Video Game Emulator - Possible Malware?

[ColecoFan1981]

Having spent several hundred dollars to a thousand on my computer to rid itself of malware, and not wanting to risk going through all of that again, I am posting to you this question (is this part of the forum appropriate for this thread? If not, then please move it):

Are any video game emulators out there potential malware? My local computer repairman, James, tells me that video game emulators may really be malware, along with the ROMs, and that his advice, at least for now, is only for I to stop downloading these programs.

I had recently checked both EmuParadise and FCEUX using the Google Safe Browsing diagnostic, and it tells me that the former site had hosted some potential malware but the latter site checked out as OK (no malware found in last 90 days).

Thank you,



Ben

[ACiD]

Not trying to be authoritarian, but I would highly advise against posting sites that link to Roms, it's usually taboo. Please edit your post from that link existing.

Most Emulators are not infected. Roms stand for Read Only Memory, they're not capable of executing code.

An Emulator Imitates an architecture so it can only execute what the Read Only Memory has. An Emulator could possibly be infected, but the chances of that happening are usually people who would download the Emulator from an unofficial source that the Developers website is not affiliated with. Stick with Open Source emulators too, they're usually more advanced and everyone has access to overview the code to ensure there's no foul play. Also, if you can compile it yourself.

I would suggest you familiarize yourself with Checksums and do some further research into this particular hobby. For the most part, your repair dude is incompetent and is ripping you off. It should not have cost you several hundred and not even close to a thousand to have malicious content removed from your computer.

A rough ballpark figure would be around $50 USD or so to ghost all your data onto the repair dudes hard drives, then reinstall windows (if that's your operating system) and then put the data back on. Should have only cost between $120.00 - $150.00 USD. Do not go back to this thief!

[bb_hood]

Your best bet is just to get the roms and emulator off a torrent. You can usually get the all the roms and the emulator in a single file, downloading roms off web sites is a waste of time. You will probably encounter more malware downloading off random sites anyway.