5 Fast Steps to Get Rid of Viruses From Your Laptop
If your laptop displays symptoms of a virus attack, such as slow performance or unusual pop-up error messages, it’s time to get rid of the virus before things get out of hand.
Some viruses can disable your laptop interface, delete your files, or even reformat your hard drives. Others like ransomware can lock your files and force you to pay ransom to access them.
In this short guide, we’ve provided you with five easy steps to remove viruses from your laptop.
Without delay, let’s dive in!
Steps To Get Rid of Viruses From Your Laptops
Step 1: Boot Laptop into Safe Mood
Enter the PC into Safe Mode by heading to Start Menu and Open Settings or press the Win + I on your keyboard.
- In Settings, head to Update & Security > Recovery
- Head to Advanced Startup and click Restart now
- Once the PC restarts, click Troubleshoot > Advanced Options
- Under Advanced Options, select StartUp Settings and hit Restart
After your PC restarts, choose Enable Safe Mode, and your laptop will start in safe mode. In safe mode, only the minimum required programs and services will load. If any virus is set to startup when Windows start, it will get blocked in safe mode.
Step 2: Clear Temporary Files
Before proceeding with the other steps, delete any temporary files. To achieve this, navigate to the Start Menu and find Disk Cleanup. After the search disk loads, select all temporary files and click OK.
Doing this will speed up the anti-virus software you will use in the next step. Also, it will clear any download files containing viruses.
Step 3: Download Anti-Virus Program
Only two variants of anti-virus programs can detect and get rid of computer viruses and malware. But keep in mind, no program can detect malware and its variants 100%.
- Real-time anti-virus: They regularly scan for malware in the background.
- On-demand Scanners: The user has to activate them manually when scanning the PC.
Today’s market is full of on-demand scanners you can download easily. A few examples include:
- Kaspersky Virus Removal Tool
- Malwarebytes
- Bitdefender Free Edition
Step 4: Removing the Infection
When scanning for viruses, it’s wise to use an on-demand scanner first. Follow up with real-time antivirus program. This increases your chance of identifying and removing the virus. Some of the on-demand programs can provide you with steps of removing the infection manually.
Step 5: Recover and Re-Install Damaged Files and Programs
Once the anti-virus completes scanning and removing the virus, you might need to re-install any programs and files that got compromised.
If you created backups, you can use them easily to restore the deleted files on Windows. Remember, it’s wise to back up your programs and files regularly.
Tips on How to Avoid Virus Attacks
Besides scanning your dell laptop for viruses and malicious software regularly, there are other measures you can take to prevent your laptop from getting compromised. These measures include:
- Update your anti-virus regularly-Cybercriminals create new viruses and malware all the time. So, it’s vital to keep your anti-virus program current to boost your protection.
- Create backups- Regularly back up your files to an external drive or cloud service or both. This way, you can prevent the loss of important information.
- Install the latest available software updates for windows.
- Don’t click malicious emails and pop-up messages claiming to have detected a problem with your laptop.
That marks the end of our guide. We hope virus attacks won’t give you headaches anymore, and you can now protect your dell laptop from potential attacks by following the aforementioned steps to get rid of viruses.