small benign graphic instead of just an "X" and resolves some of the problems with sites such as yahoo that have "http://rd.yahoo**http"://www.yahoo.com/whatever" which the site wouldn't load (rd.yahoo is considered an adspam site.) unless you took out the ad part from the address bar, e-dexter fixes most of the well-known sites automatically. For a good hosts file, I recommend getting a copy of kazaa lite 2.0.0 and follow their instructions for installing just the host file. it resides in the c:\windows\system\somewhere. I have used this constantly and it is a BIG difference in popup spam. Another debugging note that took me a long time to figure out is if you wish to run a webserver on port 80, you have to disable E-dexter for the time being since it is essentially listening on port 80 already.

I hope that helps your quest on ad nerfing

DonWyatt · #4 12-19-2003, 08:52 PM

I’ve had several customers in the last couple of months that had the same problem.
Some other symptoms that went with it are: MSOffice documents open very slowly, such as MS Word or Excel.
The cause was that in nearly every case, the customer had installed an ad supported freeware called Memory Watcher. This software will defeat popupstopper software and render it useless.
To fix the problem go into your add/remove programs area and remove Memory Watcher or any ad supported freeware that is installed. Then uninstall and reinstall you popupstopper software.
Good Luck,
Don Wyatt
Celestial Data Systems

defaulk · #5 12-20-2003, 08:52 AM

Don't know if you've solved your problem yet or not, but here's another possibility. It could be the messenger popups that Windows XP has enabled by default. This is most likely the case if your computer is not behind a firewall.

Anyway, you can always disable the windows Messenger service. (This is not the same thing as Windows Messenger or MSN Messenger) To do that, you go Start > Run, Type "services.msc" which will bring up a list of services on your machine. Find the Messenger item in the list, double-click it, and set the startup type to Manual or disabled. Right click on it and go to All Tasks > Stop to then stop it for good.

ESALADUANE · #6 12-29-2003, 10:46 AM

If you want Opera, you can get it in either a free or paid version (no ad banner) directly from their site.

http://www.opera.com/

GaryDave · #7 12-30-2003, 10:30 PM

Don't know if anyone's mentioned this yet...But try downloading the Google Taskbar, it's a well handy thing to have around, and does an excellent job at blocking pop-ups, i've had it for a few weeks, and it's blocked over 300 pop ups.

Hope i helped.

ESALADUANE · #8 12-31-2003, 08:47 AM

I agree. IE used to be the only popular browser around that didn't have a pop-up stopper. Now, if you download the new Google Toolbar, you can have a pop-up stopper on any browser you use.

hattop · #9 01-03-2004, 01:58 AM

i went to download.com and downloaded ad muncher. it is a free try and so far it blocks all adds plus adds on web pages . i will buy it after free trial ends its been that good. Worth a try if you hate them pop ups as much as i do.