Black background with red text "Warning" with ! symbol appearing on DAW after startup???

It could be a virus Beep. If it has no instruction or other indication of what it is warning about I would try to seek out what it is. Do a search for it. I hope I am wrong.  

WTH? Now after doing a full shutdown and reboot it's gone. I was going to see if I could find it in the task manager. Dammit.

I was just poking around in there but I can't decipher any of that stuff. I'm running a full scan now to see if MSE finds something. If not I'll probably do a restore tomorrow. P*ss me off. I have no idea whether this is being throw up by a program, by my MOBO or if it's a virus. Totally weird.

 I see nothing about it doing a search.  It could simply be a program acting oddly. I would check your task manager, see whats running. I tried Google, Bing and Yahoo.  I found nothing.  

John
 I see nothing about it doing a search.  It could simply be a program acting oddly. I would check your task manager, see whats running. I tried Google, Bing and Yahoo.  I found nothing.  

It's gone now but now I'm paranoid. Tomorrow I will restore and possibly remove MSE and install Avast.

I wouldn't remove MSE.

Oh I'm not concerned about MSE interfering with my recording. I'm concerned that it is ineffective for preventing viruses if this is indeed a virus. I've been using Avast for years on my heavy duty internet machines and it has never let me down. I only installed MSE because it was getting good reviews and Cake support recommended it as an unobtrusive AV. If MSE let something through though with the very minimal stuff I do online on the DAW and all the other security precautions I take... well that's messed up. Just kind of miffed because I was trying to do something and now I'm all freaked out. Cheers.

The other really bizarre thing about this is how similar the colors are to the X2 scheme. I don't see how or why Sonar would give a warning like that. I'm almost thinking if it's a virus it somehow weaseled it's way into hiding itself as the most commonly used program on the system. Just figured if it was just some kind of Sonar thing someone here would recognize it.
 

This thread is getting a lot of views rather quickly. I wonder if this is a brand spanking new infection and people are googling the symptom and being lead to this thread.
 
When I said I wanted to be a trendsetter this is not what I meant.

The NSA client software had a bug which temporarily made itself visible.

 
I recommend never putting a DAW on the internet. Never.
 
I'm pretty picky about USB sticks too.
 
best regards,
mike

Hi, guys. I did a full scan last night with MSE and it didn't find anything. I'm about to do another full scan in Safe Mode because sometimes viruses can disable your AV at startup. I've been avoiding installing other AV programs like Spybot S&D or Malwarebytes because I wasn't sure how much they'd interfering with the system. I should probably toss CCleaner on their though because I don't think it really does anything until you start it and I may toss HiJackThis onto the system. Still though I think even after the scans (which I'm doing more out of curiosity) I'm going to restore the system to where it was a few weeks ago. I haven't installed any new programs since then so it won't really change anything (I hope). The only things I've been doing since that restore point was created was import my old album and do some audiosnap work on one of the tracks. Restore SHOULD leave that stuff in place though as it only restores the system settings but leaves the files intact. Going to double check that though and back up the project I was working on to my external drive. I already have all the other files from the album on that drive anyway so they are safe and the originals are still on my old computer.
 
@Mike... Hi. I usually don't put this system online but as I said I do use it to download stuff from Cakewalk and other supposedly trustworthy audio companies I've bought from. I do this because I keep the computer so isolated in general that it's probably safer than inputting/accessing my payment providers there instead of my heavy net surfing laptop. I'm all over the net with the lappy so there are more opportunities for nasties to get on even though I general don't have any apparent problems with it. Still I just don't do anything that involves personal info on it. Ideally I want to get a second laptop that I'll use exclusively for making payments and dealing with sensitive information. I've been considering maybe pulling out one of my old decrepit laptops and installing some version of Linux or maybe even creating a fully bootable CD which would make it impossible for viruses to get in. It's just really bad timing because I have some super important stuff to do right now that requires the system to be secure. Total PITA.
 
Cheers, guys. I'll let you know how the Safe Mode scan goes.

You know what... maybe this is a sign I should go ahead with a complete reinstall/config like I've been meaning to. hmmm...

dcumpian

2:43AM
Download and run CCleaner.
Check installed programs for fishy and unfamiliar stuff. Uninstall them if found.
Download and run Malwarebytes (excellent program).
Run MSE scan.
 
I think Avast kinda sucks, but just my opinion. It let in a virus on me a few years back.

Avast seriously impacts your PC. Stick with MSE for your DAW. If you want to install Avast just for a scan, like nuking from orbit, that's cool, but I would uninstall it after that.
 
Regards,
Dan
 

Even with automatic definition downloads disabled? I've found Avast doesn't interfere with my laptop at all and it is far less powerful than my DAW... mind you I'm not doing audio on it... yet. Back when I was still using my old severely outdated and underpowered XP laptops the only time it would cause a lag was during the definition updates (it would make web pages hang before loading) but aside from that it was pretty much unnoticeable and WAY better than AVG which was being used on the more powerful desktops where I used to use for work.
 
Either way I can still completely disable it when I'm offline which is most of the time. I like MSE because truly is unnoticeable unless it's nagging to be updated but I have always been a little wary of it in regards to security. It's so hard to tell how good an AV is until a problem arises which is rare for me because I try not to scrape the underbelly of the internet and block pretty much everything while I'm surfing. I don't even allow main domains load unless it's a) a site I trust and b) I absolutely need to get at the info. Noscript is really eye opening when you look at all the crap webpages are trying to load.
 
Another note on Avast... there are settings that can be changed which allow it to "phone home" with system data. These little chats going on in the background can sap resources and serve no real useful purpose to the user. There is a bunch of other new stuff in Avast that is related to data collection and/or allowing certain things through if they come from "trusted" places which usually means those companies bribed the AV maker. Noscript and ABP+ have also hopped on board with this type of thing as I'm sure others have too. Anytime I install fresh or see a new version update has happened for any security programs I always go into the settings to see if they weaseled something in there. Those things are usually turned on by default and it's annoying... but hey, it's free so what can ya do?
 
Cheers.

djtrailmixxx
It sounds like an error I saw related to my UAD stuff, do you have any UAD hardware?

I'm not familiar with them but no hardware aside from my Focusrite interface, M-Audio keyboard controller (Oxygen 25) and my Korg padKontrol. Unless maybe there is some kind of partnership there. I also see they put out plugins. Has Cake included any of their stuff in the program or through the promos?
 
Also after wrangling with the fancy point and click BIOS utility of my ASUS MOBO I realize that the warning kind of has the same background color. I looked through the manual and can't find any pictures of it but it is kind of reinforcing my theory that the MOBO is trying to tell me something. Maybe last time I went online the ASUS utility thingy downloaded an update. I friggen hate that stupid program.