So last weekend my sister came to me with a slow performing Windows 8.1 Acer laptop. She wanted me to format it and install a new copy of Windows 8.1.

I’ve been using Debian for the last 3 years. Previously I was dual booting between Windows and Debian in-order to play DOTA 2 with my friends, but since Valve released DOTA 2 on Linux, I’ve had little reason to open my Windows installation. As you’d expect I didn’t have a Windows 8.1 setup disc or ISO lying around. I debated whether to shift her to a clean KDE based Debian machine and she agreed as long as her desktop looked nice but I changed my mind when I saw the software she was using –

  1. Cyberlink PowerDirector Pro
  2. Cyberlink PhotoDirector
  3. Bunch of free games

I’m sure I’d be able to find alternatives for the above, but it’d be too much of a learning curve for her, plus setting up a KDE machine from scratch would take some time.

I decided to investigate the reason for slowness, and possibly fix the problem itself. Upon further discussion with her, I found out that the laptop was not only slow, but was infected with some sort of a malware. She was getting permission errors while opening certain folders, and a lot of the folders were hidden.

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