Viruses just need a small hole to creep into your computer. You cannot take computer bugs any lightly, because they may cause serious damage. Everyone knows how dangerous the computers buds are, but the more important thing is to understand how to get rid of them.
Not only the internal memory, these sneaky little viruses can also attack the external hard drives. And whenever we attach the external ones to the computer, the viruses spread everywhere.
The viruses damage your computer very slowly. Initially, they affect speed of the machine, followed by a few disrupted programs. Gradually, the virus makes life very problematic for the system and user. And eventually, the machine stops working one day or another.
It is always better to scan all your internal and external hard drives after every while. The antivirus software though puts pressure on the system, it is not as heavy as the virus. Cleaning your system regularly not only speedups your machine, but also extends its life. Scanning an external drive is not a tough thing to do.
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Computer Configuration Administrative Templates Windows Components Windows Defender Scan On the right side, double-click the Scan removable drives policy. Select the Enabled option. Open the Norton product Click Settings In the Computer Settings window, next to Computer Scans, click Configure. In the Scans window, click Create Custom Scan. In the Norton product scan wizard window, click Next. Click Add Folders and then select your external drive.
- Computer viruses and other types of malware don´t just affect your computer´s primary hard drive. They can also get into devices like flash drives or external hard drives if you´re not careful. You can use Avast Free Antivirus to perform a complete scan of your external hard drive in just a few moments.
- You have to access the anti-virus manually and then, set it up to scan the external hard drive. You can trigger the scanning by clicking some of the icons on your desktop. The actual scanning depends on the amount of data contained in your external hard drive. If it is loaded, you need to wait a bit longer.
Instructions
Install reputable antivirus software
First of all, you need to install a reputable antivirus. There are plenty of programs available on the web. In order to get more secured one, buy a CD and register yourself with the manufacturer. Update it and get the latest version. Norton Antivirus and Nod32 are the most used programs in this category.- 2
Connect External Hard Drive
After getting a reputable program, connect your external Hard Drive through USB or any other port. The new Hard Drives support USB connection.
Wait for the system to recognise your hard drive. The system will automatically come up with a message, saying that a new drive has been found. - 3
Run Virus Scan
Open your antivirus program, and run a complete scan. It may take plenty of time. To save time, you can make this procedure more specific.
Open ‘My Computer’, where you will find the icon of the recently-attached hard drive. Right-click on the drive, select the option that says ‘Scan Hard Drive’. The latest versions do offer this option; however, if you don’t find it, run scan for your entire machine, which is time consuming though. - 4
Open Hard Drive after scanning
Don’t ever open the external Hard Drive before scanning, because the virus will automatically creep into the other hard drives. Once the scanning is done, you are free to use your external hard drives.
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Q. I understand that scanning my system for malware and viruses is good for my main hard drive and operating system, but how do I scan external hard drives? I want to make sure that I am not rising infection from a thumb drive or other external storage.
A. It's true that antivirus and antimalware apps typically scan your primary hard drive as part of their protection. This is because harmful software generally finds its way on to a computer through downloading if from email or a website and installing it, even though that's often done inadvertently.
And while that is the most common vector, virus and other malware can come from external drives.
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There are malicious programs that will attach themselves to a USB drive and will jump from that drive to any system it is attached to.
In many cases, a good antivirus program will detect this and block it. But not always.
If you are uncertain about the safety of an external storage device, you can force a scan of the drive and all of the files it contains.
To do this, open up Windows Explorer and right click the device. If you have a good antivirus application installed, it should give you the option to scan it.
If you do not have that option, most antivirus and antimalware applications have advanced scanning options that will allow you to kick off a manual scan. Check your application documentation for details.
As an example, Malwarebytes offers the option of right clicking a drive, folder or file in File Explorer and scanning it. The app also has custom scanning options in the app itself.
Q. I use Microsoft Office apps like Word and Excel all of the time. Both applications have been freezing and crashing with greater. Is there anything I can do to make the programs run more reliably?
A. Generally speaking, when an application starts to misbehave, one of the most effective options for resolution is to just uninstall the program, reboot and then reinstall. This fix has been a real lifesaver for me on more occasions than I can count.
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But with Office there's another option to try before taking this route and that is to use the built-in repair tool.
To access this, close any open Microsoft Office applications and then open the Control Panel.
Look for Add/Remove Programs and open that up and find Microsoft Office and highlight it.
How To Scan External Hard Drive For Virus Windows 7
When you do that, you will see an option at the top of the window that says Repair. Click on that to start the process. This tool can really work wonders on a problematic install of Microsoft Office.
Scan F Drive For Virus
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